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aspen41
Sep 24, 2006, 06:06 PM
The question is: Suppose you deal 3 cards from a regular deck of 52 cards. What is the probability they will all be jacks?

My thinking was this: 4/52 + 3/51 + 2/50 (because the first draw holds the chance of drawing 1 of 4 jacks from 52 cards, the 2nd draw 3/51, the third draw 2/50... ) but I got a really high number: 971/5525 or about 18%. I'm really thrown by this answer because it seems really high.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

s_cianci
Oct 1, 2006, 02:55 PM
You should be multiplying the individual probabilities instead of adding them.