
Universal Laws of the World - imartin2k
http://www.collaborativefund.com/blog/laws/
======
irrational
>We can expect “miracles” to happen regularly, because in a world with 7
billion people the odds of a one-in-a-billion event are pretty good.

In my mind a miracle is something that can't be explained by science (walking
on water, resurrection, etc.). I'm wondering if they mean "coincidence"
instead of miracle. Something that is extremely unlikely, but wholly
explainable by science. For example, I once went on a trip with my daughter to
a far away city. Everywhere we went she ran into someone she knew. We went out
to eat and a friend (who was from an entirely different part of the country)
was seated at a table next to ours. We went to a venue that seated 20,000
people and it turned out that the people right behind us were friends of hers
that she hadn't seen in ages. I don't think any of those meetups were
miracles. They were just a bunch of coincidences.

~~~
gwern
That may be what you define as a miracle, but there are a lot of people who
regard 'coincidences' as meaningful and evidence of synchronicity and the
supernatural such as ESP/psi, and love to recount stories as proof thereof.
(These days, the spooks now have names like 'racism', but the logic is the
same.) If you trace Littlewood's law back to the Freeman Dyson essay which
coined it ( [https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood#origin-of-littlewoods-
law-o...](https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood#origin-of-littlewoods-law-of-
miracles) ), you'll find that it's a review of a book titled _Debunked! ESP,
Telekinesis, and Other Pseudoscience_. You can easily surmise why the book
would go into discussions of how unlikely coincidences are actually likely,
but Dyson makes it clear what is being debunked by Littlewood's law:

> The book also has a good chapter on "Amazing Coincidences." These are
> strange events which appear to give evidence of _supernatural_ influences
> operating in everyday life. They are not the result of deliberate fraud or
> trickery, but only of the laws of probability. The paradoxical feature of
> the laws of probability is that they make unlikely events happen
> unexpectedly often...

So, since people do regard these coincidences as 'miracles', it is necessary
to point out that they would happen frequently in a world completely devoid of
any kind of 'supernatural influences', and thus are poor evidence for the
supernatural.

~~~
areyousure
> (These days, the spooks now have names like 'racism', but the logic is the
> same.)

I don't understand what you mean or are referencing here. Can you clarify? I
couldn't figure it out from the context. Thanks.

~~~
Koshkin
An example of something offered as an explanation (of a phenomenon or an
idea), looks like.

