You play a coin flipping game with 5 coins. On round 1 you flip all of them. On round 2, you pick up all the ones that came up tails (leaving all the heads alone) and flip them again. You continue to do this until all the coins are heads. For example:

Round 1:  H T T H T
Round 2:  - H T - H
Round 3:  - - T - -
Round 4:  - - T - -
Round 5:  - - H - -

Done in 5 Rounds.

What is the expected number of rounds you'll need to finish the game?
What is the probability you will finish the game in 3 rounds or less?

Hello,

It sounds like flip = "flip over coins that are on a table" but from the wording of the problem it seems that it really means "toss them and see how they land"

Otherwise you'd always be done after the second turn :)

Just checking

Posted by nikki on 2004-10-13 16:56:56