#coincidence

There is always room for coincidence. ↗

— Alva Noto

#coincidence #room

For existential mathematics, which does not exist, would probably propose this equation: the value of coincidence equals the degree of its improbability. ↗

— Milan Kundera

#coincidence #equality

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I have been informed and believe) on a Friday, at twelve o’clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously. ↗

— Charles Dickens

#birth #clocks #coincidence #famous-beginnings #heroes

Scientists are slowly waking up to an inconvenient truth - the universe looks suspiciously like a fix. The issue concerns the very laws of nature themselves. For 40 years, physicists and cosmologists have been quietly collecting examples of all too convenient "coincidences" and special features in the underlying laws of the universe that seem to be necessary in order for life, and hence conscious beings, to exist. Change any one of them and the consequences would be lethal. Fred Hoyle, the distinguished cosmologist, once said it was as if "a super-intellect has monkeyed with physics". To see the problem, imagine playing God with the cosmos. Before you is a designer machine that lets you tinker with the basics of physics. Twiddle this knob and you make all electrons a bit lighter, twiddle that one and you make gravity a bit stronger, and so on. It happens that you need to set thirtysomething knobs to fully describe the world about us. The crucial point is that some of those metaphorical knobs must be tuned very precisely, or the universe would be sterile. Example: neutrons are just a tad heavier than protons. If it were the other way around, atoms couldn't exist, because all the protons in the universe would have decayed into neutrons shortly after the big bang. No protons, then no atomic nucleuses and no atoms. No atoms, no chemistry, no life. Like Baby Bear's porridge in the story of Goldilocks, the universe seems to be just right for life. ↗

— Paul Davies

#chance #coincidence #fine-tuning #fred-hoyle #id

Whether I sound like Sammy or not is purely coincidence. You have got to hand it to him, he sings his ass off. There is no moss on that stone. ↗

— Gary Cherone

#coincidence #got #hand #him #his

In real life, coincidences happen all the time. In novels, they are leapt upon with fury. ↗

— Harlan Coben

#fury #happen #life #novels #real

Dressing up is inevitably a substitute for good ideas. It is no coincidence that technically inept business types are known as 'suits'. ↗

— Paul Graham

#coincidence #dressing #good #good ideas #ideas

Many applications of the coincidence method will therefore be found in the large field of nuclear physics, and we can say without exaggeration that the method is one of the essential tools of the modern nuclear physicist. ↗

— Walther Bothe

#coincidence #essential #exaggeration #field #found

Rossi was the first to describe another system working with valves in parallel; it has the advantage that it can easily be extended to coincidences between more than two events, and is therefore predominantly used today. ↗

— Walther Bothe

#another #between #coincidences #describe #easily

Is it a coincidence that in 1998, Barack Obama talks about a majority coalition of welfare recipients and in 2012 we got a record number of Americans on food stamps while he's president? I don't think it's a coincidence. ↗

— Rush Limbaugh

#barack #barack obama #coalition #coincidence #food