When three dice are tossed, what is the probability that all the numbers shown are different?

Understanding the Probability of Rolling Three Different Numbers on Dice

When you toss three dice, there are a total of 6 faces on each die, resulting in 6 imes 6 imes 6 = 216 possible outcomes.

Calculating Favorable Outcomes

To find the probability that all three numbers show different faces, we first calculate the number of favorable outcomes:

  • For the first die, you can roll any of the 6 faces.
  • For the second die, you can only roll 5 different faces (since it must be different from the first die).
  • For the third die, you can roll 4 different faces (since it must be different from both the first and second dice).

This gives us a total number of favorable outcomes calculated as follows:

Favorable Outcomes = 6 imes 5 imes 4 = 120

Calculating the Probability

The probability (P) that all numbers rolled are different can be calculated using the formula:

P(All Different) = rac{Favorable ext{ }Outcomes}{Total ext{ }Outcomes}

Using our numbers:

P(All Different) = rac{120}{216}

This fraction simplifies to:

P(All Different) = rac{5}{9}

Conclusion

Thus, the probability that when tossing three dice, all the numbers shown will be different is rac{5}{9}. This means there is a good chance that each die will show a unique number!

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