Question 117479: Hi, I am stuck in the middle of a probability and stats assignment and could use some insight.
My question is that is it true that if I flip a coin 1,000 times, I will get heads 500 of those flips and I need to explain. If its true than I dont understand what an explanation is needed for.
I appreciate any help.
B.Cook
Answer by Fombitz(32388)   (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website! No, you could flip the coin 1,000 times and get 1,000 heads.
You could also get 1,000 tails.
It's within the realm of possibility.
Most likely, most probably, you will get a value that's close to 500.
In the limit, if you did it an infinite amount of times it would go towards 50/50.
But your arm would be tired by then.
Probability does not give you an actual value.
It gives you the likelihood of the expected value.
A statistician will never say "Here's the exact value you're going to get.".
More likely she'll say "You should probably get a value near x plus or minus this much".
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