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Module 2 · Probability Foundations · Topic 3

Complement Rule

Complement. The complement of event A, written A′ (or Ā), is the event that A does not occur. Together, A and A′ account for all possible outcomes.

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Key formulas

Complement Rule

P(A′) = 1 − P(A)

From the Probability Foundations formula sheet

  • Conditional Probability: P(A | B) = P(A and B) / P(B) - Probability of A after restricting attention to cases where B occurred.
  • Bayes' Theorem: P(A | B) = P(B | A)P(A) / P(B) - Updates a prior probability after observing evidence.

See the full formula reference

Worked example

Worked Example

If P(rain tomorrow) = 0.35, then P(no rain) = 1 − 0.35 = 0.65.

When to use it

When to Use It

The complement rule is especially useful when computing P(A) directly is hard. For “at least one” problems, compute 1 − P(none) instead.

Related glossary terms

  • Independence: Two events are independent when one occurring does not change the probability of the other. Example: Two separate fair coin flips are independent.

Browse the full glossary

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