Inception of Probability As Cicero once said, “Probability is the very guide of life” (www.mathcs.carleton.edu). Probability helps mathematicians and everyday people find out the chance of something occurring. An example would be if someone tossed a coin, their chances of landing a head are 50%. In math, something occurring is known as an event. Probability of an event can also be written as fraction, decimal, or in terms such as certain, most likely, equally likely, unlikely, or impossible For a decimal, it goes from 0 to 1, 0 being that there is no chance that it could occur and 1 being that it is certain to occur (Source:http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.prob.intro.html). One must always distinguish all the different possible outcomes of an event. Going back to the coin event, there were two possible outcomes, so the chance of landing heads is 50%, or 0.50. Landing heads and landing tails have the same chance, or probability, of happening. Probability is everywhere, such examples would be the chance of the sun rising from the east , the chance that a pen will run out of ink, even the chance of the world coming to an end tomorrow, are all examples of probability. The chance of the sun rising in the east is certain, the reason being that it does so every day. A pen running out of ink is unlikely, because it does not occur very often. There is absolutely no chance that the world will come to an end tomorrow, so the chances of that event occurring is impossible, or no chance.
Laws of Probability
One law of probability is conditional probability, which states “The conditional probability of an event B in relationship to an event A is the probability that event B occurs given that event A has already occurred.” (Source: www.mathgoodies.com). In other terms, this law states that one event, in this case event B, could not have occurred if another event, event A, did not occur. A case of this law would be if there are no bees, event A, the flowers cannot reproduce and there is no pollination, event B. The flowers are dependent on the bees to reproduce and for pollination to occur. Another case of this law is that a hydrogen atom and two oxygen atoms must chemically bond, event A, or else the solution, water, cannot form, event B. In both of these cases, event B is dependent on event A to occur. Another law, the Probability Law of Success states that, “When you are taking actions to increase your level of success what you are really doing is increasing the probability that you will succeed.” (Source:www.articledashboard.com). In other terms, this law states that even if one follows this law, one may still have an unsuccessful day but that if they keep taking these steps, over time they will greater success and less failure. The famous saying “Practice makes perfect” is the perfect example for this law. If one puts effort and hard work, they may still not get immediate gratification. But, if they continue to put effort in their work, it will pay off over time and they will achieve more in life than someone that did not put in any effort. Anyone can get lucky for a while, but luck alone will not make them successful.
Probability in Life
One of the most common types of probability is gambling. Poker, blackjack, the lottery, slot machines, and even bingo all are examples of probability in real life. All these games have one thing in common: they depend on probability. For example, the game of blackjack is driven off of chance; the aim of the game is to achieve a total card value of 21, winning the hand. Cards are passed out of a shuffled deck, making the game driven off chance. Normally, a player has a 40% chance of winning a particular hand, and in the long run, a chance of around 15% for making it out with a winning (Wikipedia.org) . However, probability can help tip the match into the players favor via counting cards. Counting cards, as popularized by numerous shows and movies, is a card game strategy used to