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Why do coincidences happen?

2 pointsby karlztabout 11 years ago

2 comments

mooism2about 11 years ago
Wouldn't it be spooky if there were no coincidences?
lutuspabout 11 years ago
The article bends over backward to avoid anything resembling a rational explanation, preferring the woo-woo &quot;reasoning&quot; favored by New Age thinkers.<p>Here&#x27;s an example of a rational explanation. Bob walks up and says, &quot;I flipped a coin 20 times and guessed every singe flip correctly. Without psychic ability, that&#x27;s impossible!&quot; Alice, Bob&#x27;s scientifically trained friend, says, &quot;Actually, no, the probability that this can be explained by chance is 2^-20 or 1 &#x2F; 1,048,576.&quot;<p>Bob replies, &quot;But doesn&#x27;t that mean the same thing?&quot; Alice replies, &quot;Not at all. if a group of a million people flipped 20 coins, the probability that one or more of of them would correctly guess all 20 is 61%, better than even. That means if you pay attention to the world, coincidences appear all the time -- we tend to filter out the boring events and focus on the rare coincidences that fuel irrational belief in magic.&quot;<p>In short, they&#x27;re called coincidences for a reason.