Life Outside PLT1

Musings: Luck vs Fate

Luck - noun - 3. a combination of circumstances, events, etc., operating by chance to bring good or ill to a person (source: dictionary.com)

Fate - noun - 1. something that unavoidably befalls a person (source: dictionary.com)

Both these words can be good or bad given the outcome or process (although fate it seems associate to the bad and destiny is used to reference the good). Whether you believe in these two words there is no mistake that you will have use them to describe something. In one off instances one would use luck to state the good or ill fortunes of someone but what if that instance happens to that person again and again? Would that person then just be incredibly lucky (good or bad luck) or it’s fated (or destined if it’s a good outcome/situation).

Now I know that good luck is harder to obtain than bad luck but what if, given a situation where the outcome (statistically) is fairly even, if a person were to always come out of that situation with similar results? Some will argue that being skilful in something will lessen the use of luck thus creating a desired outcome given each situation. And because the same outcome occurs at each situation, they will argue that they are ‘fated’ to always get that outcome. Thus luck is for those that are unskilled and fate is for the skilled. An example would be a normal person trying to chat up a person vs a pickup artist.

What if, though, the situation that is presented to this person can be mathematically calculated. What if the situation is completely random but yet at every instance of that random situation the outcome is more or less similar. For example, if a person were given a randomised pack of cards and all he had to do was to flip the top card and get 8 or higher and he had to do it 1000 times with the deck randomised (by a third party) after each attempt and when he does this is randomised. If he were to flip an 8 or higher each time given all the randomised processes, would he just be lucky? What if that particular person never gets a 8 or higher?

Some maths:
There are 6 cards in a suit that is 8 or higher, so 6x4=24. 24 chances out of 52 (46%) that this person will flip the correct card.

If the pack of cards is randomised each time, that person will only have a 46% chance each time he flips. No matter how many times he does it, it will only be a 46% chance each time that he will get it correct. Even if he's done it 460 times, the 461th time will still be a 46% chance of him hitting the right card even though statically he should start getting it wrong.