MATH STINGER #94

                by Dr. Joel C. Fowler
                Associate Professor of Mathematics

   
     This issue's puzzle involves probability.  Suppose that a
standard 52 card deck is randomly divided (not necessarily evenly)
among three people with no person receiving more than half the
deck.  The first person looks at his cards and remarks (correctly)
that when two different cards are drawn from his at random then the
probability that neither is a face card is exactly 1/2.  The second
looks at his cards and makes the same remark (again correctly). 
The puzzle is to determine that same probability for the third
person.  That is, what is the probability of getting two non-face
cards when drawing two different cards from the third person's
cards.
    

Stinger #93      Stinger #95

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