You are required to take five courses, one each in humanities, sociology, science, math, and music. you have a choice of 2 humanities courses, 2 sociology courses, 6 science courses, 6 math courses, and 8 music courses. how many different sets of five courses are possible?

Problems involving probability and statistics, particularly about combinations and permutations, are very tricky. In solving these problems, there are actually templates or techniques to a certain type of problem. For this type of question, the fundamental counting principle applies.

This principle is used when you want to find the total ways of arranging objects that are in groups. In this example, there are 2 humanities courses, 2 sociology courses, 6 science courses, 6 math courses and 8 music courses. The number of ways of arranging into 5 courses would be 2x2x6x6x8 = 1,152. Thus, there are 1,152 ways.