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Showing posts from August, 2009

The science behind coincidence?

I'm reading a book by Richard Dawkins - unweaving the rainbow and have just read the chapter on coincidence. Richard argues that all coincidences are really in our imagination or the result of a desire to want to believe in a force outside our control that brings things together. This reminded me of the fact that 'like attracts like' and that this is a scientific argument - molecules of water when close together will draw together to create a drop of water - basically that seems to me to be the reason why everything 'hangs together' rather than blending together. (Of course things do 'blend together' - putting two chemicals together often creates a new substance although some things just do not go together, they cannot 'blend'). Coincidence can be scientifically proven - the book talks about the fact that in Britain, there are likely to be 38,000 people (out of the 55million odd) with the same three initials, so finding a watch with your initials on