Gordon G

Hat Trick POW

Problem: There is a box with five hats in it. Three hats are red and two are black. Three people are given
a hat but not told which color it is. They then stand in a line so that the person in the back can see the
person in the middle and the person in front, the person in the middle can see the person in front, and
the person in front cant see anyone. Our task was to find a way so that no matter what configuration of
hats we had, someone could always win. The second part of the problem was to state which person we
would rather be based on the probabilities of each person winning.
Process: I started with the first part of the problem by drawing a picture and making a chart of the
different combinations of hat colors to help me visualize the situation:
1

I started with the easiest question: when would the person in the
back know what color hat is on their head? Assuming that person 1 is
in the back and 3 is in the front, then person 1 could only be sure of
what color they had on in the situation in the third line. Person 1
would see two black hats and therefore know that they must have a
red hat, seeing as there are only two black hats. If person 1 didnt see
two black hats, then theyd have no way of knowing what color their
hat was, so they would say nothing. If person 1 said nothing, this would tell person 2 that their hat and
person 3s hats were not both black. Therefore, if person 2 saw that person 3 had a black hat, they
would know that their hat had to be red. If, however, they saw a red hat, then they wouldnt know
whether they had a red hat or a black hat since there are three red hats, so they would say nothing. So,
if person 3 hears that both person 1 and 2 say nothing, then they know that they must have a red hat.
R
R
R
B
B
R
B

R
R
B
B
R
B
R

R
B
B
R
B
R
R

For the second part, I started by thinking that there is only one situation in which person 1 would win, so
they have a 1/7th chance of winning. Person 2 could win in two situations, or 2/7ths chance of winning.
Person 3 would win the other 4/7ths of the time, giving them the best odds. This seemed obvious enough
at first, but not every combination is equally likely to occur, so the answer is slightly different. The
probabilities of each situation, in the same order as the above table are: 3/30, 6/30, 3/30, 6/30, 6/30,
3/30, and 3/30. To find what the probabilities of each person winning really are, I added the
probabilities of the arrangements that would let each person win. For example, to calculate the front
persons probability, I added 3/30, 3/30, 6/30, and 6/30 to get an 18/30ths chance of winning. The
middle person will win 9/30ths of the time, and the back person will win 3/30ths of the time.
Solution: The person in the back looks at the front two people and says red if he sees two blacks. If the
second person hears that he says nothing and sees a black in front of him, he says red. If he sees a red,
he says nothing, and the front person, hearing this, says red. Of the three, the person in front is twice
as likely to win as the middle person, and the middle person is three times more likely to win than the
back person, so I would want to be the front person.

Justification: I know that the first part of my answer is correct because it works in all of the seven
possible situations. To demonstrate, Ill pick a random one, say Black, Red, and Red. The back person
would say nothing because he doesnt see two black hats. The middle person knows that he and the
front person dont both have black hats, but because he sees a red hat in front of him, he doesnt know
if he has a red or black hat, so he says nothing. The front person, hearing that both the middle and back
people say nothing, knows that he has a red hat and therefore wins.
Im not as confident in the second part of my answer, but it makes logical sense that to find the
combined probability of any of several things occurring, you would add the probabilities of each of those
things occurring on its own. Im not completely sure that this is correct, but the answers do make sense
in context. For example, the most likely situations have a 6/30ths chance of occurring. If two of the
three most likely circumstances lead to the front person winning, it makes sense that they would have a
significantly higher chance of winning. This is what my numbers reflect, which is why I am fairly
confident in them.