A meeting of the minds!

Twenty people at a convention are of different ages and have different names.

The following is true of four of the people:

  • Allen is older than Bob.
  • Bob is older than Carrie.
  • Bob is older than Dave.

If Edward is part of this convention, the probability that Dave is older than Edward is a b , \frac{a}{b}, where a a and b b are coprime positive integers.

What is a + b ? a+b?

Assume that for any particular age, each person has the same chance to be that age.


The answer is 13.

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9 solutions

Geoff Pilling
Oct 8, 2018

There are two possibilities for the order of A A through D D :

  • A > B > C > D A > B > C > D
  • A > B > D > C A > B > D > C

This gives 10 10 equiprobable possibilities for the order of A A through E E , since E E can fit in anywhere in either of the two scenarios above. (Five possible positions in each)

Only 3 3 result in D > E D>E . Namely E E being youngest in the first one, or E E being second or first youngest in the second one.

Therefore P ( D > E ) = 3 10 P(D>E) = \dfrac{3}{10}

3 + 10 = 13 3+10 = \boxed{13}

(The fact that there are 20 20 people is irrelevant)

Your Basic problem that was also posted this week is the perfect warm-up for this one. My solution is identical.

Jeremy Galvagni - 2 years, 8 months ago

I don't get why we don't consider the 20 people...Can someone give a clarification?

Prem Chebrolu - 2 years, 7 months ago

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We only need the relative positions of 5 people. Knowing, for example, that person F is between A and B changes nothing.

Jeremy Galvagni - 2 years, 7 months ago

Considering the other 15 people results in multiplying the numerator and the denominator of Geoff's solution by the same number.

Specifically, the number of ways to put the other 15 people in is as follows: 20C5 * 15! (The number of ways to pick slots for A, B, C, D, and E in the roster of 20) * (The number of arrangements in which the other 15 can be placed into the 15 remaining slots)

I must admit that I did not realize this fact when I solved the problem, so my solution was a bit more cumbersome.

Jake Deschamps - 2 years, 7 months ago

Since we're talking about 20 people, I believe you should concider the possibilities like in this example: P>K>A>S>H>F>B>L>T>D>G>I>M>C>J>N>O>R>Q Where E can fit in any of the 20 places. In this specific example there are 10 out of 20 possibilities where Dave would be older than Edward. Which leaves the question: how do we determine all the different possibilities and their specific situations where Dave is older than Edward? Would you still end up with 3/10?

chester mcchesterchest - 2 years, 7 months ago

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Yes. I believe you would!

Geoff Pilling - 2 years, 7 months ago

I think Chester Mcchesterchest is correct. No. of people does seem to matter. Imagine the people are arranged as per their decreasing ages from left to right. Then B can occupy any position from 2nd (from left, to allow A to her left) to 17th (from left, to allow C and D to her right). Calculating the desirable possible arrangement (i.e., D older than E) and the sum total possible arrangements with B in position 2 to 17, I get a different value depending on the total number of people. For n (no. of people) = 6 , the p (D > E) = 3/10 (answer same as 13). But for case n = 7 the p (D > E) = 17 / 56 (= 0.3036 ). And for n = 20, I got, p ( D > E) = 22,331 / 55, 290 = 0.404 !

NARAYAN RAMANATHAN - 2 years, 7 months ago

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I believe it should be 3/10 no matter how many people you have. If you can show your calculations I'd be happy to take a look.

Geoff Pilling - 2 years, 7 months ago

Why is there being twenty people irrelevant? Why is it necessary to consider C? I thought it was only necessary to consider A > B > D among the twenty people.

Kermit Rose - 2 years, 5 months ago

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Well the answer is the same whether you are talking about 20 people, 100 people, or a million people.

Geoff Pilling - 2 years, 5 months ago
Jing Jie
Oct 15, 2018

10 possibilities: 1)ABCDE 2)ABDCE 3)ABCED 4)ABDEC 5)ABECD 6)ABEDC 7)AEBCD 8)AEBDC 9)EABCD 10)EABDC and only 1),2) and 4), is D older than E, therefore having a probability of 3/10

Why did tge solution not consider the cases when two or more people have the same age

Vaibhav Pachaulee - 2 years, 7 months ago

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The problem states: "Twenty people at a convention are of different ages..."

John Rasor - 2 years, 7 months ago
Manifold M
Oct 19, 2018

Using the given information, there are two possibilities: A > B > C > D A > B > C > D Or A > B > D > C A > B > D > C Let (1) denote the first case, and (2) the second. Assuming (1) does happen, we observe that adding Edward gives us five different possibilities. Because we need to save the relation between the four people. Though only 1 gives us the scenario where D > E. Meaning the probability is 1 5 \frac{1}{5} . Doing the same for the second case, we get the probability of 2 5 \frac{2}{5} . So the total probability is: 1 2 1 5 + 1 2 2 5 = 3 10 \frac{1}{2} * \frac{1}{5} + \frac{1}{2} * \frac{2}{5} = \frac{3}{10}

Thanks, great explanation

אילנה r - 2 years, 7 months ago
Parth Sankhe
Oct 9, 2018

Only 3 (abcde, abdce, abdec) out of the 5! possible combinations of the 5 people satisfy the requirements, out of the 2 (abcd, abdc) out of 4! already given. Thus, 3/120 ÷ 2/24 = 3/10

Are we assuming equiprobabble case. Where all orders are equally likely.

Srikanth Tupurani - 2 years, 8 months ago

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Yes, all orders are equally likely

Parth Sankhe - 2 years, 8 months ago
Brian Lamptey
Oct 20, 2018

Since this is probability, we can ignore all other people and focus on the five mentioned in the question because each permutation of them appears in an equal number of permutation of all the people.

So before we include Edward, if we organize them in order of age there are two possibilities: A B C D ABCD and A B C D ABCD .

E E has five possible locations to be added in each of these, providing a total of 10 10 possibilities. The only three where David is older are:

A B C D E ABCDE , A B D E C ABDEC and A B D C E ABDCE .

So the probability of David being older will be 3 10 \frac {3}{10} . 3 3 and 10 10 are coprime, so:

3 + 10 = 13 3+10=\boxed {13}

Justin Freeman
Oct 19, 2018

The total number is irrelevant; we only care that there are five named people. The probability that someone other than Edward (call this person Allen) is oldest is 4 5 \frac{4}{5} . The probability that someone other than Edward is next oldest (call them Bob) is 3 4 \frac{3}{4} . Carrie's age relative to Edward's is unknown and therefore irrelevant, but there is a 1 2 \frac{1}{2} probability that Dave is older than Edward. 4 5 × 3 4 × 1 2 = 12 40 = 3 10 \frac{4}{5}\times\frac{3}{4}\times\frac{1}{2} = \frac{12}{40} = \frac{3}{10}

I didn't get why we don't consider the 20 people?

Prem Chebrolu - 2 years, 7 months ago
流布 宿
Oct 18, 2018

( 3×(20!/5!) ) / ( 2×(20!/4!) ) =3/10

I guessed it. Stop reading this. (By the way, this is just a joke comment)

Paul Evans
Oct 18, 2018

Brute force python:

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from itertools import permutations as perm

l = [] 
conf = perm(range(20),5)
for a,b,c,d,e in conf:
    if a > b and b > c and b > d:
        l.append((a,b,c,d,e))
m = len(l)  

n = 0
for _,_,_,d,e in l:                          
    if d > e:
        n += 1

a, b = n, m
while a:
    a, b = b % a, a
print(n//b + m//b) 

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