5 Probability

Probability assigns a number between 0 and 1 to a given event. The number represents the likelihood of this event occurring. To assign a probability to an event, we need to conduct an experiment which is a procedure to obtain outcomes, i.e., the results of an experiment. Suppose you want to know the probability of obtaining exactly seven heads from flipping a coin ten times. We will see later that you can easily calculate this probability but if you do not know how, you have to resort to an experiment. You have to flip a coin ten times and write down the number of heads you obtain. You then have to repeat this experiment multiple times. Each time you get one of eleven possible outcomes. If you conduct the experiment 1,000 times and 117 times the outcome is a 7, then you know the probability of obtaining seven heads from flipping a coin 10 times is around 11.7%.

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