Today is May 23, commonly written as 23/5. So naturally I'm thinking about the Law of Fives.
I first read about the Law in the Illuminatus! books when I was an impressionable teenage dweeb about 23 years ago. Maybe you've heard of it too. If not, then you're about to acquire an absurd mental tic which will compromise your rational thinking for the rest of your life. Hope you don't mind.
Basically, the Law of Fives states that everything is related to the number 5, its fractions 2 and 3, or their concatenation, 23. I don't have my Illuminatus! books anymore, but as I recall, they're peppered with illustrations of how there's something genuinely historic and indeed sinister about the number 23. Here are some examples:
The earth is tilted at an angle of 23 degrees. There are 23 letters in the Latin alphabet. The first prime numbers are 2, 3 and 5. Each human parent contributes 23 chromosomes to a new baby; human chromosomes are arranged in 23 pairs. The philosopher Descartes chose the equation 2+3=5 as a sample objective truth in his seminal “Cogito Ergo Sum”. The number of people required to exceed a 0.5 probability that some random pair share a birthday is 23 (try this experiment at work, it’s fun).
Wait, it gets better. Divide 2 by 3 to get .666, the decimal of the Beast. Time Magazine was founded in 1923. Radioactive Uranium is U235. The Lunar Cycle is 28 days, or 23+5. The Mayan calendar ends on December 23, 2012 (and 2+0+1+2 = 5). Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564 and died on April 23, 1616 (the very same day as Miguel de Cervantes). His famous First Folio, without which he’d probably have been forgotten, was published in 1623.
But there’s more! Tupac Shakur was shot 5 times! Psalm 23 in the Bible, “The Lord is my shepherd…”, is TOTALLY the best! There are 22 books of Revelations, begging the question, what happens in the missing 23rd??? Caesar was stabbed 23 times! The world's most evil band is U2 – note that U is the 21st letter in the alphabet, and 21+2 gives 23! Similarly, the current Taoiseach's initials are 2nd and 3rd, assuming the Government hasn't fallen yet! Like, wow!
Cretinous? Well, yes. But you just try getting through the rest of your life without seeing 23 in every phone number, lottery result, address or anniversary. And remember, today is May 23. There are 222 days remaining in the year, and that's, well, the number 2 written 3 times. C'mon... isn't that just a tiny bit weird?