10.

4 The fundamental counting principle EMCJZ

Mathematics began with counting. Initially, ngers, beans and buttons were used to
help with counting, but these are only practical for small numbers. What happens
when a large number of items must be counted?
This section focuses on how to use mathematical techniques to count different assort-
ments of items.
Introduction EMCK2
An important aspect of probability theory is the ability to determine the total number
of possible outcomes when multiple events are considered.
For example, what is the total number of possible outcomes when a die is rolled and
then a coin is tossed? The roll of a die has six possible outcomes (1; 2; 3; 4; 5 or 6)
and the toss of a coin, 2 outcomes (heads or tails). The sample space (total possible
outcomes) can be represented as follows:
S =

(1; H); (2; H); (3; H); (4; H); (5; H); (6; H);
(1; T); (2; T); (3; T); (4; T); (5; T); (6; T)

Therefore there are 12 possible outcomes.

The use of lists, tables and tree diagrams is only feasible for events with a few out-
comes. When the number of outcomes grows, it is not practical to list the different
possibilities and the fundamental counting principle is used instead.
DEFINITION: The fundamental counting principle
The fundamental counting principle states that if there are n(A) outcomes in event A
and n(B) outcomes in event B, then there are n(A) n(B) outcomes in event A and
event B combined.
If we apply this principle to our previous example, we can easily calculate the number
of possible outcomes by multiplying the number of possible die rolls with the number
of outcomes of tossing a coin: 6 2 = 12 outcomes. This allows us to formulate the
following:
If there n
1
possible outcomes for event A and n
2
outcomes for event B, then the total
possible number of outcomes for both events is n
1
n
2
This can be generalised to k events, where k is the number of events. The total number
of outcomes for k events is:
n
1
n
2
n
3
n
k
NOTE:
The order in which the experiments are done does not affect the total number of
possible outcomes.
425 Chapter 10. Probability