Question

Two baskets contain white balls and yellow balls. the first basket contains 2 white balls and 7 yellow balls and the second basket contains 3 white balls and 10 yellow balls. a ball is drawn at random from each basket. what is the probability that both balls are white?

Answer 1

The probability of the ball being white in the first basket is: 2/9

The probability of the ball being white in the second basket is: 3/13

Work:

First off, in basket 1, there are 9 balls in all, 2 of which are white, 7 of which are yellow. So, to find your denominator (If doing this in fraction form), you add up the number of balls. In this case, the first basket has 2 white balls and 7 yellows balls, so 2 + 7 = 9. To find your numerator (Which is the specified color ball probability), you just simply choose the number of balls it is asking for. In this question, it is asking for the probability of white balls in each basket. In basket one, there are 2 out of 11 balls in total. So, your answer would be that there are 2/11 white balls in basket 1.

I am not going to say this same process for the 2nd basket because it takes some time, but I hope this helps! :)