Good Luck / Bad Luck
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Justin S.
Member
Seditious
GodSlayer
'good' and 'bad' thing happen to me all the time randomly so I wouldn't say either exist except as some sort of psychosomatic thing or as a superstitious thing (like saying 'god did it' to explain things, luck is just a way of avoiding probabilities and other logical ideas)
It seems safe to say that "luck" is just another nebulous idea or word we use to describe the origins of our fortunes and misfortunes. Given that "luck" as the term is generally used would likely require some mystical force to cause these "good or bad" things to happen, I cannot accept it is reality. I could be entirely wrong...
Seditious
GodSlayer
lol, why feel the need to add disclaimer to such an utterly reasonable statement as if the acceptance of fallibility were not already implied by a very attitude of rationality itself?
Good point
I suppose because I figure any time now someone will unbosom a lenghty epistle, explaining why this wasn't so easily dismissed. Apparently, I have some manner of philosophical paranoia
I think we've all had that feeling that whatever we do, nothing wrong can go wrong. It's almost as though a serious of positive events for example, can create some sort of psychological momentum.
On the otherside, if you walk into an environment you are uncomfortable in and you're lacking confidence for whatever reason, chances are you'll stumble. Perhaps then, on some unconscious level, and all the decision making that goes in our lives on some subtle level, adds up to the good and bad luck we find ourselves in given enough time.
On the otherside, if you walk into an environment you are uncomfortable in and you're lacking confidence for whatever reason, chances are you'll stumble. Perhaps then, on some unconscious level, and all the decision making that goes in our lives on some subtle level, adds up to the good and bad luck we find ourselves in given enough time.
Seditious
GodSlayer
that's exactly what I meant by the psychosomatic explanation. What appears to be luck as merely our own creation---improving probabilities with our own attitude and endeavor. In a book about Bruce Lee, he apparently said, "I don't believe in pure luck. You have to create your own luck. You have to be aware of the opportunities around you and take advantage of them." I think this is exactly it---taking more chances with a better attitude and thus improving chances of success by comparison to when depressed and cautious and passing up opportunities to the extent we want to say 'nothing good ever happens to me,' as if it were not an active process having to choose to act upon things so they may happen to you. So of course the actual increase of better experiences through a better attitude and willingness to live may change, but the perception that it is 'luck' which is responsible for it, and that it is 'luck' not one's own attitude which facilitates further good fortune seems just a psychosomatic consequence---we just in lacking a clear awareness of how we behaved between then and now assume we haven't done enough to credit ourselves fully with our 'luck' and instead see it as some mysterious thing acting independent of us.
So to summarize I guess, there is that subjective component (ie., how you personally view a situation over another persons whereby, in some cases, may be as different as night and day depending on the type of person you are) and the objective (ie., those unconcious and subtle effects on your decision making ability, which may actually help create a concrete positive or negative future event depending).
That said, I wonder, with the sheer complexity of human interaction in every respect .. does positivity necessarily lead to better decision making and thus a better outcome?, or is it not just as blind? In otherwords, is the subjective basis the strongest aspect in the determination of good or bad luck?
In the same way, even if we had free will (to make a comparison), I am still ignorant to the full extent of my choices and what might follow and thus, is the benefit entirely in my own mind and at the end of the day? Will the odds have just played out the same way they always do?
More clearly, does the unpredictability of events reduce the strength of individual choice?
That said, I wonder, with the sheer complexity of human interaction in every respect .. does positivity necessarily lead to better decision making and thus a better outcome?, or is it not just as blind? In otherwords, is the subjective basis the strongest aspect in the determination of good or bad luck?
In the same way, even if we had free will (to make a comparison), I am still ignorant to the full extent of my choices and what might follow and thus, is the benefit entirely in my own mind and at the end of the day? Will the odds have just played out the same way they always do?
More clearly, does the unpredictability of events reduce the strength of individual choice?
Seditious
GodSlayer
The Eastern view would be that anything which obscures accurate perception is detrimental, so even though there is that thing called 'depressive realism' where people who're mildly depressed are more honest about their abilities and chances in life, the 'positive' delusion wouldn't be regarded as better to them as to the cheery Americans, as if being in bliss by ignorance makes you more likely to succeed. Answering the quoted In short, 'no, not necessarily.'
