Appendix: Elements of Probability and Statistics
In this Appendix we provide a brief overview of some statistical concepts that are needed for a better understanding of the materials discussed in the body of the text.
RANDOM VARIABLES
The set of all possible outcomes of an experiment is called the sample space of that experiment. For example, in rolling a fair six-sided die, the sample space is
. A random variable is a real-valued function defined on the sample space that associates each outcome of an experiment to a real number. The state space is all possible real values that a random variable can assume. Therefore, random variable
is a function from sample space
to state space
where members of the sample space are all possible outcomes of the experiment and members of state space
are all possible values that the random variable can assume. For example, in an experiment in which a fair die is rolled four times, the sample space consists of all possible sequences of numbers that ...
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