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Luck is the phenomenon and belief that defines the experience of improbable events, especially improbably positive or negative ones. The naturalistic interpretation is that positive and negative events may happen at any time, both due to random and non-random natural and artificial processes, and that even improbable events can happen by random chance. In this view, the epithet "lucky" or "unlucky" is a descriptive label that refers to an event's positivity, negativity, or improbability.
Supernatural interpretations of luck consider it to be an attribute of a person or object, or the result of a favorable or unfavorable view of a deity upon a person. These interpretations often prescribe how luckiness or unluckiness can be obtained, such as by carrying a lucky charm or offering sacrifices or prayers to a deity. Saying someone is "born lucky" may hold different meanings, depending on the interpretation: it could simply mean that they have been born into a good family or circumstance; or that they habitually experience improbably positive events, due to some inherent property, or due to the lifelong favor of a god or goddess in a monotheistic or polytheistic religion.
Many are related to luck, though these are often specific to a given culture or set of related cultures, and sometimes contradictory. For example, lucky symbols include the number 7 in Christian-influenced cultures and the number 8 in Chinese-influenced cultures. Unlucky symbols and events include entering and leaving a house by different doors or breaking a mirror in Greek culture, throwing rocks into a whirlwind in Navajo culture, and in Western culture. Some of these associations may derive from related facts or desires. For example, in Western culture opening an umbrella indoors might be considered unlucky partly because it could poke someone in the eye, whereas shaking hands with a chimney sweep might be considered lucky partly because it is a kind but unpleasant thing to do given the dirty nature of their work. In Chinese and Japanese culture, the association of the number 4 as a homophone with the word for death may explain why it is considered unlucky. Extremely complicated and sometimes contradictory systems for prescribing auspicious and inauspicious times and arrangements of things have been devised, for example feng shui in Chinese culture and systems of astrology in various cultures around the world.
Many polytheistic religions have specific gods or goddesses that are associated with luck, both good and bad, including Fortuna and Felicitas in the Ancient Roman religion (the former related to the words "fortunate" and "unfortunate" in English), Dedun in Nubian religion, the Seven Lucky Gods in Japanese mythology, mythical American serviceman John Frum in Polynesian , and the inauspicious Alakshmi in Hinduism.
Before the adoption of luck at the end of the Middle Ages, Old English and Middle English expressed the notion of "good fortune" with the word speed (Middle English spede, Old English spēd); speed besides "good fortune" had the wider meaning of "prosperity, profit, "; it is not associated with the notion of probability or chance but rather with that of fate or divine help; a bestower of success can also be called speed, as in "Christ be our speed" (William Robertson, Phraseologia generalis, 1693).
The notion of probability was expressed by the Latin loanword chance, adopted in Middle English from the late 13th century, literally describing an outcome as a "falling" (as it were of dice), via Old French cheance from Late Latin cadentia "falling". Fortuna, the Roman goddess of fate or luck, was popular as an allegory in medieval times, and even though it was not strictly reconcilable with Christian theology, it became popular in learned circles of the High Middle Ages to portray her as a servant of God in distributing success or failure in a characteristically "fickle" or unpredictable way, thus introducing the notion of chance.
Circumstantial luck with accidental happenstance of favorable discoveries and/or inventions is serendipity.
More contemporary authors writing on the subject believe that the definition of good destiny is: One who enjoys good health; has the physical and mental capabilities of achieving his goals in life; has good appearance, and; has happiness in mind and is not prone to accidents.
In the rationalist perspective, probability is only affected by confirmed causal connections.
The gambler's fallacy and inverse gambler's fallacy both explain some reasoning problems in common beliefs in luck. They involve denying the unpredictability of random events: "I haven't rolled a seven all week, so I'll definitely roll one tonight".
Philosopher Daniel Dennett wrote that "luck is mere luck" rather than a property of a person or thing. Elbow Room by Daniel Clement Dennett, p. 92. "We know it would be superstitious to believe that "there actually is such a thing as luck" - something a rabbits' foot might bring - but we nevertheless think there is an unsuperstitious and unmisleading way of characterising events and properties as merely lucky."
Luck can also be a belief in an organization of fortunate and unfortunate events. Luck is a form of superstition which is interpreted differently by different individuals. Carl Jung coined the term synchronicity, which he described as "a meaningful coincidence".
