Coincidence, Synchronicity, and the Brain

One morning, your order at Starbucks comes to $4.45. Then, you notice that your next appointment happens to be at 445 Oswald Street. There, your client tells you there's been a 44.5% increase in web traffic since last year. Later, you get a cell phone call -- from area code 445. It's actually your partner, who tells you to remember to pick up the kids at ... 4:45 PM.

What's up with all those 4-4-5's? To find out more, read on!

Along the same lines: ever had one of those days when a number, name, phrase, product, or picture seems to follow you around? Ever had a Tarot card "haunt" you -- turning up again and again over the course of several weeks? Ever learned a new word -- only to see that unfamiliar word in every book and magazine and article you read for the next six days?

Could experiences like these merely be the result of how the human brain -- a tireless seeker of patterns -- wrestles with new information? Some scientists think so, and they've given the phenomenon a name: Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon. Fascinating reading!

Comments

[Anewsoul]

I'm surprised that you would even suggest that synchronicity could be just a function of the human brain making connections. I've had too many meaningful coincidences for me to believe it's anything but the Universe winking at us.

[Mark]

Well, to be fair -- asking the question ("Could experiences like these merely be...?") is not quite the same as suggesting that something is true. :)

Personally, I'm able to be fascinated by scientific efforts to explain intuitive phenomena ... and even by intuitive efforts to explain scientific phenomena! Even the contradictions and paradoxes delight me.

Your mileage may vary! I still hope the article can be food for thought for ya. :)