I also got as far 8!-8. The picture shows eight food items.
If your "menu" includes all 8 , there are 8! ways to order it.
Which 8 orders you then reject as disgusting I don't know.
(And why only 8?)
A more realistic sum is to say that you eat or not eat all 8 items
independently, giving 2^8 or 256 choices. However that includes
not eating any of them, a choice that Macdonalds do not want to encourage.
I suppose they decided that 255 was a pathetic number for a poster
(much less than the odds against you on the national lottery, for instance)
& looked elsewhere. How they came up with 8!-8 I don't know.
************************
Paul Seed
[log in to unmask]
Medical Statistician
Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine
Charterhouse Square
London EC1M 6BQ
(020) (+44) 7882 6298
fax 7882 6270
> -----Original Message-----
> From: A UK-based worldwide e-mail broadcast system for the statistical
> community, [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jon Heron
> Sent: 11 January 2002 10:36
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: QUERY: Macdonald's advert
>
>
> Dear all,
>
>
> you may have seen the new MacDonalds advert that states that
> with a choice
> of 8
> different 'food' items (I use the term 'food' loosely) there are 40312
> possible
> combinations.
>
> I have gotten as far as realising that
>
> 40312 = 8! - 8
>
> but has anyone got an idea on what on earth they are thinking?
> Surely there are infinite possible combinations e.g. I'd like
> 319,542 cokes
> please
> (and no I don't want fries with that!!!).
>
>
>
> Jon
>
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