Deep within the psyche of the individuial there is this expectation that good actions return in the form of good events, and bad or negative action, bad events, which of course leads to karma, religion, supersition, but I guess the most important part of it all is a feeling of control over the world they subsequently gain, which benefits the individual on the psychological level.
It is true in a general sense though especially in the caes of human interaction, I mean, treatinig others well will usually cause them to treat you well, or at least without just hostility, though this may not always be the case. Sometimes in trying to please everyone, you necessarily offend, though unintentional.
I do agree though, it need not be the case. What we may consider to be a negative event one day, may well result in an extremely positive situation weeks or years later. Again, the determination of what is good or bad as far as events go appears arbitrary and rather, based upon the subjective importance that person places in the contrast to other life events.
It is true in a general sense though especially in the caes of human interaction, I mean, treatinig others well will usually cause them to treat you well, or at least without just hostility, though this may not always be the case. Sometimes in trying to please everyone, you necessarily offend, though unintentional.
I do agree though, it need not be the case. What we may consider to be a negative event one day, may well result in an extremely positive situation weeks or years later. Again, the determination of what is good or bad as far as events go appears arbitrary and rather, based upon the subjective importance that person places in the contrast to other life events.
Magrathean
worldbuilder
I wouldn't say that probability is a logical idea. It's just a tool we use to be able to predict to a certain (preferably high) degree of accuracy what will happen given certain situations when we don't know every rule. To use the classical example, we say that there is a probability 0f 1/2 or 50% of a coin landing on tails (ok, 49.99999% for those of you who claim that it can land on its side), but if we knew the initial position of the coin, its exact location, the exact location/inclination/roughness/slipperiness/etc of the floor, the density of the air, the exact direction and strength with which the coin was thrown, the speed and direction of the wind and the speed with which the coin is turning in the air we would be able to predict with 100% certainty the final result.Seditious said:
My answer to this is an extension of my answer to Seditious's post (above), but then the validity each person gives to it is subject to whether they are deterministic or not.judas69 said:
My answer: No, there isn't such a thing. I believe that if we knew the exact positions and properties of all the particles in the universe at a particular moment we could predict exactly what will happen at any given moment after that. Particles have certain properties and behave according to certain rules (which physicists have tried to find out for centuries), and as such every event has only one possible outcome, which is the result of all the particles and energy interacting and following those "rules", so any other outcome would imply the violation of those rules. Therefore, there isn't such a thing as luck or chance. Those are just names we give to our ignorance of how things work and how they will turn out. OldScratch said it
It's only psychological. And the problem with this, as with every other act of faith, is that if it doesn't happen (in your case, if something does go wrong) then you can shrug it off and say "oh, well, we all make mistakes" or blame something/someone else but if it does happen (in your case, if you were right and nothing did go wrong) then everybody takes it as proof that their belief is true (in your case, everybody would go "you see? I told you he had good luck").judas69 said:
But then it isn't luck, it's the logical consequence of a series of events all added up together. You stumbled because you were already unconfident (you didn't try hard enough, you accepted failure instead of trying again, you didn't pay enough attention to things because you were thinking that you'd probably fail...), this reduced your confidence even more, that becomes part of your personality or state of mind, it influences your future actions.judas69 said:
No, not necessarily. Overconfidence can also blind us to something really important to the outcome of an event, thus making us fail. I think that the more objectively we see something the better-prepared and more-likely we are to succeed.judas69 said:
To answer the last question, yes. Things happen the way they have to happen, every moment is the logical and only possible consequence of the previous moment. How you view things might affect the way you act upon them and thus the ultimate consequence of something, but in the end that view was the consequence of everything that happened before and thus inevitable, so you didn't really "change destiny" or anything by reacting in a certain way. So i guess the other question is answered: what you think about something might have an effect on what happens later, but regardless of what it is that you think what happened happened and couldn't have happened any other way.judas69 said:
In the end, do we even have individual choice? I'd say no. Everything we "choose" is the logical consequence of the past.judas69 said:
The universe is moral-free, it doesn't think or feel. In the end, "positive" and "negative" are in our mind.
