A store offers 32 different flavors of ice cream. You ask your friend to stop and get two different types of ice cream. What is the probability of your friend s

Question

what is the probability of selecting chocolate and vanilla from 32 different flavors of ice cream?

 

Answer 1

Since it doesn't matter which of you gets which flavor, there are 2 ways to meet this outcome of chocolate and vanilla (CV or VC). 

 

The first person to pick has 32 flavors to pick from while the second person only has 31 (since they need to pick a different flavor).  Therefore there are 32 x 31 or 992 different flavor pairings.

 

The probability would then be 2/992 = 1/496.