Question

Ryan has $3$ red lava lamps and $3$ blue lava lamps. He arranges them in a row on a shelf randomly, then turns $3$ random lamps on. What is the probability that the leftmost lamp on the shelf is red, and the leftmost lamp which is turned on is also red

Answer 1

There are 6! = 720 ways of arranging the lamps.

If the leftmost lamp is red, there are 3 choices of lamp in the leftmost position, and the remaining 5 can be placed in any order, so there are 3×5! = 360 ways of arranging the lamps and the leftmost is red.

Hence there is a 360/720 = 1/2 probability that the leftmost lamp is red.

Ignoring lamp color for the moment, the probability of arranging 3 lit lamps and 3 unlit lamps is the same, 1/2.

Since Ryan arranges the lamps randomly by color, then turns 3 of them on randomly, the two events are independent. So

P(leftmost red AND leftmost lit) = P(red) × P(lit) = 1/2² = 1/4