Seditious
GodSlayer
lol, I wouldn't universalize the tendencies of the ignorant to all.
indeed there is that 'Christian Karma' as I call it (Since it is a gross misuse of the word karma used in an ethical monotheist sense) which imagines 'the bull wont charge me cos I'm a vegetarian' rather than, as actual karma would have it, 'there must be some lesson I am to learn from the bull charging if it does so.' I think it's only in foolishness we expand on our common sense idea of feeling good in return for eating good and other sorts of cause/effect over to imagining doing good in one realm (like being nice to one person) should magically have the entire universe henceforth favour us in all respects (such as all people treating you nicely), it's like a causal fallacy you can imagine occuring from the intelligent creature which learns these relationships of things ending up with when lacking the wisdom to know which relationships are actually properly correlated, hence calling it a matter of ignorance.
The allusion here is to a system of Justice and I personally don't think belief in such a system is all that ignorant. The most intelligent and moral animals (humans) adhere to a system of justice of some form, which is very much characteristic to the higher modes of thought and cognitive development in general and is extremely important in the functioning of society aswell so, it works and is an important basis for our Civilization.
As I've mentioned in another thread, global karma exists because we live on an enclosed planet, and in an enclosed system, inherit the debt of previous generations and so on. There may not be a mystical component here, but karma and causuality and basic physics and energy conservation, all run along the same lines.
As I've mentioned in another thread, global karma exists because we live on an enclosed planet, and in an enclosed system, inherit the debt of previous generations and so on. There may not be a mystical component here, but karma and causuality and basic physics and energy conservation, all run along the same lines.
Magrathean
worldbuilder
I wouldn't say that. There are animals who ensure the survival and improvement of the species/colony by letting their injured/sick/defective induviduals die (or sometimes even killing them): screw a few for the benefit of the majority, and there isn't any bullshit like discrimination or corruption. Wouldn't you call this a "better" or "higher" moral system than the one we have? Of course, this behavior some animals have hardly has anything to do with morality (it's the way their brains are programmed from birth), but it could be regarded as a "more moral" system than ours, in which we sacrifice all of society in order to protect and help less-fit individuals just because "everyone has the same right to live".judas69 said:
This hardly has to do with karma or the belief that good actions will return good luck. Societies have as basic rules to treat your neigbors at least respectfully because this allows for a peaceful and harmonic living, not because "the universe will repay you with good things" (replace "the universe" with 'God' and that's what religions say, but that's just their excuse; religions originally set rules or commandments such as "treat others as you would have them treat you" to ensure peace and harmony). And, as Seditious said, it is absurd to suppose that the whole universe will repay your good conduct with good luck. It's healthy for a majority of individuals in a society to think like this because it reduces crime and such, but it is not the way the universe really works.judas69 said:
No, this doesn't have to happen. Actually, it is absurd to me that some people have to pay the price and endure the consequences of their ancestors' mistakes. That would only make every person in the world be born guilty of something, and that goes against the general welfare of societies. I, for one, don't consider myself guilty for anything any member of my family/country/whatever has done.judas69 said:
No, karma necessarily has a mystical component and has nothing to do with physics or energy conservation, which contradict everything that karma suggests.judas69 said:
So basically, you disagree with everything I said.
As far as animal intelligence goes, you're making the arguement for a specific state of interaction and survival implications there of, which is fine but this has little to do with animal intelligence (everything to do with instinct) and virtually nothing to do with morality.
Implicit in the term Justice, is the balancing of positive and negative forces in a very primitive sense, and thus, is indeed the basis for a system of luck, karma in the western sense, physics ..and what have you. That's not to say the system is completely fair and balanced to the individual of course, but that is at least the assumption, the feeling, the desire.
And to the last part there, I was refering to my own perspective, and example of how global karma indeed exists, and how it need not imply anything mystical as some claim, especially as far as ideas of good and bad luck go. However, just a side point, in the eastern tradition "karma" translates to "action" and is not grounded in mysticism at all so, dictionary.com in that sense is really only supporting a more new-age and western interpretation.
As far as animal intelligence goes, you're making the arguement for a specific state of interaction and survival implications there of, which is fine but this has little to do with animal intelligence (everything to do with instinct) and virtually nothing to do with morality.
