And now EgyptAir Flight 990 crashes off Nantucket. Four recent flights ending in tragedy off the Eastern Seaboard. Patterns in Randomness Confronted with these plane crashes and the nonstop media coverage and speculation that accompany them, one might be excused for momentarily entertaining some strange ideas about a link among them. Of course, we don't yet know what caused the crash of EgyptAir Flight 990. But it's important to understand that this recent spate of crashes is most likely a series of random events.
Humans have an innate tendency to attribute significance to anomalies and coincidences.
Thus in stories like this crash, where there are so many details regarding times, dates, locations, manufacturing specifications, grieving relatives, political intrigues and other items of possible relevance, there will undoubtedly be some seemingly unlikely links. Our ability to separate the possible from the probable tends to deteriorate under this torrent of information, leading us to speculate about cause and effect based on the flimsiest of connections. Coincidences Are Usually Just That A related foible is our often unconscious belief that if we can vividly imagine something, this makes it more likely. The EgyptAir Boeing 767 rolled off the production line immediately before another Boeing 767 jetliner that crashed eight years ago in Thailand. It's easy for us to envisage tired workers suffering a momentary lapse of attention.