This book is designed to be comprehensive. It attempts to cover everything you will need to know in the course and more. It proves all our results, explains our definitions, provides worked examples, suggests quick check exercises, presents some case studies, and offers thought experiments that probe our understanding of chance. Lectures may not cover everything, so, if you are working on a studysheet problem, discussion worksheet, or HW problem, this book should be your go to reference.
I don’t expect you all to know everything in here. I do suggest you give it a careful read during the first couple weeks until you learn which parts are most helpful for your understanding.
To help you navigate the book, we’ve added highlight boxes like this one. Read the highlight boxes. Don’t skip them. These are essential information.
Most of that essential information is distilled in the Chapter Summaries at the end of each chapter. I don’t suggest you read those first. Read the text first, then use the summary as an efficient reference. The material in the summaries won’t make sense alone.
We’ve also added sections that expand, like the one below. These can be skipped. They either provide a formal argument, expand an idea, or offer solutions to quick check exercises.