Abrahamic religions believe God controls future events; belief in luck or fate is criticised in :
Belief in the extent of Divine Providence varies; most acknowledge providence as at least a partial, if not complete influence on luck. Christianity, in its early development, accommodated many traditional practices which at different times, accepted and practiced forms of ritual sacrifice in order to divine the will of their supreme being or to influence divine favoritism. The concepts of "Divine Grace" or "Blessing" as they are described by believers closely resemble what is referred to as "luck" by others.
religions, such as the , Mayans and Incas, had particularly strong beliefs regarding the relationship between rituals and the gods, which could in a similar sense to Abrahamic religions be called luck or providence. In these cultures, human sacrifice (both of willing volunteers and captured enemies), as well as self-sacrifice by means of bloodletting, could possibly be seen as a way to propitiate the gods and earn favor for the city offering the sacrifice. An alternative interpretation would be that the sacrificial blood was considered as a necessary element for the gods to maintain the proper working order of the universe, in the same way that oil would be applied to an automobile to keep it working as designed.
Many traditional African practices, such as voodoo and hoodoo, have a strong belief in superstition. Some of these religions include a belief that third parties can influence an individual's luck. and are both respected and feared, based on their ability to cause good or bad fortune for those in villages near them.
In personality psychology, people reliably differ from each other depending on four key aspects: beliefs in luck, rejection of luck, being lucky, and being unlucky.Maltby, J., Day, L., Gill, P., Colley, A., Wood, A.M. (2008). Beliefs around luck: Confirming the empirical conceptualization of beliefs around luck and the development of the Darke and Freedman beliefs around luck scale Personality and Individual Differences, 45, 655–660. People who believe in good luck are more optimistic, more satisfied with their lives, and have better moods. People who believe they are personally unlucky experience more anxiety, and less likely to take advantage of unexpected opportunities. One 2010 study found that golfers who were told they were using a "lucky ball" performed better than those who were not.
Some people intentionally put themselves in situations that increase the chances of a serendipity encounter, such as socializing with people who work in different fields.
Almost all sports contain elements of luck. A statistical analysis in the book The Success Equation attempted to elucidate the differing balance between skill and luck with respect to how teams finished in the major North American sports leagues. This analysis concluded that, on a luck-skill continuum, the NBA had the most skill-dependant result while that of the NHL was most luck-dependant.
Numerology, as it relates to luck, is closer to an art than to a science, yet numerologists, astrologists or psychics may disagree. It is interrelated to astrology, and to some degree to parapsychology and spirituality and is based on converting virtually anything material into a pure number, using that number in an attempt to detect something meaningful about reality, and trying to predict or calculate the future based on lucky numbers. Numerology is folkloric by nature and started when humans first learned to count. Through human history it was, and still is, practiced by many cultures of the world from traditional fortune-telling to on-line psychic reading. Dudley describes numerology as, "the delusion that numbers have power over events."
Although previous studies have explored the antecedents and consequences of luck using attribution theory (e. g., Fischoff, 1976; Weiner et al., 1987),Fischoff, B. (1976). Attribution theory and judgment under uncertainty. In J. H. Harvey, W. J. Ickes, & R. F. Kidd (Eds.), New directions in attribution research (Vol. 1, 421−452). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Weiner, B., Frieze, I., Kukla, A., Reed, L., Rest, S., & Rosenbaum, R. M.(1987). Perceiving the causes of success and failure. In Edward E. Jones, David E. Kanouse, Harold H. Kelley, Richard E. Nisbett, Stuart Valins, & Bernard Weiner (Eds.), Attribution: Perceiving the causes of behaviors pp. 95−120. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. personality variables (Darke & Freedman, 1997a;b),Darke, P. R., & Freedman, J. L. (1997a). The belief in good luck scale. Journal of Research in Personality, 2, 486−511. and more recently a cognitive priming approach (DeMarree et al., 2005; Kramer & Block, 2008) research on the underlying mechanism of how luck influences consumer judgment and behavior has been noticeably absent in the extant literature. Moreover, in much of this previous work, luck is manipulated in a way that is very likely to elicit positive affect as well. Thus, it is difficult to articulate whether the observed effects of luck are due to chronic beliefs about luck, temporary changes in how lucky people feel, or because of changes caused by the positive affect that is experienced. Their research showed that priming participants subliminally with luck-related stimuli made them feel luckier and happier. It was also found that the effects of priming luck using subliminal messages increased participants' estimates of the likelihood of favorable events, their participation in lotteries, the amount of money they invested in relatively risky financial options and these effects appeared to be mediated by temporary changes in perceptions of luck rather than by affect.DeMarree, K. G., Wheeler, S. C., & Petty, R. E. (2005). Priming a new identity: Self-monitoringmoderates the effects of nonself primes on self-judgments and behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 89(5), 657−671.Kramer, T., & Block, L. (2008). Conscious and non-conscious components of superstitious beliefs in judgment and decision making. Journal of Consumer Research, 34(6), 783−793.
