Coincidence Theory

I had to laugh the other day while reading Dalrock's blog. Someone was ranting against the stupidity of those tinfoil hat conspiracy theorists again, which is nothing new, but a reply from another commenter was fantastic when he queried, "So, you're a coincidence theorist then?"

I laughed out loud.

But seriously, this is actually something I have pondered about before, so it was kind of a smug laugh.
 
Now, I don't want to get into a whole lot of 9/11 technical crapola, but I would simply like to point out some basic maths. Most of us have probably heard the riddle, "If I flip a coin and nine times in a row it lands on heads, what are the odds it lands on heads the tenth time?" The answer to this is, of course, 50%. The same as it was each and every time you flipped the coin, and on the tenth flip, the odds are still 50/50 that it will be heads or tails. Oooh, so smart is the mathematician with his fancy degree! But, a bookie in Vegas wouldn't give you 50/50 odds that someone could flip a coin and have it land heads 10 times in a row, would he? No, he would use maths by saying 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2 = 0.0976525% - So, approximately 1 to 100 odds, and then he would take the vig.

(In other words, on one flip there is a 50/50 chance it lands on heads, in two flips there is a 25% chance it lands on heads both times, 3 flips is 12.5%, 4 is 6.25%, 5 is 3.125%, 6 is 1.5625%, 7 is 0.78125%, 8 is 0.390625%, 9 is 0.1953625% and for one to flip heads ten times in a row, there is only a 0.0976525% chance, or in other words, there is just less than a one percent chance that someone could flip a coin ten times in a row and have it land on heads each time, even though on that last flip, the odds are still 50/50 it will land on heads on the tenth flip - The odds of getting that far though, are less than 2%).

Now think about 9/11 objectively for a moment. In all of aviation history, how many times has an airliner crashed without leaving virtually any trace of wreckage and survivors? Not very many. In fact, last I heard, not once. Even when France had an airliner crash over one of the deepest parts of the ocean a few years back, they retrieved bodies and wreckage. But on 9/11? There were four planes in three different locations that destructed with absolutely zero evidence left afterwards that a plane was even there.  This would be an odd coincidence of events for even just one plane, but for four airliner crashes to happen one after the other with the same result is well, astronomical in its own right! Multiply that factor on top of the fact that skyscrapers catching on fire has never caused a collapse in the way that three buildings collapsed on 9/11, one right after the other, under two differing circumstances, and we have gone from out of this world odds and into the astronomical. When you consider how many times a year the military practices terrorist drills simulating airliner attacks on skyscrapers per year, and then just add that "coincidence" to the equation... I mean, come on folks, this isn't just flipping a coin ten times in a row and having it land on heads. This is a One in Gazillion chance that this is "the right story" - if you are a coincidence theorist.

And it seems odd to me that coincidence theorists would mock conspiracy theorists, given the mathematical odds of each being correct. For example, in the past century alone, false flag conspiracies have been involved with US involvement in The Great War (The Lusitania), World War Two (Hitler dressing dead soldiers in opposing uniforms and claiming Poland attacked first, AND, the USA's knowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack beforehand, but allowing its devastation to unify the nation), and the Vietnam War (Gulf of Tonkin). The only of the wars the USA was involved in during the past century that didn't involve a false flag event was the Korean War. So, compared to the One in a Billion (or Trillion) odds that the events of 9/11 happened the way were told, or if opposingly there were elements of nefarious activities behind the scenes (1 in 4 odds), I would say that the conspiracy theorists are on the right side of the bet compared to the coincidence theorists. All thoughout history people have "conspired" to make history. Bismarck "conspired" to villify the French and start the Franco-Prussian War, Canada became a confederated country because after the US Civil War it was discovered that US War Hawks were conspiring to manipulate war with Canada in order to maintain the size of their military complex, and Britain figured it would be more damaging for the Americans in International Politics to attack a newly formed nation than to attack a colony of Britain, thus, Canuckistan now stands as the True North Strong and Free.  Conspiracy theories are found far, far, FAR more often in history than one in a gazillion coincidence theories. Et Tu, Brute?   

So, if I were to bet on which side is right, I would estimate my odds being so substantially higher siding with the conspiracy theorists than coincidence theorists, that I would be a buffoon to side with a coincidence theorist, given that compared to their opponents they have a statistical probability of being right at around one in million (or trillion), while conspiracy theorists claiming there are strings "behind" the scenes being pulled, would probably be batting at least .500, if not higher, according to the history of the world.  

"But, but, but," the coincidence theorists protest, "It is so unbelievable!"

Not really.

The biggest mistake that coincidence theorists undertake is when they believe everything related has to be some grand nefarious scheme. This is complete nonsense. The world is chaotic enough (something that "coincidence" theorists cannot deny by the very nature of their argument), and over any given decade in human history, I can point out earthquakes, famines, tsunamis, economic crises, that all led to government increasing their power. The coincidence theorist would like to discredit his opponents by pointing out the tin-foil hatters claiming that, say, Hurricane Katrina was affirmed by some to be a conspiracy theory of the US government using HAARP to attack its own people.

I don't know the answer to that, but I suspect it is more simple. If I were to start a conspiracy theory, i would just keep it simple! I would simply say to my nefarious colleagues that we need not figure out how to use HAARP to make Katrina happen. All we simply have to do is wait for Katrina to happen. Tragedies happen all the time, and in a decade long period, we can expect probably three major earthquakes, one economic crisis, one ill-attempted war from a despotic country, and so on and so on. We don't need to conspire to make those things happen, like all the coincidence theorists are claiming we do, All we need to do is know that there will be, on average, 10 major events over the next decade, and each time one of them happens, we have to push for the same response (and results) uniformly.

I mean, DUH!

Why would you go through all the trouble to orchestrate such nonsense when so many events happen naturally anyways?

All you really need to do is have a ready-made response to any and all events that happen in the future, like, "the solution to this crisis is world government!" Thus, you don't need to crash planes into towers, or use HAARP to make earthquakes and tsunamis, and so on. All you need to do is respond to the natural crises of the world with a uniform response, which always leads into the same direction.