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A high rectangle of width 2 is open from above, and the L-shaped domino falls inside it in a random way (see the figure).

a) \(k\) \(L\)-shaped dominoes have fallen. Find the mathematical expectation of the height of the resulting polygon.

b) \(7\) \(G\)-shaped dominoes fell inside the rectangle. Find the probability that the resulting figure will have a height of 12.

Investigating one case, the investigator John Smith discovered that the key witness is the one from the Richardson family who, on that fateful day, came home before the others. The investigation revealed the following facts.

1. The neighbour Maria Ramsden, wanting to borrow some salt from the Richardson’s, rang their doorbell, but no one opened the door. At what time though? Who knows? It was already dark...

2. Jill Richardson came home in the evening and found both children in the kitchen, and her husband was on the sofa – he had a headache.

3. The husband, Anthony Richardson, declared that, when he came home, immediately sat down on the sofa and had a nap. He did not see anyone, nor did he hear anything, and the neighbour definitely did not come – the doorbell would have woken him up.

4. The daughter, Sophie, said that when she returned home, she immediately went to her room, and she does not know anything about her father, however, in the hallway, as always, she stumbled on Dan’s shoes.

5. Dan does not remember when he came home. He also did not see his father, but he did hear how Sophie got angry about his shoes.

“Aha,” thought John Smith. “What is the likelihood that Dan returned home before his father?”.

Every Friday ten gentlemen come to the club, and each one gives the doorman his hat. Each hat is just right for its owner, but there are no two identical hats. The gentlemen leave one by one in a random order.

Seeing off the next gentleman, the club’s doorman tries to put the first hat that he grabs on the gentleman’s head. If it fits (not necessarily perfectly), the gentleman leaves with that hat. If it is too small, the doorman tries the next random hat from the remaining ones. If all of the remaining hats turned out to be too small, the doorman says to the poor fellow: “Sir, you do not have a hat today,” and the gentleman goes home with his head uncovered. Find the probability that next Friday the doorman will not have a single hat.

Two hockey teams of the same strength agreed that they will play until the total score reaches 10. Find the mathematical expectation of the number of times when there is a draw.

Chess board fields are numbered in rows from top to bottom by the numbers from 1 to 64. 6 rooks are randomly assigned to the board, which do not capture each other (one of the possible arrangements is shown in the figure). Find the mathematical expectation of the sum of the numbers of fields occupied by the rooks.

The teacher on probability theory leaned back in his chair and looked at the screen. The list of those who signed up is ready. The total number of people turned out to be \(n\). Only they are not in alphabetical order, but in a random order in which they came to the class.

“We need to sort them alphabetically,” the teacher thought, “I’ll go down in order from the top down, and if necessary I’ll rearrange the student’s name up in a suitable place. Each name should be rearranged no more than once”.

Prove that the mathematical expectation of the number of surnames that you do not have to rearrange is \(1 + 1/2 + 1/3 + \dots + 1/n\).

10 children were each given a bowl with 100 pieces of pasta. However, these children did not want to eat and instead started to play. One of the children started to place one piece of pasta into every other child’s bowl. What is the least amount of transfers needed so that everyone has a different number of pieces of pasta in their bowl?

Fred chose 2017 (not necessarily different) natural numbers \(a_1, a_2, \dots , a_{2017}\) and plays by himself in the following game. Initially, he has an unlimited supply of stones and 2017 large empty boxes. In one move Fred adds a1 stones to any box (at his choice), in any of the remaining boxes (of his choice) – \(a_2\) stones, ..., finally, in the remaining box – \(a_{2017}\) stones. His purpose is to ensure that eventually all the boxes have an equal number of stones. Could he have chosen the numbers so that the goal could be achieved in 43 moves, but is impossible for a smaller non-zero number of moves?

Gary drew an empty table of \(50 \times 50\) and wrote on top of each column and to the left of each row a number. It turned out that all 100 written numbers are different, and 50 of them are rational, and the remaining 50 are irrational. Then, in each cell of the table, he wrote down a product of numbers written at the top of its column and to the left of the row (the “multiplication table”). What is the largest number of products in this table which could be rational numbers?

The television game “What? Where? When?” consists of a team of “experts” trying to solve 13 questions (or sectors), numbered from 1 to 13, that are thought up and sent in by the viewers of the programme. Envelopes with the questions are selected in turn in random order with the help of a spinning top with an arrow. If this sector has already come up previously, and the envelope is no longer there, then the next clockwise sector is played. If it is also empty, then the next one is played, etc., until there is a non-empty sector.

Before the break, the players played six sectors.

a) What is more likely: that sector number 1 has already been played or that sector number 8 has already been plated?

b) Find the probability that, before the break, six sectors with numbers from 1 to 6 were played consecutively.