Whereas some religious men, while living of food provided by the faithful make their living by such low arts, such wrong means of livelihood as palmistry, divining by signs, interpreting dreams ... bringing good or bad luck ... invoking the goodness of luck ... picking the lucky site for a building, the monk Gautama refrains from such low arts, such wrong means of livelihood. D.I, 9–12
Belief in luck is prevalent in many predominantly Buddhist countries. In Thailand, Buddhists may wear verses (takrut) or lucky amulets which have been blessed by monks for protection against harm.
God's sovereignty involves two aspects. God's active will or sovereignty would involve something God causes to happen such as the leading of wicked King Ahab into battle (2 Chronicles 18:18-19). Ahab's death was not merely the result of a randomly shot arrow, but as 2 Chronicles 18 reveals, God actively directed the events that led Ahab into battle and used that randomly shot arrow to accomplish his intended will for Ahab that day.
God's passive will involves God allowing, rather than causing, something to happen. Chapter 1 of the book of Job illustrates this in what God allowed Satan to do in the life of Job. It is also involved in the evil that God allowed Joseph's brothers to do to Joseph in order to accomplish a greater good, a good not apparent to Joseph until years later (Genesis 50:20).
The Gita says; "Set thy heart upon selfless performance of thy natural duty (Svakarma, Svadharma), but never on its reward. Work not for a reward; but never cease to do thy work" (Gita, 2.47).
There are five causes of all actions as given in the Samkhya wisdom; says Gita—
"The physical body (adhisthana), the lower 'I am' (karta), the means of perception (karanam), the varied multiple efforts (vividhasch pruthak cheshta) and the Cosmic Wheel of Action (daivam), these five sources together are responsible for success or failure of any action" ( Gita, 18 . 14–15 ).
Here the word "daivam" does not mean luck, fate, fortune, providence, or destiny. None of these English words are the exact synonym for the Sanskrit word "Daivam" here. "Daivam" is the Cosmic Wheel of Action (Kshara-gati, Apara-Prakriti, Maya) that keeps the perfect account of our past and present actions.
A man who says "Nothing is impossible for me; I am the only hero of all these achievements; who else is there like me?" He is a man of clouded vision and he does not see the Truth.
The Tunisian people retain some native beliefs of Berber people origin such as the evil eye. A number of practices, such as shutters painted blue are also used to repel evil spirits.
André (2006)Andre, N. (2006). Good fortune, luck, opportunity and their lack: How do agents perceive them? Personality and Individual Differences,40 (7), 1461–1472. proposed a model of luck-related perceptions that includes separate positive and negative beliefs. She found the positive and negative components of personal luck beliefs correlate highly, suggesting they are conceptually very close or in fact the same. Maltby et al. (2008)Maltby, J., Day, L., Gill, P., Colley, A., & Wood, A. M. (2008). Beliefs around luck: Confirming the empirical conceptualization of beliefs around luck and the development of the Darke and Freedman Beliefs Around Luck scale. Personality and Individual Differences, 45, 655–660. proposed a six-dimensional model of beliefs around luck, but empirical analyses supported only a four-dimensional model: belief in being personally lucky; belief in being personally unlucky; general belief in luck; and rejection of belief in luck.
Thompson and Prendergast (2013)Thompson, E. R., & Prendergast, G. P. (2013). Belief in Luck and Luckiness: Conceptual Clarification and Measure Validation. Personality and Individual Differences, 54(4), 501-506. clarified the concepts of belief in luck and belief in personal luckiness. They addressed the logical problem that nobody who disbelieves in luck could consider themselves lucky by differentiating between belief in luck as a deterministic phenomenon that affects the future, on one hand, and on the other, belief in personal luckiness as an appraisal of how fortunately or otherwise chance events in the past might have turned out. They developed and validated an internationally applicable scale to measure, respectively, belief in luck and personal luckiness constructs. They found no correlation between the constructs and no evidence of a distinction between positive and negative aspects of each, suggesting they represent two discrete and unidimensional constructs. Belief in luck and personal luckiness were also found to correlate differently with personality and psychological variables, such as the Big Five and affect.
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