Thread: coincidences

Something Ive wished id always recorded is all those times that bizzare coincidences occur - i am talking about the times you are thinking of an old say film or song, talking about it, and then a few days later it is on tv.

at the risk of attracting much ridicule..
we were all messing about using a name generator for 'bond girl' names, ie james bond - its rather amusing... and the rule is the girl has to start with the surname of her favourite actress, which will then become the first name of the bond girl name.
So this girl says i dont have a favourite actress
so we said just use your favourite female singer then instead
she decided on the singer pink - obviously thats not a surname, so we had to look up pink's real name to get her surname
and its moore
like roger moore - james bond actor.

The odds have got to be outrageous.

Coincidences like that aren't really as special as they might seem.

If you think about it, every moment of every day, the dice of fate are rolled. For the most part, only on rare occasions does this roll pan out to a situation of coincidence.

So statistically speaking, it's almost expected to happen at least once over a finite period of time.

It can still be an interesting experience when does happen, though.

The chief of all coincidences is that I was born on the 23th of August.

EDIT: But seriously, I subscribe to the notion that coincidences are all around us and happen at every instant in time. Like in Nabokov's Laughter in the Dark, the fisherman lost a diamond on the sea. Many years later he was eating a fish on that very same day and there was no diamond inside the fish. That's the beauty of coincidences.

If you think about it, every moment of every day, the dice of fate are rolled. For the most part, only on rare occasions does this roll pan out to a situation of coincidence.

So statistically speaking, it's almost expected to happen at least once over a finite period of time.

What? A finite period of time like one day? You mean infinite period of time?

I did ask if she knew the real name of Pink - She said no - and i do believe that, but at the same time I think sometimes there are subliminal effects of memory. Like if Pink is a favourite female singer, then at some point in the past she may have read an article or seen/heard something that stated her actual name, even if it was years ago, and that combined with us laughing about the james bond movies led to the choice...But i like the stunning, innocent coincidence more...

Nabokov's Laughter in the Dark, the fisherman lost a diamond on the sea. Many years later he was eating a fish on that very same day and there was no diamond inside the fish.

Is that not just cynicism in a way? - or black humour - forgive the weak pun.

Originally Posted by Matticus

If you think about it, every moment of every day, the dice of fate are rolled. For the most part, only on rare occasions does this roll pan out to a situation of coincidence.

So statistically speaking, it's almost expected to happen at least once over a finite period of time.

Originally Posted by rogster001

What? A finite period of time like one day? You mean infinite period of time?

I'd say if the 'dice of fate' are rolled every moment of every day -- and only very rarely they returned a situation of coincidence -- there would be an infinite number of coincidences that could happen in a day.

I'd say if the 'dice of fate' are rolled every moment of every day -- and only very rarely they returned a situation of coincidence -- there would be an infinite number of coincidences that could happen in a day.

Yes == anything is possible, anytime

Originally Posted by rogster001

Is that not just cynicism in a way?

I believe so. I think his point was that we look for coincidences from our own perspective and dismiss other events as non-coincidental. That is, we look at coincidences merely from a self-interest point of view. There's no realization that he was eating a fish on the same day he lost a diamond to the sea many years before, which could be interpreted as a coincidence. There's also no realization that it's a good coincidence that the fish had no diamond in his stomach.

He ends in irony by stating that's what he likes in coincidences; i.e. the fact they are everywhere and happening at the whole time. The whole existence is a series of coincidental events. We just fail to look at them. Which essentially means coincidences don't exist. Another form of cynicism says that the probability that a series of unrelated events to come together in a meaningful way is so low, that, when it happens, it can't be a coincidence.

EDIT:
And more food for thought:

• How coincidental it is that a coincidence occurred?
• Isn't it a coincidence that a coincidence didn't occur?

Originally Posted by rogster001

Something Ive wished id always recorded is all those times that bizzare coincidences occur - i am talking about the times you are thinking of an old say film or song, talking about it, and then a few days later it is on tv.

at the risk of attracting much ridicule..
we were all messing about using a name generator for 'bond girl' names, ie james bond - its rather amusing... and the rule is the girl has to start with the surname of her favourite actress, which will then become the first name of the bond girl name.
So this girl says i dont have a favourite actress
so we said just use your favourite female singer then instead
she decided on the singer pink - obviously thats not a surname, so we had to look up pink's real name to get her surname
and its moore
like roger moore - james bond actor.

The odds have got to be outrageous.

In a system of many states ( the universe ), the chance of reaching any state may be nearly infinitely small. For instance consider the chances of your being able to read what I'm typing, and my chances of being able to type it. Your mother had to meet your father, your grandparents had to meet, ect ( add that to the chances of the correct sperm finding it's way, in each generation, and all of this happening at the correct time to produce our current state ).

So the chances of any one state are as near impossible as they can probably be. Yet the system must exist in some state, no matter how unlikely that state is. If not this state then another, if not you reading this, then another similar person reading this (or doing something else) who also would marvel at the unlikeliness of it all.

This isn't really cynicism on my end, just skepticism.

EDIT:
And more food for thought:
How coincidental it is that a coincidence occurred?
Isn't it a coincidence that a coincidence didn't occur?

So that is what recursion is? ;->

There must be an escape condition somewhere..

In a system of many states ( the universe ), the chance of reaching any state may be nearly infinitely small. For instance consider the chances of your being able to read what I'm typing, and my chances of being able to type it. Your mother had to meet your father, your grandparents had to meet, ect ( add that to the chances of the correct sperm finding it's way, in each generation, and all of this happening at the correct time to produce our current state ).

So the chances of any one state are as near impossible as they can probably be. Yet the system must exist in some state, no matter how unlikely that state is. If not this state then another, if not you reading this, then another similar person reading this (or doing something else) who also would marvel at the unlikeliness of it all.

This isn't really cynicism on my end, just skepticism.

Quantum physics is what you are saying it boils down to.

Which makes sense - but to the observer/experiencer of these events it is unbelievable - but then so is as you say, making it to being born..Its just that that does not strike anybody as being unusual

Originally Posted by rogster001

So that is what recursion is?

Or think it in another way; That's what happens when you have a word that also means its opposite.

// duplicate post. sorry

we look for coincidences from our own perspective and dismiss other events as non-coincidental

that says it nicely