About luck.

I just read a quote on a friend's Facebook page, it goes like this:

"Synchronicity holds the promise that if we will change within, the patterns in our outer life will change also. If the people and events of our lives are here because we have drawn them here, then what happens in our lives apparently by chance or fortune is not really accidental." 

Jean Shinoda Bolen

People often misunderstand concepts like fortune, luck or accidental. I feel I should use this opportunity to explain with some detail what these ideas mean to me.


The first problem in misunderstanding the concept of luck, is the fact that people understand it. There is no such thing as luck, or at least not as most people believe, so there is nothing to be perceived in the first place. Because most of us treat luck as this distinct objective thing that some people have and some people don't. Like it can be possessed, in different quantities - some people have lots of luck, some people are plain unlucky and, according to Rod Steward, some guys have all the luck, which is clearly wrong. Even if by "some guys" he meant "every guy but me" it would still mean that for all the women in the planet plus Rod Stewart himself, nothing good was ever to be expected! But back to topic. On one of those blogs I mentioned in the first post, I once wrote "Luck is not something you have, it's something you had". I still cling to this sentence as representative of the most rationally acceptable idea of luck possible, as it defines the concept as simply "something good that happened to someone". It's inevitably attached to the past tense, which means you can safely say "that was lucky" (meaning "A good thing happened to you there, and I could have gone horribly wrong") but you can't project luck on someone's future and believe that Mary should always roll the dice because she is luckier than anyone else, increasing the chances of getting certain numbers in the game. That would imply Mary carries an above average amount of luck with her that influences the world around her.
But what if Mary has an outstanding record of blissful outcomes when throwing the dice? Again, something noticeably above average? It's possible, yes. Is it luck? No, never. Explanation follows.
The question here is "Why do dice land the way they do? Why not with different numbers facing up?". As you may imagine, the answer is physics. I know this answer doesn't convince most people, leading them to mysterious and supernatural explanations. That happens mainly because although I state that it's physics that make the dice roll they way they do, it's still impossible to predict how the dice will land and stop. What some people fail to understand at this point is that just because there is no way to, in practice, predict the outcome (or, in other questions, explain a phenomena), it doesn't mean you can jump to obscure explanations. It doesn't mean there isn't a natural (as opposed to supernatural) explanation.
The problem with calculating the outcome of a dice throw is simple: too many variables. No human or machine can calculate that many variables before the dice actually stops: gravity, height, all the interacting forces between the skin and the dice, how soft or wrinkly the skin is and consequently how much friction there is, air resistance, dice-table interaction, weight distribution, etc etc. It's an almost infinite equation. Almost. But it's because of all those variables that dice drop they way they drop and stop the way they stop, showing certain numbers. It's possible that Mary, in her long history of throwing dice, has acquired a certain habit. A certain angle, a certain power, wrist rotation, picking the dice and holding them in her hand in a specific position - cutting it short, repeating a number of variables that sum up to a favorable result (how close is that to the concept of evolution?). Unlikely as it seems, some people do this consciously and even for a living. Take snooker players. For a first timer, snooker seems completely random - balls hit and go in directions he can't predict. And if in a single blow he wins the game, he surely calls it luck. But for professional players it's different. Where a newbie sees random, a pro sees controllable variables. That's the big difference - learning to control variables in order to influence an outcome. Now, you would call the first timer lucky when he scores, but a professional isn't lucky, and he surely hasn't been "gathering luck" throughout his career. He's just been controlling the variables.
Anyone who has ever tried a precision based sport will understand this, and I dare say its something common to all sports when taken to the professional level. I dare even say it happens in literally everything.
So, random is one of those "if by that you mean" concepts. It's true if by random you mean "something that derives of too many variables for me to calculate and predict, but still follows strict rules", and wrong if you mean "something that will always be different from our predictions, independent of our understanding of the situation" - there is no such thing (or if there is, it's probably quantum physics and I'm pretty sure they'll be trimmed out eventually).
Natural events shape the natural world, not luck. The most "unlucky" person can find her soulmate if she happens to be in the right place at the right time. The "luckiest" person will get hit by a car if their trajectories collide. Don't blame it on luck or lack of it. Luck is not something you lack, it's something you lacked. You lacked an incredible complex combination of variables that would lead to a positive outcome. That's the only definition of luck I can accept.


P.S. Let me know about this "Read post" link. I thought it might be boring to scroll down so much to find a post so I'll start using these links. But if for some reason the other way is better I'll correct it.