Everything Comes in Threes

You've likely heard the saying that bad things comes in threes.  With the recent passing of the great David Bowie and Alan Rickman, there were several memes floating around that Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen, as two other famous British actors/entertainers, should watch out.  Sigh.

Is there any truth to the bad things come in threes saying?  No.  Not at all.  There's nothing in this world that causes three people to die near the same time.  It's all chance.  It's easy to say that bad things happen in threes because it's easy to change the parameters to make it so.  For example, if we're talking about the deaths of celebrities, what defines a celebrity?  How far down the celebrity list must we go to reach three deaths in a short period of time.  And what defines a short period of time?  An hour?  Day?  Week?  Month?

So yes, I can change the parameters to always make it true that bad things happen in threes, but by that argument, bad things also happen in twos, fours, five, seventy-fives, five thousand three hundred forty threes, not to mention ones!!!

The next time someone tells you that bad things happen in threes tell them that is nonsense, because it is.  And for the record, I'm not ready to see Patrick Stewart or Ian McKellen go just yet!  It was hard enough losing Alan Rickman as an actor!  But things don't happen in threes, so Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen have many more tricks up their sleeves to amaze us all!