Every morning, my neighbor goes out walking. I observe that 20% of the time she walks with her beagle, 70% of the time she walks with her golden retriever, and 30% of the time she walks alone. If these events are all disjoint, is this an example of a valid probability distribution?

Question

Mathematics

Jasmine Wang

16 October, 22:12

Every morning, my neighbor goes out walking. I observe that 20% of the time she walks with her beagle, 70% of the time she walks with her golden retriever, and 30% of the time she walks alone. If these events are all disjoint, is this an example of a valid probability distribution?

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Gwendolyn Cross · Answer 1

No, This is not a valid Probability Distribution

Step-by-step explanation:

Probability [Neighbour walks with Beagle] = 20%

Probability [Neighbour walks with Golden Retriever] = 70%

Probability [Neighbour walks alone] = 30%

Disjoint Events are the events that have zero probability of occurring together. If all the three above items are disjoint, it means that it can never happen that two of them happen together.

The total (summed) probability of a valid probability distribution, with disjoint sets = 1. In given case, total probability = 0.2 + 0.7 + 0.3 = 1.2; i. e > 1.

So, this probability distribution with stated disjoint events is not a Valid Probability distribution.