Surnames starting with the same letter.

[JellyFish]

The question asks what is the probablity that out of 40 people's surnames no two start with the same ltter assumin that each letter is equally likely to appear at the beginning of the name?

Maybe I am looking at this too simply but if there are only 26 letters in the alphabet is there not 0% probablity that no two surnames will start with the same letter?

 

[Deleted member 4993]

The question asks what is the probablity that out of 40 people's surnames no two start with the same ltter assumin that each letter is equally likely to appear at the beginning of the name?

Maybe I am looking at this too simply but if there are only 26 letters in the alphabet is there not 0% probablity that no two surnames will start with the same letter?

The 27 th person must have surname that repeats one of the previous ones.