Complementary event

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Complementary event
In probability theory, the complement of any event A is the event [notA], i.e. the event that A does not occur. The
event A and its complement [notA] are mutually exclusive and exhaustive. Generally, there is only one event B such
that A and B are both mutually exclusive and exhaustive; that event is the complement of A. The complement of an
event A is usually denoted as , or .
Simple examples
A coin is flipped and one assumes it cannot land on its edge. It can either land on "heads" or on "tails" Because
these two events are complementary, we have
Three plastic balls are in a bag. One is blue and two are red. Assuming that each has an equal chance of being
pulled out of the bag,
Example of the utility of this concept
Suppose one throws an ordinary six-sided die eight times. What is the probability that one sees a "1" at least once?
It may be tempting to say that
Pr(["1" on 1st trial] or ["1" on second trial] or ... or ["1" on 8th trial])
= Pr("1" on 1st trial) + Pr("1" on second trial) + ... + P("1" on 8th trial)
= 1/6 + 1/6 + ... + 1/6.
= 8/6 = 1.3333... (...and this is clearly wrong.)
That cannot be right because a probability cannot be more than 1. The technique is wrong because the eight events
whose probabilities got added are not mutually exclusive.
Instead one may find the probability of the complementary event and subtract it from 1, thus:
Pr(at least one "1") = 1 Pr(no "1"s)
= 1 Pr([no "1" on 1st trial] and [no "1" on 2nd trial] and ... and [no "1" on 8th trial])
= 1 Pr(no "1" on 1st trail) Pr(no "1" on 2nd trial) ... Pr(no "1" on 8th trial)
= 1 (5/6) (5/6) ... (5/6)
= 1 (5/6)
8
= 0.7674...
Complementary event
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References
Robert R. Johnson, Patricia J. Kuby: Elementary Statistics. Cengage Learning 2007, ISBN 9780495383864, p.
229 ( restricted online copy
[1]
at Google Books)
External links
Complementary events
[2]
- (free) page from probability book of McGraw-Hill
References
[1] http:/ / books. google. com/ books?id=DWCAh7jWO98C& pg=PA229
[2] http:/ / highered. mcgraw-hill. com/ sites/ dl/ free/ 0072549076/ 79746/ ch04_p175. pdf
Article Sources and Contributors
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Article Sources and Contributors
Complementary event Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=488400241 Contributors: Call me Bubba, Cheeser1, Deathguy820220, Devin, Electron9, Grick, Happaballer12,
Kmhkmh, LeaveSleaves, ManoaChild, Materialscientist, Melcombe, Michael Hardy, PizzaMargherita, Squids and Chips, Zeldaoot, 24 anonymous edits
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