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Mathematics Help to calculate the probabilities!, challenging question

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bgeh
post Jul 15 2009, 11:54 AM

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QUOTE(darkwall @ Jul 15 2009, 10:49 AM)
Those favoured are not necessarily to get into top 3. The top 3 may be all non-favoured, also can be all favoured, of course can be 2 favoured and 1 non-favoured, 1 favoured and 2 non-favoured.
The highest prob for a favourite pig to win also can be out of top 3 and at the same time other favourite pigs get into top 3.
So, is there the probability for favourite pig to win still needed? rclxub.gif  rclxub.gif  icon_question.gif  icon_question.gif
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Yes you need to, else it'll be a 15-variable problem which would be a pain in the arse (algebraically) to solve
bgeh
post Jul 15 2009, 01:20 PM

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I'll provide the steps:

Firstly get all the listed probabilities of the pigs to win

Secondly, to simplify the calculation, we assume indepedence of each pig's performance in the race to all its contemporaries. Compute the probabilities of every possible combination that gives you either an even or odd number (which will be very very very long)
bgeh
post Jul 15 2009, 01:32 PM

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QUOTE(darkwall @ Jul 15 2009, 01:29 PM)
there are 455 combinations rclxub.gif  rclxub.gif
do we nid the permutation? if yes, 2730 combinations rclxub.gif  rclxub.gif
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Yes permutations, because clearly pig no. 1 and pig no. 3 getting first and third respectively is different from third and first respectively.

But you've listed down the probabilities for a top 3 finish instead, which may help to simplify things further
bgeh
post Jul 15 2009, 01:49 PM

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QUOTE(wKkaY @ Jul 15 2009, 01:37 PM)
If this is like most toy problems, it shouldn't be a 15-variable problem. Assuming that pigs within the same class have same probability of winning, then there's only one variable involved - the bias in favor of the strong pigs vs the weak pigs.

The problem can be simplified by classifying the pigs into {Strong,Weak} x {Odd,Even}. And the top three positions as {Even,Odd} x {Even,Odd} x {Even, Odd} - pick only the outcomes that result in an even sum.

Then the rest of the problem can be solved with a probability tree. Okay, that would be how i'd do it coz i'm stupid - but it will work! tongue.gif
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That's right, except that he's weighted each strong pig with different probabilities, which makes it more of a pain instead

Edit: I forgot an added simplification step:

Suppose pigs 1, 3, 5 get the top 3 positions. We don't really care about the arrangement of the other 12 pigs thereafter, so we can compute the number of possible permutations with pigs 1, 3, 5 being in the top 3 to be 12! * 3! (3! for the various arrangements of pigs 1, 3, 5)

This post has been edited by bgeh: Jul 15 2009, 02:00 PM

 

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