h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I've been giving this subject a lot of thought because I have quite a few personal examples.

What do we mean by "coincidence"? Do we all share the same definition? Or is it simply a 'dustbin term' for events we cannot satisfactorily explain?

Well, one thing is certain, it does force us to ask questions. Unfortunately, the answer science gives us is "It's simply a coincidence." That maybe a reply, but it is not an answer. It is just another way of saying "I don't know.".

So, labelling a particular event coincidence, explains nothing, and means nothing. As a label,it does not 'define' or clarify. The term clumsily lumps a wide variety of events/experiences together that have nothing in common except their resistance to rational explanation.

I don't know what the answers are, but at least that puts me, and the rest of us, on a par with scientists because, here, in the odd world of coincidence, our guesses are every bit as good as theirs.

Science, for good reasons of it's own, gave up on the subject a long time ago. Such random, unpredictable events cannot be reproduced in the controlled environments of scientific research - precisely why they are inexplicable to scientists.

Clearly, no government or organisation is going to fund research on the subject because there is no discernably useful end-product. So, I guess it's up to the rest of us, as indivduals, to examine the examples of coincidence that litter our own lives. I intend to list a couple of examples of my own later.