(Counting & Probability) The Counting Principles, Permutation, and Combination

Multiplication Principle

• If procedure $A$ has $a$ distinct outcomes, and another procedue $B$ has $b$ distinct outcomes (by “another”, we essentially mean these two procedure are not related in any ways), then the procedure $AB$ (do $A$, then $B$, or vice versa as $A,B$ are not related) has $ab(=ba)$ distinct outcomes.
• Generally, a procedure $A=A_1....A_n$, composed by a series of sub-procedures $A_1,...,A_n$ with $a_1,...,a_n$ outcomes respectively, has ${\prod }_{i=1}^n{a}_i$ outcomes.

Coin Toss

• Toss a fair coin for $4$ times, how many possible outcomes?
• Sol
  • $2^4$ because each tossing has $2$ outcomes, and we repeat it for $4$ times.

$nPn$

• Fill $n$ positions (their “physical locations” are fixed) with $n$ distinct objects; each position must take one and only one object. How many possible ways? (This is abbreviated as $nPn$)
• Sol
  • The procedure of filling these $n$ positions can be decomposed into the following series of sub-procedures:
    • The first position can be filled in $n$ distinct ways.
    • The second position thus can be filled in $n-1$ distinct ways.
    • …
    • The last position has only $1$ way to be filled, given the previous $n-1$ positions being filled already.
  • Thus, by multiplication principle, we get $n!$ many ways to fill the positions.

$nPr$

• Fill $r$ positions with $n$ distinct objects; $r\le n$ (This is abbreviated as $nPr$).
• Sol
  • The procedure of filling these $r$ positions can be decomposed into the following series of sub-procedures:
    • The first position can be filled in $n$ distinct ways.
    • The second position thus can be filled in $n-1$ distinct ways.
    • …
    • The last position has $n-(r-1)$ ways to be filled, given the previous $(r-1)$ positions being filled already.
  • Thus, Thus, by multiplication principle, we get $\frac{n!}{(n-r)!}$ many ways to fill the positions.

$nCr$

• Choose $r$ objects from $n$ distinct objects, $r\le n$.
• Sol:
  • For each combination of $r$ objects in $nCr$, it corresponds to $r!$ different permutations by the multiplication principle.
  • Therefore, KaTeX parse error: Undefined control sequence: \codot at position 7: nPr=r!\̲c̲o̲d̲o̲t̲ ̲nCr.
  • Thus, $nCr=\frac{n!}{(n-r)!r!}$

$nCr=nCn-r$

• Out of $n$ objects, whenever we choose $r$ objects, we are also choosing the rest $n-r$ objects, so this identity holds.

More Coin Toss Problem

• Toss a coin $5$ times. What is the number of situations where exactly $2$ heads and $3$ tails appear?
• Sol
  • Choose $2$ to be head, and the rest are automatically tails because that’s the only other possibility. Thus, we have $5C2=\frac{5!}{2!3!}=10$.

Permutation With Repetation

• We have $5$ different letters, and with repetation of letters allowed, how many distinct words of length $3$ can we write? What if repetation is not allowed? What if we just choose $3$ letters with repetation allowed, how many distinct combinations will we get?
• Sol
  • $5\cdot 5\cdot 5$ with repetation (this works in the same way tossing a coin $3$ times works, but instead of head and tail, which are two different objects, we now have $5$ different objects)
  • $5P3$ because repetation is now forbidden.
  • The last situation:
    • three distinct letters: $5C3$
    • two repeated letters (so two distinct letters are picked into forming the word): $5C2$
    • three repeated letters: $5C1$
    • The sum will be the answer.

Multiplication principle of probability

• This is essentially the exact definition of multiple events being mutually independent.
• Suppose there are two events: $A$ and $B$. The probability that $A$ happens is $p_A$; the probability that $B$ happens is $p_B$.
• Then if $A$ and $B$ are independent events; that is, by the defintion of two events being independnent, $P(A\cap B)=P(A)\cdot P(B)$ (intuitively, independence means the occurence of one event does not affect the likelyhood of the other, which means $P(A|B)=\frac{P(A\cap B)}{B}=P(A)⟹P(A\cap B)=P(A)P(B)$). This is the multiplication principle for probability.
• It actually fits the notion of the multiplication principle in counting pretty well: $A\cap B$ just means that $A$ happens first and then $B$ happens (or vice versa, as they are independent events), so we essentially have to achieve the event $A\cap B$ using a sequence of events: $A,B$.
• If $A_1,...,A_n$ are mutually independent events (that is, they are pairwise independent, and $P(A_1\cap ...\cap A_N)={\prod }_{i}P(A_i)$), then $P(A_1\cap ...\cap A_N)={\prod }_{i}P(A_i)$.

Addition Principle

• If we have $A$ number of ways of doing something and $B$ number of ways of doing another thing and we can not do both at the same time, then there are $A+B$ ways to choose one of the actions

Inclusion-Exclusion Principle

• $|A\cup B|=|A|+|B|-|A\cap B|$