{"id":59714,"date":"2022-02-02T13:53:00","date_gmt":"2022-02-02T17:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=59714"},"modified":"2022-02-14T13:56:07","modified_gmt":"2022-02-14T17:56:07","slug":"law-of-very-large-numbers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/","title":{"rendered":"Coincidence and the Law of Very Large Numbers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>What is the law of very large numbers? How does the law of very large numbers help explain coincidences? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The law of very large numbers is one of the key concepts in probability and statistics. The concept is quite simple: with a sample that&#8217;s large enough, even the most improbable events could happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep reading to learn about the law of very large numbers and how it explains coincidences and improbable events. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-hardly-anything-is-impossible\">Hardly Anything Is Impossible<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>People attribute strange events to the supernatural<\/strong>\u2014for example, believing someone getting struck by lightning twice is a message from God or the universe\u2014because <strong>they think such events are impossible and can\u2019t be the result of coincidence<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In reality, these strange events <em>are <\/em>possible, though unlikely. People can\u2019t accurately estimate probability, so they think strange events are less likely than they actually are. Continuing our example, someone getting struck by lightning twice seems impossible, but with 7.7 billion people on earth and 1.4 billion lightning strikes per year, it\u2019s bound to happen eventually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thus,<strong> don\u2019t get too excited when something unusual happens,<\/strong> Dobelli suggests. Hardly anything is impossible, and the probability of any event occurring is likely higher than you think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-law-of-very-large-numbers\"><strong>The Law of Very Large Numbers<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Dobelli\u2019s explanation that coincidences are more likely than you think is supported by the law of very large numbers: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/us\/blog\/intentional-insights\/201611\/your-most-incredible-days-and-how-often-you-can-expect-them\">When your sample size is very large, \u201cimpossible\u201d events are inevitable<\/a>. For example, if the chance of being struck by lightning twice is one in 3 million and there are 7.7 billion people on earth, 2,000 people will be struck twice <em>by coincidence<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So why don\u2019t people take the law of very large numbers into account? It\u2019s because <a href=\"https:\/\/gizmodo.com\/how-to-comprehend-incomprehensibly-large-numbers-1531604757\">humans can\u2019t visualize very large numbers<\/a>. Since early humans didn\u2019t need to understand such large numbers, your brain didn\u2019t evolve the instinctive ability to do so. Humans\u2019 ability to understand just how large a number is starts to degrade after 100, and it breaks down completely for numbers above a million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thus, when people try to estimate probabilities that involve very large numbers\u2014for instance, the size of the human race\u2014they underestimate their sample size and don\u2019t take the law of very large numbers into account. For example, you can\u2019t visualize how big 7.7 billion <em>or <\/em>3 million are. You think those numbers are closer in size than they really are, so you assume the chance of being struck by lightning twice is much lower than 2,000. Thus, when it happens, you search for another explanation, attributing it to supernatural intervention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is the law of very large numbers? How does the law of very large numbers help explain coincidences? The law of very large numbers is one of the key concepts in probability and statistics. The concept is quite simple: with a sample that&#8217;s large enough, even the most improbable events could happen. Keep reading to learn about the law of very large numbers and how it explains coincidences and improbable events.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":36232,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,25],"tags":[576],"class_list":["post-59714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-psychology","category-statistics","tag-the-art-of-thinking-clearly","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Coincidence and the Law of Very Large Numbers - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The law of very large numbers states that with a sample that&#039;s large enough, even the most improbable events could happen. Learn more.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Coincidence and the Law of Very Large Numbers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The law of very large numbers states that with a sample that&#039;s large enough, even the most improbable events could happen. Learn more.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-02-02T17:53:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-02-14T17:56:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/dice-chance-luck-risk.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Darya Sinusoid\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Darya Sinusoid\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/0421cce75bc249b11e2517b3a91f9c46\"},\"headline\":\"Coincidence and the Law of Very Large Numbers\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-02-02T17:53:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-02-14T17:56:07+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\"},\"wordCount\":435,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/dice-chance-luck-risk.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"The Art of Thinking Clearly\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Psychology\",\"Statistics\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/\",\"name\":\"Coincidence and the Law of Very Large Numbers - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/law-of-very-large-numbers\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/dice-chance-luck-risk.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-02-02T17:53:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-02-14T17:56:07+00:00\",\"description\":\"The law of very large numbers states that with a sample that's large enough, even the most improbable events could happen. 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