New Years Eve 2049
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.
On the 13th June 2005 a colleague's husband was tragically killed in a cycling accident in France-he'd been hit by a car. My colleague received the news whilst at work and as you can imagine her grief was felt by us all in the office.
On 16th June 2005 I purchased the New Scientist magazine and read the article headlined 'Double Jeopardy'. It discussed the latest scientific work on quantum theory and suggested that either space -time was an illusion or free will was an illusion. On the drive home from work that evening I noticed a cyclist just ahead that I needed to overtake. Due to recent events I gave him a very wide berth and at the same time my work mobile phone rang. I ignored it because I did not have my earphones. When I pulled up and listed the missed calls there was just one sent at 31/12/2049 and the time showed 23-59-59. (New Year's Eve 44 years ahead of our time). The magazine was on the front seat of my car. I have a photograph of the phone displaying this time. The man in the mobile phone shop ran into the back office - spooked!
Many years earlier in 1989 my two sister's in law died within a fortnight of each other aged 45 and 50. We were a close family and met up regularly but especially at New Year. Where I was when I received the call from the future also correlated with other profound experiences in my life.
There was a time when my coincidences terrified me and rendered my brain incapable of distinguishing fantasy from reality. I became very ill(1998). I have since written a book hoping that some academic has answers to those coincidences that correlate and have such impeccable timing! I have experienced nearly all coincidences listed below.
Date submitted:Mon, 04 May 2015 07:22:34 +0000Coincidence ID:8083