Coincidence

Is there such a thing as coincidence (Zufall)? There is no doubt that the Lincoln assassin had the plan for his deed in him for a long time; but the manner and circumstances which suddenly gave him the opportunity to do so contain such an adventurously high degree of circumstances favorable to him for the execution of the deed, according to the criteria of probability, that it is hardly scientifically and methodologically permissible to speak of "coincidence" here. A mathematically based theory, according to which it is a systematic law that if something can go wrong as a result of social action calculated with risk, then it will go wrong, can be reversed as a systematic hypothesis and thought through to the end: if none of the many concrete possibilities that could have prevented the assassination or the assassin occurred, this suggests a higher necessity that caused the act. A positivist science will refuse to take the idea of "fate" or "predestination" seriously, and will relegate such explanatory patterns not only to the realm of faith, but even more to the realm of superstition. But this makes it structurally blind to the actually fascinating, exciting questions.

=> Blind Spot