Our First Discussion Of Coincidence: The Olympics Blackout

You will have heard perverts imposed themselves on the Olympic’s opening ceremony, mocking God and committing innumerable blasphemies in the name of, well, whatever the name is of the sex god cult that now rages over the world. Some call it “Globohomo”, and this is good enough for a working monkier.

Some Christians complained that it was not God that was insulted, but them. There is, of course, some truth to that. Cult members do not like, even hate (while simultaneously condemning hate), little-o orthodox Christians for not surrendering to the demands of the cult, chief of which is to admit (even if insincerely) that the acts of Globohomoists are good. Well, so what. Christians, and even bloggers, can be insulted, and usually to no effect, or interest. Insulting God, however, is another matter altogether.

Shortly after the blasphemies, this happened, in the words of Sister Mary Joseph Calore:

Just twenty four hours after the opening olympic debauchery in Paris they get a blackout – the only lights that could be seen were on the Basilica Of The Sacred Heart Of Jesus – Sacré-Cœur Basilica located at the summit of the butte of Montmartre. From its dome two hundred meters above the Seine, the basilica overlooks the entire city of Paris and its suburbs.

The picture of the blackout heads today’s post. These two events form a coincidence. A co-incident. Two, or more, incidents occurring together near in time, where “near” is judged relative to the circumstances.

Two or more incidents occurring near in time are not by themselves interesting. After all, as you read these words, right now, there are innumerable incidents happening in world, and outside the world. So many that no man could count them all. This is true now, and will always be true.

Recognizing this, there are two main meanings of coincidence, and they are mirrors of each other. The first is co-incidents matched with a causal connection. The second, which predominates, features the same co-incidents but where there is no causal connection, and where some might falsely think there is. This dismisses from consideration the infinite number co-incidents that assail us, and focuses on those which appear to have, or are wrongly thought to have, some causal tie.

The blasphemy-blackout co-incidents fits either of these definitions well, and one of them perfectly, depending on whether there was a cause tying the two together.

Now, before we come to that, here is what I find fascinating. About two weeks ago, I started on a series of graphics, to show how likely and unlikely certain coincidences are, on the second, mundane interpretation of the word. I was casting about for some dramatic, juicy coincidence that would illustrate a case where both interpretations are possible. I must, after all, keep you entertained as well as informed, dear reader. The blasphemy-blackout fell into my lap, as it were. Another pair of co-incidents which fits both interpretations.

Persi Diaconis and Fredrick Mosteller investigated the math of coincidences of the second kind in the well known 1989 paper “Methods for Studying Coincidences.” We’ll look into that math, and the graphics I made, another time. Meanwhile, here is what they say about cause:

Hidden Cause. Much of scientific discovery depends on finding the cause of a perplexing coincidence. Changes in the world can create coincidences; likewise, changes in our own behavior such as a new pattern of reading or eating can create a pattern. Frequency of forecasting the same dire event improves the chances of simultaneity of forecast and outcome. Forgetting many failed predictions makes success seem more surprising.

At the same time, vast numbers of coincidences arise from hidden causes that are never discovered. At the moment, we have no measure of the size of this body of occurrences. Similarly, we have no general way to allow for misrepresentation, mistaken or deliberate, that may lead to many reports of coincidences that never occurred.

The point, as I have repeatedly emphasized, in all scientific investigations, it that cause must always be paramount. Effects, the events we see, have causes, even if we can never discover them, and even if they are undiscoverable specifically.

In both interpretations of coincidence, there is cause. There are separate immediate causes of both or all incidents involved. But only in the first, and stronger definition, is there an overriding cause connecting all incidents. This is the meta-cause; the cause behind the causes of the coincidental incidents. In the second, and weaker, interpretation, there is no overriding or meta-cause, but some might mistakenly think there is.

It is not terribly interesting discussing intermediate causes, unless we are, as with Persi and Fred, trying to find a mathematical theory of improbability of them, given certain assumptions. We’ll do that, too, another day.

What’s gripping are the possible connecting or meta-causes. The behind-the-scenes causes that drive all co-incidents.

Can we prove or disprove in the blasphemy-blackout coincident if there was a meta-cause?

One candidate meta-cause is obvious. And that cause may still have been operative even if, as some are pointing out, the Basilica had a generator. Presumably lots of places (like hospitals) had generators. The main thrust of the coincidence is not the (second) intermediate cause of the light, which is the generator, but the blackout itself which allowed the generator its time to shine.

The job of the man holding with the meta-cause is easy in this case, but not always—think of those tangled-line memes “exposing” deep conspiracies to explain strange coincidences, in which the meta-cause is a complex conspiracy. It does not take much argument to see the form of the meta-cause in the blasphemy-blackout conjunction. God is only slow to anger. Consider the blackout as a sign or omen, a warning of worse to come should the perversions continue. There are precedents of what “worse” means. And so on.

Those dismissing the meta-cause as “just a coincidence” (tacitly in the second definition) have the harder task, as far as formal proof goes. Most would concede that God, assuming God exists, would consider the perverts’ actions blasphemies. Others would say God does not exist, and that’s that. But the other side would say the coincidence is evidence for God’s existence. The atheist might shoot back that this coincidence prove religious people see causes where they are not.

Others might point to the frequency of blackouts when the electrical system is similarly stressed (numbers of air conditioners in use, say), to show that this kind of thing might be expected. There is some value in investigations into the intermediate causes like this, as Persi and Fred showed, and we will examine later. Some will even attack the idea that the perversion actually wasn’t one. Which shows that one can go after either side of the incidents to argue against the meta-cause.

Yet none of these arguments, on either side, are proofs. Not sound, valid logical proofs. Consider, atheists would have to prove God does not exist, a key premise in their arguments, a task which has never been accomplished. And theists to come to perfect knowledge would have to insist they heard from God himself on the matter.

Since there doesn’t appear to be such proof, being short in this case of divine revelation, we are stuck with uncertainty.

Which is our state for most coincidences. Uncertainty. We usually leave it at uncertainty, too, saving coincidences in a bucket of evidence which might be used for a time they can can be fit together with other similar evidence.

Or we can choose to believe, or act as if we believe, whether the meta-cause is there or not. Belief, and acts, are not uncertainty. They are decisions. Acts and decisions come with costs and rewards. But that is a subject for another time.

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