What are the odds..... No really, what are the odds?

There's two big 'coincidences' that has happened to me. I'm not a mathematician or probability statistician but sometimes folks naive with those subjects (myself included) may think things that happen to them improbable when in actuality they're quite probable.

However these two things that occurred really flipped me out.

Try to keep it short

1) Had this client I did product photography for on Long Island, NY. Son of client ran a sub-division. Enter a woman friend of the son who worked for a graphics house in manhattan who got the client to design and print a couple catalogs through her firm. I did the photography as well.
About the same time enter's a small area ad agency trying to get my clients business. After woman friend of son's couple of catalog productions she drops out of the picture and I continue photographing whilst small ad agency does the graphic design & printing.

Turned out that ad agency owner went to school (college) with son of clients woman friend (no, that's not the coincidence, lol) I went on to continue doing photography for ad agency owner over many years for other clients of theirs.

Here's the kicker. Around 5 years after this woman friend of clients son is completely out from both our lives, out of the blue...total non-sequitur.... I blurt out to my agency (now a friend) while talking in his office....'ever hear from 'so & so'? Of course his answer was no.
After that I go home. I plop myself in front the tv and start fast flicking through the cable channels. In that instant before next flick, I catch a familiar face..... It's HER.... she's the subject in some cable channel lifestyle show because apparently she was the fashion editor of some magazine.

Now WTF are the odds of all that??? lol

2) The 11:11 thing.
For several years in the mid to late 90's I was noticing that 11:11 thing (google if unfamiliar). I just laughed thinking, ya know, one of them trickster universe synchronicity things that was just on me... solely for my own 'entertainment'.
At the very end of the 90's my web surfing has me looking up paranormal stuff. Its then I come across this Art Bell person. I find the local am radio station that he's on and every now and again, I put a radio by my ear and fall asleep to while his show is on. ( 1am - 5 am)

Finally early one morning after about 6 months of doing this, I suddenly become wide awake at just about 4:30am. I catch a caller in the middle of a conversation to hear...

Caller: "Art, do you know anything about these numbers people keep saying they're always seeing...?

Art Bell: "I don't know what's going on caller but I've been receiving thousands upon thousands of faxes and emails from people all over saying they keep seeing the number 11:11.

Well, let me tell you, I totally FREAKED OUT!! lol

What are the chances in these cases? =8-0

I'm pretty certain ya'll have similar outlandish coincidences!
 
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I won't comment on the probability itself.

However, it lends itself to consideration of different ways of looking at the world, different models of reality.

1. everything is simply random and without meaning or significance.

2. Humans are good at spotting patterns, such as seeing shapes in clouds, when something looks like an identifiable pattern, we take notice. But it could still be random/meaningless. Or it might have meaning.

3. There may be precognition/clairvoyance etc. We may gain knowledge through non-ordinary means. Though things may still be random and meaningless, or they might have significance.

4. The world is an active process of which we are a part - it isn't possible to separate 'what happens to us' from 'what we are'. In this view, things follow a pattern because we are active participants in actually creating that pattern.

5. ... dunno ... I'm sure there are others but that's enough for now.
 
Yeah... too bad that as far as individual type synchro/coincidences go, one would have to probably shell out a fair amount of money to commission a bunch of mathematicians to work out the probability as opposed to the generic type you read about like... 'chances how many random people in a room of 100 people all share the same birthday or are related', lol
 
At the very end of the 90's my web surfing has me looking up paranormal stuff. Its then I come across this Art Bell person. I find the local am radio station that he's on and every now and again, I put a radio by my ear and fall asleep to while his show is on. ( 1am - 5 am)

I don't know what the odds are of those events, either. However, I'm pretty sure if Art Bell is talking to your unconscious mind every night ... really weird shit is bound to happen lol

Thanks for sharing, though. For some reason, I always find stories of synchronistic-like events kind of neat.
 
I don't know what the odds are of those events, either. However, I'm pretty sure if Art Bell is talking to your unconscious mind every night ... really weird shit is bound to happen lol

Thanks for sharing, though. For some reason, I always find stories of synchronistic-like events kind of neat.

Most all of my life I'd always go to bed with either music on or talk playing. Let me tell you, weird subject matter is very helpful by way of inducing very entertaining full movie in scope dreams. And I gotta tell you...dreaming is what I live for. The absolutely strange adventures one can have dreaming is totally impossible in the 'real' world, lol
 
I had a series of 3 consecutive 'coincidences' with the same person within a year, only for another one to pop several years later during an important date for that person and then a year and half later for no apparent reason. Luckily, they were witnessed by people close to me, which were as amused as me. My opinion is that those involving other people do defy the odds, as it involves not only 'meaning' but a repetitive arrangement of independent circumstances so that both persons take part in it.

I dismissed the first and the second, but the third was pretty fascinating and the "return" one finally cracked the shell of my belief system (I was hardcore materialist and de facto atheist back then) and made me look into a number of philosophical debates on the nature of reality and, naturally, mind. I first moved to panpsychism and, when its flaws were apparent, a more abstract POV.

On the other hand, I would be more inclined to believe that those involving numbers are more likely the result of selective attention.
 
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On the other hand, I would be more inclined to believe that those involving numbers are more likely the result of selective attention.

When I mentioned the 11:11 thing to one friend of mine, he quipped, "I keep seeing the number 6:30........ every morning when my alarm clock goes off". lol

However, aside from whether or not the number thing is a selective attention thing, the astonishing coincidence lies in the fact that this particular number that I thought was mine alone for some years I then became aware of under such an unusual circumstance that the same number was so ubiquitously being seen by others
 
At least couple of times a week I have mobile phone synchronicity with my wife: I reach for the phone to call her and somewhere between the pocket and the ear the phone rings and it's her. And vice versa: I call her and she says: "I just wanted to call you!" It also happened a few times with other people whom I talk to infrequently - the name comes to mind and seconds later the phone rings.

The stats of coincidences are quite interesting. You often hear stories like "I was flying from here to there and we stopped in "some craphole", and then I saw this guy whom I was at college, army, school etc. thirty years ago. What are the odds!" The truth is, the odds are not that low. More precisely, the odds of meeting this particular guy at this particular place are very low. However, the chances of some coincidence is fairly high. During several decades of life we interacted with numerous people - several hundred at least? And the chance of meeting them at some point somewhere are not incredibly low.

I do not, however, believe that my wife's precognition of my call is coincidental.
 
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