Now, i’ve read on the internet about you only notice stuff if they are a coincidence, like listening to a song and then someone singing it, and you don’t realise all the times that you listen to a song and no-one starts singing it, so I understand them types of coincidences, but their are a few that are really stange, like for example, I was sleeping over at someones house last night, and this morning, we both got up to go to the toilet at like literally the same second. Now, i’d understand if this happened at my own house, as I sleep there like nearly everyday, so it’s bound to happen one of these days, but this only the second time that i’ve slept at this persons house, so I find it a bit of a coincidence.
Another one is that I started using twitter a couple of weeks or so ago. I later found out that just like literally a couple of hours or so before I started using it, someone I know signed up for it, which I find really weird.
What explanation is there for this things that keep happening?
The only explanation is the one you already have. Confirmation bias.
At what time did every single other person you know sign up for twitter? Every single one of those is equally a coincidence. In other words: Who da’ thunk it that somebody would sign up for twitter exactly 2 days, 4 hours, and 17 minutes before I did. It’s incrediible!!! What are the odds???
And that other friend who did it 5 days, 18 hours and 7 miinutes afer me?? Now this is getting creepy with all these coincidences!!
That’s all there is to it. Once you decide that two things are connected, it turns into a coincidence. The coincidence is *not *out there in the real world. it’s 100% inside the decision you made.
And once you get in the mental habit of creating coincidences, there will be lots of them. If you get in the mental habit of looking for red cars while driving you’ll see (notice actually) more of them than if you’re purposely ignoring red cars or even just paying no particular attention one way or the other. The number of red cars on the road is not changing; what’s changing is whether you become consciously aware of them.
Thing is though, I am only following 27 people at the moment. Twitter has been out for months and months and months and months before I started using it, so for one of them 27 people to sign up just like 2 hours or so before I started using is a bit of a weird coincdience.
Confirmation bias explains some of it but for events that seem very closely related like you are about to call a friend you havn’t talked to in a while and as you are about to dial they call you, the Jungians would call that synchronicity.
Exactly. I understand about things like listening to songs and then someone singing it the next day, because I listen to songs like nearly every day, but I don’t sign up for things like twitter like everyday, or sleep at someone else house like everyday, so thats why these coincidences seem to weird.
Thanks a coincidence in it self (the bit in bold), because I looked at another thread from 2004 like half-an-hour before posting this, and someone said like the exact same thing on that, which was like 7 years ago.
Actually, maybe not, as, looking on google, it is quite a well known and well used phrase for this kind of stuff.
How is getting up to the toilet at the same time as someone else an interesting coincidence? I don’t know about others, but, living with roommates, something like this occurring wasn’t exactly a cosmic event.
Yeah but like I said, if it heppened at my own house, where I sleep like nearly every night, then I wouldn’t find it a coincidence, but its only the second time that i’ve slept at this other house.
It was just weird as the bathroom has 2 door, one to the bedroom they were sleeping in, and one to the hall-way. It was weird that we could of got up at different times from around 7:00am to around 9:00am, which is a two hour period, yet we seemed to walk through these different doors at like the same second.
Why would it be less weird at your own house? Presumably, the other person would be sleeping over at your house so it would be weird for him/her to wake up at the exact same time.
Because there are many, many things that would be considered a “weird coincidence”. The chances of a specific weird coincidence happening is very low. The chance of any one of possible weird coincidences happening to you is very high.
There is one big scary coincidence that happened recently that has got me wondering about this kind of stuff, and it is really getting on my mind. I’ll put something very similar below, but NOTE, this is not the actually coincidence, as I don’t really want to talk about, just something very simlar with slight changes.
I was playing on my xbox on Thursday and I was just randomly looking through my recent gamers, and i found a guy’s gamertag, which was death SL (which are my initials). Now SL could stand for anything, like Super legit, or supreme legacy, etc, but anyway, this is the scary bit. I clicked on his profile, and inhis motto, it said 25/10/11. I later found out that this is maybe because this is the date that the next next battlefield comes out, and looking at his recent games, he does play alot of battlefield games. Anyway, since then, i’ve been doing alot of GTA races, and i’ve been checking the bio of like nearly every person that i’ve played with, and not one has a username that I find as scary, and not one has had a future date in there motto or bio. Like i say, the gamertag might be just random, and the date might just be when the next battlefield comes out, but it is really freaking me out, and I’m scared that something bad might happen on that date.
Like I said, most of that story is true, apart from like the gamertag bit, as I don’t want to put that, but you get the idea.
You need to get outside and breathe some fresh air.
Seriously, man, this moves from “boy, isn’t that a weird coincidence” to sounding more than a little like paranoia.
If you look hard enough, you can see coincidences all over the place…and make yourself crazy trying to understand if there’s some deeper meaning to them. They’re coincidences, nothing more.
More likely, in your sleep, one or the other of you hear the other stir, which causes you to return to some wakefulness, whereupon you realize you have to go to the bathroom. One of you just happened to wake the other without you noticing it.
But perhaps not if one of you likes the door closed when sleeping.
If the connection to you is no more than the initials, then I’d actually (I’m not trying to be rude, I also contemplate synchronicity) think about a therapist. When I was young, out of a belief in synchronicity (I do believe it happens in the Jungian sense) I began to attach way too much significance to minor things that really didn’t warrant it. Being fearful for your life over this is pretty extreme. Maybe we Dopers can talk you out of it. If we can’t please do not live your life like that, and get some help for it. I did and I was much happier for it. If you do, screen your therapist first for a belief in synchronicity. A therapist dead set against the idea won’t help; you need one who can help you avoid unreasonable attachments like this.
Again, in no way do I mean to insult you, just recounting what helped me in a similar position to yours.