Implicit in the term Justice, is the balancing of positive and negative forces in a very primitive sense, and thus, is indeed the basis for a system of luck, karma in the western sense, physics ..and what have you. That's not to say the system is completely fair and balanced to the individual of course, but that is at least the assumption, the feeling, the desire.
And to the last part there, I was refering to my own perspective, and example of how global karma indeed exists, and how it need not imply anything mystical as some claim, especially as far as ideas of good and bad luck go. However, just a side point, in the eastern tradition "karma" translates to "action" and is not grounded in mysticism at all so, dictionary.com in that sense is really only supporting a more new-age and western interpretation.
Magrathean
worldbuilder
My point was that animals don't have moral codes and that what could be considered their equivalent to our moral codes (their conduct/instinct/behavior) have no reason to be considered worse or more primitive than our moral codes. It probably has little or nothing to do with the main theme, but it was my reply to a small parenthesis that was opened.
I think you're mixing ideas. That justice necessaily implies a distinction between "good" things and "bad" things doesn't mean that those "good" and "bad" things have to have anything to do with luck, karma or divine intervention. The very justice system defines "good" and "bad" (supposedly based on its particular society's needs, philosophy and resources) and imposes punishments for the "bad" things, but those punishments are carried out by humans and so have nothing to do with any kind of mystical power or force.
Fine, then let's use the oriental meaning of 'karma', just explain what it means so that i may build up an answer.
judas69 said:
You basically made my point, Justice is inherent in a system of Karma ..while mysticism of course, has no part in our justice system and goes without saying. Perhaps I should have used another word besides "force", it I think gave you a wrong impression, but I was however using it in the most general sense and by what I said prior, it should have been apparent.
That said, quantum mechanics is proving to be an interesting area especially when we begin to question the true nature of the world around us and thus, should be included at least for brief consideration. Over the past 50 years so much of what physicists have previously inferred to be constant, orderly and predictable, are reduced to statistics and a generally pretty gray and confusing picture.
That said, I think the quantum world offers hints of things that philosophers would never have dreamt of years ago and as far as this topic relates, the connection between the world and mind, thought, action, is definitely a lot more intimate than previously thought, at least at this level.
Animal behaviour, instinct, morals etc, is slow to develop signifigantly - it relies on evolution, which gives it the benefit of developing in balance with the world around them, but also an inability to maintain this balance should their situation (or the world as a whole) undergo rapid change, beyond the speed of evolution. Nature (physics) sorts it all out in the end - whether it comes up with a 'good' result depends I guess on the perspective you want to take, and whether complexity and variety is deemed 'good' in your value judgements.
As the most powerful and intellectual animals, we have created a world where evolution itself appears unable to keep up and maintain the previous level of diversity and complexity. To salvage what we can and 'develop' further into the future we rely on our own moral development through intellect. Though we have created this instance of extinctions ourselves, the potential for it to happen naturally is just as clear. I believe in the intrinsic value of diversity, complexity appears less common in the universe than simplicity, so from that unproven / irrational 'belief' I can rationally view human moral systems as more 'valuable' than animal.
Sorry to pursue this even further off topic - Oldscratch summed up the posted topic happily enough for me
NegativeVolume
The Unemployed Wonder
I only briefly skimmed this thread, so I'm not sure if I'm repeating here. If I am, terribly sorry.
Diligence is the mother of good luck ~ Ben Franklin
I think good luck here could actually mean benefits or rewards, but I suppose that is good luck as well. I know the more I worked towards learning poker I've received many less "bad beats" and have dealt out my fair share of them. Good luck for me, bad for whoever is on the receiving end of my beating. But shitty things unfortunately do happen to people, and we labeled it bad luck. So in that sense yes, it does exist.
Diligence is the mother of good luck ~ Ben Franklin
I think good luck here could actually mean benefits or rewards, but I suppose that is good luck as well. I know the more I worked towards learning poker I've received many less "bad beats" and have dealt out my fair share of them. Good luck for me, bad for whoever is on the receiving end of my beating. But shitty things unfortunately do happen to people, and we labeled it bad luck. So in that sense yes, it does exist.
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