Probability Law – What is Its Significance in Event Based Terminology?

An event is a change that alters a thing (or more than anything else, a collection of things) in the time it exists. In natural philosophy, events are abstract objects in either time or instantaneous realizations of properties of objects. On some conceptions, only changes in the shape of getting or losing something can constitute such events, as the extinguishing of the leaves on the tree. However, the notion of event as something concrete and observable is not very natural. For example, what kind of event makes you cry or what kind of event makes you laugh?

To illustrate this using a simpler example, let us take the definition of an event as something concrete and observable. Take two boxes of the same weight and size and place them on the floor, one box on top of the other. Then, drop in some water from a bucket onto each of the boxes and watch what happens. You will observe that one box sinks lower than the other. This sample space must have at least one component defining its position in the sample space.

Now suppose there is someone who throws a coin into one of the boxes. Let us suppose there are infinitely many possible outcomes for this event. For simplicity, we arbitrarily choose the first outcome and call the event the toss. We then assume that every possible outcome of the coin toss occurs in some portion of the sample space. The events that occur in this portion of the sample space must also occur. Thus we have the first law of thermodynamics – every event has a corresponding alternate outcome.

The second law of thermodynamics is slightly more involved. The second law of thermodynamics deals with how energy changes as the result of an event. For example, let us imagine there is a really simple event Epen. Epen is the total amount of energy that is emitted by the gas as it absorbs heat from the surroundings. There are many different possible outcomes for Epen, and each corresponding alternate outcome of Epen is the sum of the energy emitted as the average heat of the surrounding is multiplied by the amount of heat the gas is absorbing.

The third law of thermodynamics is in contrast to the first and second laws. The third law, which is often referred to as the cumulative law of thermodynamics, is concerned with the total amount of energy that is absorbed or released by a system over time. In the previous example, assume that after throwing a coin, the average heat of the surrounding is exactly doubled. This doubling would then be multiplied by the amount of heat the gas is absorbing. Thus we have the third law of thermodynamics, which states that there are mutually exclusive possible outcomes for Epen.

If we consider the real life events that take place, then the third law would hold true. The cumulative law of thermodynamics states that the probability of an event E taking place is equal to the sum of the probabilities of all of the other events taking place, i.e., the chances of one event occurring, given that B happens to be the first event, while C, D, and E are all following close behind. Therefore the probability of the empty set event taking place is simply the product of all the probabilities. A zero probability event does not exist and cannot occur. The sum of all the probabilities gives rise to the law of probability that states that a certain number of occasions must take place before an event occurs.