Is there really such a thing as luck?

To me there is no such thing as luck. Its like the tooth fairy or the boogy man. Luck is a made up word that people use as an excuse as to why something happened. Someone broke there leg....it was "bad luck". Someone survived a horrible car accident....it was "good luck". I laugh anytime I hear someone say they were lucky because X happened or unlucky because Y happened. I'm not here to debate why things actually happen, but just to ask the question, Is there really such a thing as luck? Why/why not?

Do you truly believe there is a force, or something out there that literally causes good things or bad things to happen to you? If you win a big jackpot or the megamillion jackpot, was it "good luck" that allowed you to win? If you lose all your gambling money on your first day in Vegas, was it "bad luck" that made you lose? Can you buy or borrow or find "good luck" or get rid of "bad luck"?

What do you think????

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Descriptive luck, yes. You are using it in your post. We need a way to describe (un)fortunate things that happen in our lives.

Prescriptive luck, no. I don't believe that luck is actually a force. I think we've seen this discussion before, and most people on the board don't. But it doesn't hurt to have a superstition or two.

There are five forces in the universe:

Gravitation is by far the weakest.
Electromagnetic
The Weak Force
The Strong Force
Luck

NO.
Not in the tangible sense. There is no "thing" such as luck.
Strictly a temporal/quantum situation.

Luck
is
Variance

Luck is the first pick in the 2012 NFL draft :)

Quote: thecesspit

Luck is the first pick in the 2012 NFL draft :)

Unless it's RGIII, in which case Luck will be the second pick in the 2012 NFL Draft.

All kidding aside, it's silly to ask on a forum predominantly used by mathematicians if luck exists. It's kind of like asking an atheist if God exists. Of course they are going to say no. In the LONG RUN, all things balance out and the house wins in the long run and yada yadda yadddddda...

However, I absolutely believe luck exists. Yes, an RNG determines if you'll win the Megabucks jackpot, but the precise moment you choose to push the button that determines your win is determined by luck. You can't quantify it, but it's obviously there. It's the feeling you have when you win (or if you're unlucky, when you lose).

Nareed's 12th Law: There's no such thing as luck.

How can I argue with me? :)

Seriously, "luck," as has been noted, serves as a descriptive term to mean "favored by random factors," or "favored by chance." So you can refer to a person as being lucky if she hits two royals in one session of VP, and as unlucky if she doesn't hit even one in 75,000 hands of VP.

I agree, though, that there is no "force" or "factor" such as luck, which can be managed, regulated, changed, directed, etc. It's just an expression (literally!). It is good manners to wich someone (other than a stage actor) "good luck." But no amount of rabbit's feet, four-leaf clovers, upturned horseshoes, etc etc will guarantee you'll win at the casino.

Depends about what you are talking about;

if you refer to casino games - or in general games of luck, then the luck factor is the standard deviation.

In real life there is also luck but in a much more ambigous way. Generally you cannot extrapolate to say that given the roulette is random all life experiences are random and vice versa.

Quote: Nareed

and as unlucky if she doesn't hit even one in 75,000 hands of VP.

Nah, that's not too bad...now, 160k hands without a royal is starting to get unlucky...