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kristenc812 · Oct 9, 2008, 06:57 AM

I'm having trouble with this math problem. I have the answer, but I don't know how to get to the answer.

**In a New York State daily lottery game, a sequence of 5 digits (not necessarily different) in the range 0-9 are selected at random. Find the probability that all 5 are different.**

The answer is .3024. What is the process to get that answer? I'm having trouble because I don't know how to calculate it so that the numbers are different. Thanks in advance! :)

ISneezeFunny · Oct 9, 2008, 07:10 AM

__ __ __ __ __

five places.

in the first spot, you have out of 10 numbers (0 - 9) to choose from.

In the next spot, you now have 9 numbers to choose from, because the first one has taken one of the numbers.

In the next spot, you now have 8 numbers to choose from...

so on and so forth

10 * 9 * 8 * 7 * 6 = 30240 possible combinations.

kristenc812 · Oct 9, 2008, 07:15 AM

Thanks for the post, but I don't need to know how many combinations are possible, but I need to know what the probability is to choose 5 numbers, all of them different. Like I said in my original post, the correct answer is .3024 or 1/3 (13/43).

ISneezeFunny · Oct 9, 2008, 07:17 AM

... I was throwing you a bone.

we don't do your work for you, we help you along.

I just gave you how many different combinations are available.

So the next step would be to find out how many combinations TOTAL is available.

10*10*10*10*10 = 100000

now, 30240/100000 = ?

kristenc812 · Oct 9, 2008, 07:33 AM

Ok, thanks.. and I guess my second post came across wrong. I didn't mean for you to solve it.. I apologize if that's how it came across! I tend to over-think things and just assumed that the process was more complicated than it really was. Anyway, thanks for the help! Very valuable to this ADD brain of mine. :)