Related papers: Bertrand's paradox: a physical solution
A chord diagram refers to a set of chords with distinct endpoints on a circle. The intersection graph of a chord diagram $\cal C$ is defined by substituting the chords of $\cal C$ with vertices and by adding edges between two vertices…
The broken stick problem is the following classical question. You have a segment $[0,1]$. You choose two points on this segment at random. They divide the segment into three smaller segments. Show that the probability that the three…
We give a new bound on the probability that the random sum $\xi_1 v_1 +...+ \xi_n v_n$ belongs to a ball of fixed radius, where the $\xi_i$ are iid Bernoulli random variables and the $v_i$ are vectors in $\R^d$. As an application, we prove…
Consider a coin tossing experiment which consists of tossing one of two coins at a time, according to a renewal process. The first coin is fair and the second has probability $1/2 + \theta$, $\theta \in [-1/2,1/2]$, $\theta$ unknown but…
We consider the twin paradox of special relativity in a universe with a compact spatial dimension. Such topology allows two twin observers to remain inertial yet meet periodically. The paradox is resolved by considering the relationship of…
The paradoxes of the double-slit and the EPR experiments with particles are shown to originate in the implicit assumption that the particles are always located in the classical space. It is demonstrated that there exists a natural…
Effects associated in quantum mechanics with a divisible probability wave are explained as physically real consequences of the equal but opposite reaction of the apparatus as a particle is measured. Taking as illustration a Mach-Zehnder…
The Ehrenfest paradox for a rotating ring is examined and a kinematic resolution, within the framework of the special theory of relativity, is presented. Two different ways by which a ring can be brought from rest to rotational motion,…
Alford, Granville, and Pomerance proved that there are infinitely many Carmichael numbers. In the same paper, they ask if a statement analogous to Bertrand's postulate could be proven for Carmichael numbers. In this paper, we answer this…
Whenever we consider any relativistic quantum wave equation we are confronted with the Klein paradox, which asserts that incident particles will suffer a surplus of reflection when dispersed by a discontinuous potential. Following recent…
The apparently trifling unexpected hanging paradox has generated an enormous philosophical literature. We introduce the mathematician to this literature, paying special attention to aspects that involve nontrivial mathematics. This xxx…
Let $C_n$ be the $n$-th generation in the construction of the middle-half Cantor set. The Cartesian square $K_n$ of $C_n$ consists of $4^n$ squares of side-length $4^{-n}$. The chance that a long needle thrown at random in the unit square…
A solution to the 50 year old problem of a spinning particle in curved space has been recently derived using an extension of Clifford calculus in which each geometric element has its own coordinate. This leads us to propose that all the…
In science, as in life, `surprises' can be adequately appreciated only in the presence of a null model, what we expect a priori. In physics, theories sometimes express the values of dimensionless physical constants as combinations of…
In this report, the explicit probability density functions of the random Euclidean distances associated with equilateral triangles are given, when the two endpoints of a link are randomly distributed in 1) the same triangle, 2) two adjacent…
There are two methods for counting the number of occurrences of a string in another large string. One is to count the number of places where the string is found. The other is to determine how many pieces of string can be extracted without…
Parrondo's paradox is ubiquitous in games, ratchets and random walks.The apparent paradox, devised by J.~M.~R.~Parrondo, that two losing games $A$ and $B$ can produce an winning outcome has been adapted in many physical and biological…
We develop probabilistic tools for upper and lower bounding the expected time until two independent random walks on $\ZZ$ intersect each other. This leads to the first sharp analysis of a non-trivial Birthday attack, proving that Pollard's…
A large amount of literature in social choice theory deals with quantifying the probability of certain election outcomes. One way of computing the probability of a specific voting situation under the Impartial Anonymous Culture assumption…
The so-called Lindley paradox is a counterintuitive statistical effect where the Bayesian and frequentist approaches to hypothesis testing give radically different answers, depending on the choice of the prior distribution. In this paper we…