"There Are No Coincidences"@en . . . . . . "As any student of cause and effect can tell you, a coincidence is when two or more events happen either simultaneously or in sequence, without any sort of obvious (and in most cases, inobvious) causal connection. Generally coincidences surprise us because, naturally enough given their nature, we just weren't expecting them. Most people know that sometimes things just happen at the same time. But some people just refuse to believe it. There are, after all, reasons people say \"where there's smoke there's fire.\" They also often say \"There Are No Coincidences.\" Compare Chekhov's Gun."@en . . . . . . . "As any student of cause and effect can tell you, a coincidence is when two or more events happen either simultaneously or in sequence, without any sort of obvious (and in most cases, inobvious) causal connection. Generally coincidences surprise us because, naturally enough given their nature, we just weren't expecting them. Most people know that sometimes things just happen at the same time. But some people just refuse to believe it. There are, after all, reasons people say \"where there's smoke there's fire.\" They also often say \"There Are No Coincidences.\" Interestingly, this line can be made by both the Agent Scully and the Agent Mulder. One believes that the improbable has a simpler explanation and one believes that is has a fantastic one. Both are Genre Savvy in that Contrived Coincidence is something that should usually be avoided in serious plots. Usually used either to motivate investigation into possible reasons why an apparent coincidence actually sprung from a common cause -- the Conspiracy Theorist has an advanced case of it, and no willingness to stop the investigation -- or as a Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane way to say Because Destiny Says So. This belief is, of course, Rule One of Wild Mass Guessing. The Genre Savvy are particularly prone to it, because fictionally, the Law of Conservation of Detail militiates against its falsity. Compare Chekhov's Gun. Examples of There Are No Coincidences include:"@en . . . . . . . . . . . .