First Course in Probability, A

I don't know how this book compares to previous editions, but I find the writing in this book is very clear but concise, there are plenty of examples and exercises for each chapter. You could easily learn probability on your own with this book, no professor required.

I LOVE the practice problems in the back of the chapters! There is an (almost) full answer key in the back of the book that is also a great resource! The book also shows both the main concepts, and supporting proofs.

I will preface this with the following: I have a 3.96 as a triple majored senior. This is not errant complaining from someone flailing around their college education. We are three weeks into the term and I have decided to lower the rating of this book even further. There is no theory and very little explanation provided in the text. You will gain very little intuition from reading this book, and given that so much of this material is based on intuition and understanding how to do different things in different scenarios, this is rather insulting, especially for the price. This is quite literally a book of examples. And examples are great when coupled with robust material to actually facilitate how to do them. This lacks that. Further, every section has 50-80 end of chapter problems. Do not worry, only the first third or so will have answers or explanations in the back of the book if you get hung up. I'd try to avoid this hundred dollar doorstop at all costs.

Rose books generally covers the material clearly, and examples are really well chosen to interest readers.

Book arrived quickly and in expected condition

The exercises tend to be worded in a very convoluted manner. It is often difficult to figure out exactly what is being asked. For example: “How many outcome sequences are possible when a die is rolled four times, where we say, for instance, that the outcome is 3, 4, 3, 1 if the first roll landed on 3, the second on 4, the third on 3, and the fourth on 1?” All this simply to ask, “How many outcomes are possible when a dice is rolled four times?”

That Probability book is addressed to University students in STEM degrees. Very useful book.

Like most have said, unless you have a professor that is good at explaining the material, you'll be screwed in whatever class you need this for. As a person with an Engineering degree and significant experience in high-level mathematics, you'd think I'd be able to comprehend this book. Here are my primary issues with the book: 1) The explanations are worded in the most vague fashion possible. While I enjoy brevity, it's best left to simple topics and books where the reader already has a baseline understanding of the material. 2) The exercises prefer quantity over quality. It's great if you have a book with a ton of options to improve your understanding of the material, however there are exercises in each section that seemingly have nothing to do with anything in that section, especially in the early chapters. 3) It seems that all of the exercises are intentionally designed to trick the reader. Again, if this were an advanced probability course I could understand it, but it's hard enough to get a grasp on the concepts with the terrible explanations in the chapters without having intentionally misleading questions. I couldn't imagine being a sophomore or junior in college and taking this course. Our university only requires Calc 2 as a prerequisite and that is definitely not enough information. Be prepared to go to office hours frequently or find another textbook to supplement this one.

The book itself is good, but the print is just not that good

Excelente libro, esencial para cursos de probabilidad. Para de lo básico e incrementa el nivel hasta lo más complicado .

This is not what a would call: "Used-Good"… This is more "Used-Bad/dirty". I only keep it because It’s mandatory for my classes. Very disappointing.