NETMaths

Is this true?

Pairwise independent events are mutually independent

No — it is false.

The counterexample

Two fair coin tosses: A = first is heads, B = second is heads, C = the two agree

Each pair is independent, but P(A∩B∩C) = 1/4 ≠ 1/8 = P(A)P(B)P(C).

The kind of mistake this is

Dependence misread

Independence, pairwise vs mutual, or correlation vs dependence.

Drill statements like this

Others that fail the same way

From ProbabilityAxioms, conditional probability, independence, Bayes

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