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On a shelf there are 60 novels and 20 poetry books. What is the probability that Person A chooses a novel and walks away with it and then Person B walks up shortly after and picks another novel?

22) On a shelf there are 6060 novels and 2020 poetry books. What is the probability that Person A chooses a novel and walks away with it and then Person B walks up shortly after and picks another novel?

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Q. 22) On a shelf there are 6060 novels and 2020 poetry books. What is the probability that Person A chooses a novel and walks away with it and then Person B walks up shortly after and picks another novel?
  1. Calculate Probability Person A: First, we need to determine the probability that Person A chooses a novel. There are 6060 novels and 2020 poetry books, making a total of 8080 books on the shelf. The probability that Person A picks a novel is the number of novels divided by the total number of books.\newlineCalculation: Probability of Person A choosing a novel = Number of novels / Total number of books = 60/(60+20)=60/80=3/460 / (60 + 20) = 60 / 80 = 3 / 4
  2. Calculate Probability Person B: Next, we need to calculate the probability that Person B chooses a novel after Person A has already taken one. Now there are 5959 novels and still 2020 poetry books, so the total number of books is 7979. The probability that Person B picks a novel is the number of remaining novels divided by the new total number of books.\newlineCalculation: Probability of Person B choosing a novel = Number of remaining novels / New total number of books = 5959+20\frac{59}{59 + 20} = 5979\frac{59}{79}
  3. Find Overall Probability: To find the overall probability of both events happening (Person A and Person B both choosing novels), we multiply the probabilities of each event.\newlineCalculation: Overall probability = Probability of Person A choosing a novel ×\times Probability of Person B choosing a novel = (34)×(5979)(\frac{3}{4}) \times (\frac{59}{79})
  4. Perform Final Multiplication: Now we perform the multiplication to find the final probability.\newlineCalculation: Overall probability = (34)×(5979)=177316(\frac{3}{4}) \times (\frac{59}{79}) = \frac{177}{316}

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