Cambridge Coincidences Collection

As of the 23rd May 2022 this website is archived and will receive no further updates.

understandinguncertainty.org was produced by the Winton programme for the public understanding of risk based in the Statistical Laboratory in the University of Cambridge. The aim was to help improve the way that uncertainty and risk are discussed in society, and show how probability and statistics can be both useful and entertaining.

Many of the animations were produced using Flash and will no longer work.

Well I Never!

Professor David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge University wants to know about your coincidences!

Premonition

At the age of 16 a thought popped into my into my head, leading me to ask my mother "Who's Young Frank? ". She explained that he was a cousin living in Lancashire whom we had last seen 10 years before when he had stayed with us in London for several days. We had since moved to Sussex and had not been in touch. 15 minutes later Young Frank appeared at our front door. He was working as a driver and had heard we had moved nearby.He had found our address by calling at the local fire station where he had been allowed to look through the electoral register.

The wonder of the internet

My cousin in America did a google search on her name for the first time on the day my mother's obituary appeared on our local paper site. Coincidently they both had the same name even though they were only related by marriage.

Tagholm

A friend of mine has the surname Tagholm. He knew it was Danish, but due to a family rift in his grandfather’s generation he had no records or information on his antecedents. He did, however, know that his grandfather had been born in America and had moved to Cardiff when he was a boy. Some years ago, a work colleague of his father’s had been to Denmark on holiday and had reported back that he had seen a place called “Tagholm”, which caused some interest in the Tagholm household. Some years on again, my friend decided to visit Denmark and, recalling the friend’s visit, he thought he’d pay Tagholm a visit. Examining various maps, he discovered there were actually three places called Tagholm. As it happened, he decided to visit the most convenient one to where his planned journey passed, which was the one on the peninsula of Romo, off the west cost of Jutland (which, in fact, was not the same Tagholm that his father’s friend had been to). When he got to the place, it turned out to be no more than an intersection of two small tracks.

Ciao

Yesterday (8 Feb 2012) I was having a long Skype call with a friend, when he noticed a book I had just had delivered on the table beside me. It was “The Etymologicon” by Mark Forsyth. My friend asked what it was about, and although I hadn’t actually read much of it, I explained that the book was an amusing take on the origins of words, illustrating how words were linked and how, often, the links spanned many languages and many centuries of etymological evolution. My friend asked for an example. I said I’d read him a section out loud at random and so I opened the book roughly in the middle. The section happened to be on page 80 and was headed “Ciao Slave Driver”. I read him the explanation of the Italian salutation “Ciao” which intriguingly was derived from the phrase “Sono vostro schiavo” which means “I am your slave”. Schiavo itself was derived from Slav, since the Slavonic people were deemed to be the original slaves. Over time, in demotic Italian the sono vostro was dropped and the schiavo morphed into the modern word “Ciao”, which is in common use today throughout Italy and beyond.

weddings

There were three of us who were very friendly work colleagues, we used to go for lunch together once a week, we all had daughters of similar age and used wonder who would get married first. One of the colleagues left and we didn't see her for about 6 years. I was in Manchester with my daughter looking for a wedding dress when we met our friend with her daughter also looking for a wedding dress ! In our discussion we found out that they both were being married in the Dominican Republic at the same place and on consecutive days. Both our families flew out together. Also the other colleague's daughter was getting married the same month but in Scotland and was honeymooning in the Dominican Republic !

Skeptics and relevance their place in the scheme of things.(4)

my son who is skeptical in that he thinks coincidences are irrelevant. However, he told me about the following. He's a carer and with his "client"(a keen local organist) they were watching old episodes of Alf Garnett in which Alf is pushing his wife in a wheelchair in the road confusing the traffic. The next day they went to the local town to buy a tape/cd, as a birthday present , of Reg Dixon the organist. Setting off they found that the wheelchair could not be pushed on the pavement, so they went onto the road, reminding each other, laughingly, of the Alf Garnett problems. They arrived at the music shop without incident. Flicking through "D" for Dixon section of tapes/cds they came across Alf Garnett singing Music Hall songs.Considering my son's skepticism he features in another coincidence,as follows. He was preparing to become a kidney donar for his niece who suffers from cystinosis, a rare condition and at 15year of age would now require a transplant.After all the various tests and safeguards he was fit and ready to go ahead with the transplant operation.

Symmetrical Mum

My mother sadly passed away just over four years ago. Her date of death 30/01/08 was the mirror image of her date of birth 08/01/30. Together with some of my old pals who I studied Statistics with at the University of Bath, I estimated that the chance of such an occurrence was about 1 in 100,000 although she will always be a Mum in a million to me.

Married Couples

We were surprised to read in the paper that the daughter of John and Monica Hyde was getting married, ours is certainly not! John and Monica Hyde ps: know there are lots of John Hyde's about, but how many married a Monica?

Days of the week

Within our household, this year, all our birthdays fall on the same day of the week.

small world

We were on holiday in Mallorca, and came across a small restaurant that had just opened up, called "Tolos". Six months later I was on business in Yorkshire, and found a small restaurant called "Picolo Mondo", or "Small World". I overheard the conversation at the next table to mine, talking about the style and decor of the place. One lady said "This is just like the place we found in Mallorca, called Tolos". I had to lean over and say "It's a small world, isn't it".

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