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Statistical probability questions and answer.
bpost
Member Posts: 32,669 ✭✭✭✭
(1) You are sitting at your desk, you are using a pen, pencil or sharpie. You drop said item, what is the probability the item will roll to the furthest area under the desk?
(2) You are working on your car, you drop the wrench it clatters to the floor, what is the probability it will bounce out to an area where it it easily retrieved?
(3) You are working on your car, you drop the wrench what is the probability the wrench falls into a easily seen and accessed area.
(4) You are working on a piece of equipment that has many, many bolts or nuts, what is the probability the last one will be frozen, rusted, cross threaded or have rounded corners that no wrench can fit?
ANSWERS: (1) 100% (2) 0% (3) 0% (4) 100%
Comments
Been there. Almost all the time!!
Murphy’s law.
What are the odds that when changing spark plugs on a vehicle the last one is the hardest to get to 🤬.
"Never do wrong to make a friend----or to keep one".....Robert E. Lee
Or the wrench or socket falls into the cars frame or some hidden space.
When I drop one I pray to hear the clink on the floor.
You drop the wrench under the hood and it must disappear or cease to exist because it is never seen again.
Or, you are working on a fore end stock that is vintage, in very good shape, valuable, and has been stripped and very lightly sanded and like a idiot you hit it with a short burst of air (against the grain of course) and out flies a chip next to the inletting, never to be found again. Looked inside snow blower, lawn tractor every piece of equipment in my garage and finally in utter desperation I moved everything in the damn double car garage onto my driveway. Still no missing chip!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ------------------------------------Ray
You can blame all that on that guy Murphy .......................
Friend has a auto salvage yard and several buckets of tools found in abandoned cars, many from places not accessible till teardown.
Working on something/anything and you drop a specific bolt. You spend an obscene amount of time crawling around looking for it under the machine and finally give up. A totally disinterested person takes a 2 second look at the machine and notices the bolt in plain sight on the frame of the machine. What's the chances of that?
Here is away to test Murphy’s Law. Take a quarter and drop it by your foot, it will land and stay by your foot 10 out of 10 times, but when dropped by accident it will go under something as sure as the sun will rise.
Yeah yeah yeah, blame the Irish. As to the op, 100% correct.
Yes, these can all be attributed to Murphy's law, who merely DEFINED the effect, and should not be BLAMED, per se, for it. The OTHER "postulator" who deserves mention is Orwell, who declared that Murphy was an optimist.
Washing machine goes out in mid May. !0 days later the fridge stops working. Closest appliance store is Reno, Nv. 110 miles away. They can deliver in 5-10 days. We drive up mountain to fill ice chests with snow until then. When fridge is delivered it is 2 (TWO) inches too tall to fit under cupboard. We cut cupboard. A few days later Wife says leak under sink. Call plumber. Can come out on Monday (3 days) all is well, faucet, pipes replaced and I am $351.05 poorer. Just the other day my check engine light came on. O'reilleys says it is my catalytic converter $$$$$$$. They sell me an additive that might correct the problem ($27) I will find out tomorrow.........if I don't have a flat tire on the way to town. And how was yer day???
What are the chances that the socket you drop and lose, is a 10mm , and it is the only one that you don't have a spare ???
Huh, you guys must be going to the wrong mechanic.
Oakie, You are 100% correct, you an have twenty 10MM sockets and within six months you will search for hours to find just one!
But on the brighter side elubsme - there is a brighter side isn't there?