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Fear of Meaningful Coincidences
The phenomena of the meaningful coincidence has found fertile ground in the Net. Seemingly synchronistic events sprout like weeds and crawl kudzu-like around the lattice of the Net. When researching a new idea on the web, I approach the web with trepidation, half expecting to find the exact same idea, fully realized, word for word, staring me in the face.
An Example
On Wednesday, August 9, 1995 I was sitting in front of my computer, bluejeans rolled up to my knees, my feet soaking in a bath of epsom salts. I was seeking relief from the eight craters carved out of my soles by a sadistic podiatrist and distracting myself by monitoring the opening of Netscape on CNBC. Like many of the analysts, I was astonished by what I what I was watching, and felt compelled to compose a short e-mail message commenting on the folly. My mood, undoubtedly influenced by the fact that most of my consciousness was focused on my feet, contributed to the tone of this note.
This note was sent to my brother Harlan, and to a few friends at The Corporation who depend on my musings about the stock market as a reliable contrarian indicator of what the market will actually do (I believe they have all subsequently retired on their Netscape gains). In any case, the following Monday, I open my copy of Barrons to find the following.
Now, how does this happen? Pure coincidence? Was the Barron’s cartoonist and I immersed in the same collective unconscious thoughts as we watched the same unfolding events on CNBC? Or, was this actually a causal event? Did my e-mail message snake it’s way around the net and into the inbox of the Barron’s cartoonist, inspiring the cartoon?
Another Example
Consider the underlying theme of this site: cave paintings as a metaphor for the Web. I came back from a trip to Africa and start building the Africa Tour site, with (what I thought to be) this original metaphor in mind. Harlan, the first person to see the site, immediately deflates my balloon, by documenting a two year old Usenet group exchange (see NetSnake Chapter 1), staking his own claim to inventing the metaphor. Then, a few months after posting the first chapter of NetSnake, I find this:
Maybe this metaphor is just too obvious, and anyone who works on the web comes up with the same idea. Or maybe this is an artifact of the homogeneity of the Web world. The Web world is still populated with over 70% white male Americans with an average income of $69,000 who are probably in a computer related business. We’re all the same, so we all come up with the same ideas. Or maybe Harlan has the answer: “They are all ripping me off. “ Paranoid fantasies aside, the web is a copy and co-opt culture. I may have even borrowed a few icons myself, some from Harlan. Certainly if the “24 Hours in Cyberspace” people did not think it neccesary to offer even the most perfunctory nod to the virtually identical Day in the Life of Cyberspace efforts launched by MIT six months earlier, why should anyone expect anything more from them. This continuous downpour of intellectual larceny creates a thick fog obscuring the originators of ideas. Perhaps that same fog creates this powerful illusion of coincident and synchronistic thoughts, ideas, and events.
Perhaps, but still I find it hard to believe that all of us, even Teo and Bob are thieves. I am sure that they, like me, believe that they came up with the idea themselves. Perhaps we all did. Perhaps this synchronistic inflation is the first hint of something new. It is the nature of the Net that connections are made in unpredictable and unknowable ways. The collective unconscious is being re-engineered, rewired and upgraded with an order of magnitude improvement in raw speed, efficiency, and capacity. Increasing synchronistic experiences may simply be the inevitable by-product.
Continuum
Spoken language transfers ideas between minds.
Paintings (on caves or canvas) and manuscripts (on stone or paper) transfers ideas to minds across time.
The printing press rapidly reproduces ideas, permitting distribution to many minds across time.
Broadcast media distributes ideas to many minds instantly and simultaneously.
The Net creates many connections between many ideas and many minds instantly and simultaneously.
Expect the unexpected.
Frequently.
Continue to Chapter 4: Eyeballs
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