Explaining Coincidence

[David L. White]

        Perhaps I have not understood what was being said, in which case
never mind.  But if I have ....
        Coincidences, unless they are taking up more than their fair share
of reality, do not need to be explained.  I will give an example:  a few
days ago I met a woman whose baby was born on the same day mine was.  She
said, "What a coincidence!"  Should I have responded "Prove it."?  I don't
think so.
        More formally, I would say that coincidence serves as the default
explanation (or assertation that the concept of explanation is not
applicable) until someone shows that coincidence is for some reason not as
good as some other true explanation.
        In the case at hand, there is no reason at all to think that
languages with similar sound systems should not have similar words.  Indeed
it would be both difficult and perverse for them to try to avoid it.  What
are we to imagine, that the Lemno-Tyrrhenians, as they set out to use a word
"naphoth" in their language, would have gone "Oh my god, we can't use that,
for in the language of the Hebrews (which none of us knows) it is a word
meaning 'ridge'".  Reality does not work that way.

Dr. David L. White