How likely am I to find the handle of a mug facing me after heating a drink on the turntable of the microwave?

Answer 1

This is impossible to answer with the limited information you have provided. How long will the mug be heated for and was the handle facing you when you placed it into the microwave? What is the rate of turn for the turntable? Sorry I can't answer it for you. Good Luck!

Answer 2

This question can have many solutions, but here are the two most likely ones:
If you want the mug's handle pointing directly at your body, the probability will be dependant upon how far away from the microwave you are standing. Suppose you are stanging a distance X from the microwave, and your body is y wide. If you are standing directly in front of the microwave, your shoulders and the mug will make an iscocolese triangle. From your width and distance, you can use
tan(a) = (y/2)/(X), or arctan(y/(2X))=a, and from this we know that a is half of the angle the mug is making between your two shoulders. From this we get
2a as the number of degrees that will make the mug pointing directly at your body, and therefore:

2a/360 (if in degrees), or 2a/2pi (if in radians).

arctan(y/(2X))/180 or arctan(y/(2X))/pi.

If the goal is to find the probability that the handle will be on the side of the mug closer to you, then the probablity is 180/360, or 1/2.

Answer 3

Most are designed these days to do just this. The motor responsible for the rotation of the platter has a "memory" and will return to the same position every time.

Answer 4

All orientations have equal probability so half the time it will face you, half the time it won't. I guess it depends on what you mean by "facing me". I assume it means it is somewhere on the side facing the door. If you only mean directly pointing the door (+/-10 degrees), the answer is different (20 / 360 = 1/18).