Whenever a hawk meets a dove, the dove is killed. Whenever two hawks meet, they fight to death, and both are killed. And if two doves meet, nothing bad happens.

There are H hawks and D doves, and you are either a hawk or a dove. Assuming that meetings are random, what are your chances of survival?

(In reply to re: Bird's Eye View ! by Charlie)

The below is incorrect, as pointed out in later discussion:

Carried for up to 11 doves we get:

 H    1      2      3      4      5      6      7      8      8     10     11
 2 0.3333 0.3056 0.2833 0.2650 0.2495 0.2362 0.2246 0.2144 0.2053 0.1971 0.1897
 4 0.2000 0.1822 0.1677 0.1556 0.1453 0.1365 0.1287 0.1219 0.1158 0.1103 0.1054
 6 0.1429 0.1308 0.1207 0.1122 0.1049 0.0986 0.0930 0.0881 0.0836 0.0797 0.0761
 8 0.1111 0.1024 0.0950 0.0886 0.0831 0.0783 0.0740 0.0702 0.0668 0.0637 0.0609
10 0.0909 0.0843 0.0786 0.0736 0.0693 0.0654 0.0620 0.0590 0.0562 0.0537 0.0514
12 0.0769 0.0717 0.0671 0.0631 0.0596 0.0565 0.0537 0.0511 0.0488 0.0467 0.0448
14 0.0667 0.0624 0.0587 0.0554 0.0525 0.0498 0.0475 0.0453 0.0433 0.0416 0.0399
16 0.0588 0.0553 0.0522 0.0494 0.0469 0.0447 0.0426 0.0408 0.0391 0.0375 0.0361
18 0.0526 0.0496 0.0470 0.0446 0.0425 0.0405 0.0388 0.0372 0.0357 0.0343 0.0330
20 0.0476 0.0451 0.0428 0.0407 0.0388 0.0371 0.0356 0.0342 0.0328 0.0316 0.0305
22 0.0435 0.0413 0.0393 0.0375 0.0358 0.0343 0.0329 0.0317 0.0305 0.0294 0.0284

Edited on September 13, 2004, 8:24 pm

Posted by Charlie on 2004-09-13 10:42:31