168,661 research outputs found
Personal Papers (MS 80-0002)
No full textLetter from Daniel W. Kempner to J. Malcolm Luck informing that he is curious to see who the importer is in Boston
Personal Papers (MS 80-0002)
No full textLetter from J. Malcolm luck to Daniel W. Kempner providing the contact information he requested regarding the import of some wedgwood plates
Free will and luck
No full textThe problem of free will is a problem about control and luck. If causal determinism is true, then everything we do is ultimately a matter of luck, as it is if causal determinism is false. Either way we seem to lack free will of the kind needed for moral responsibility. In this thesis a case is built for a certain type of modest incompatibilist view on free will. It is argued that it makes no difference in terms of control whether determinism or indeterminism obtains. What matters is that we have a certain kind of ownership over what we do. Causal determinism rules this out, but indeterminism does not. This has the upshot that not only does free will turn out to be compatible with luck, exposure to a certain kind of luck is actually required, for unless we are exposed to this kind of luck our actions will not be truly ours. By providing luck with a positive role this thesis invites a re-evaluation of the reasons causal determinism destroys free will, and a re-evaluation of our attitudes towards luck. In short this thesis challenges the anti-luckism that lies behind the problem of free will
The problem of moral luck: An argument against its epistemic reduction
No full textWhom I call 'epistemic reductionists' in this article are critics of the notion of 'moral luck' that maintain that all supposed cases of moral luck are illusory; they are in fact cases of what I describe as a special form of epistemic luck, the only difference lying in what we get to know about someone, rather than in what (s)he deserves in terms of praise or blame. I argue that epistemic reductionists are mistaken. They implausibly separate judgements of character from judgements concerning acts, and they assume a conception of character that is untenable both from a common sense perspective and with a view to findings from social psychology. I use especially the example of Scobie, the protagonist of Graham Greene's novel The Heart of the Matter, to show that moral luck is real-that there are cases of moral luck that cannot be reduced to epistemic luck. The reality of moral luck, in this example at least, lies in its impact on character and personal and moral identity. © 2009 Springer Science Media B.V
Luck and the Limits of Equality
No full textA recent movement within political philosophy called luck egalitarianism has attempted to synthesize the right’s regard for responsibility with the left’s concern for equality. The original motivation for subscribing to luck egalitarianism stems from the belief that one’s success in life ought to reflect one’s own choices and not brute luck. Luck egalitarian theorists differ in the decision procedures that they propose, but they share in common the general approach that we ought to equalize individuals with respect to brute luck so that differences in distribution are only a consequence of the responsible choices that individuals make. I intend to show that through the application of its own distributive procedures, the luck egalitarian approach actually undermines its original motivation by making the lives of individuals subject to brute luck.Master of Arts (MA)Philosoph
Epistemic luck
No full textIn almost any domain of endeavour, successes can be attained through skill, but also by dumb luck.
An archer’s wildest shots occasionally hit the target. Against enormous odds, some fair lottery tickets
happen to win. The same goes in the case of purely cognitive or intellectual endeavours. As
inquirers, we characteristically aim to believe truly rather than falsely, and to attain such standings as
knowledge and understanding. Sometimes such aims are attained with commendable competence,
but of course, not always. Epistemic luck is a species of luck which features in circumstances where
a given cognitive success—in the broadest sense, some form of cognitive contact with reality—is
attained in a manner that is (in some to-be-specified sense) interestingly lucky—viz., chancy,
accidental or beyond our control. In the paradigmatic case, this involves the formation of a belief
that is luckily true, and where the subject plausibly deserves little credit for having gotten things
right. Although the literature on epistemic luck has focused predominantly on the relationship
between luck and propositional knowledge—which is widely taken to (in some sense) exclude
luck—epistemologists are increasingly exploring the compatibility of epistemic luck with other kinds
of epistemic standings, such as knowledge-how and understanding
Psi may look like luck: Perceived luckiness and beliefs about luck in relation to precognition.
No full textSmith (1998) has shown that different people use the term 'luck' to mean different things, some of which might be used euphemistically to account for psi experiences. However, previous luck-psi experiments have only measured luck via the Perceived Personal Luckiness (PPL) scale without investigating what participants actually mean by the term, so in this study luck beliefs were measured using the Questionnaire of Beliefs about Luck (QBL). Previous literature indicates that luck might best be understood in terms of Stanford's model of 'psi-mediated instrumental response' (PMIR), so 100 participants completed a PMIR-inspired non-intentional precognition experiment with static fractal images as targets, and depending on success experienced either a task involving erotic images (psi incentive) or a boring vigilance task (psi disincentive). The mean psi score over ten forced-choice trials was 2.85 (MCE = 2.5), which gives a significant overall precognition effect (t[99] = 2.508, p = 0.014, r = 0.244). Furthermore, scores on the PPL and the Luck subscale of the QBL were found to correlate significantly with precognition performance (r = 0.263, p = 0.008 for both). However, only the Luck subscale was found to be a significant predictor variable of psi score (adjusted R² = 0.06, t[99] = 2.7, p = 0.008), indicating that beliefs about luck are more relevant to psi performance than PPL alone. Psi task performance was also related to belief in psi (rs[98] = 0.236, p = 0.02) and suggestively with belief in the paranormal (rs[98] = 0.194, p = 0.10), offering tentative support for the notion that psi ability drives belief initially. Precognition performance was also found to be suggestively higher amongst the erotically reactive than the erotically unreactive (t[99] = 1.65, p = 0.10), offering indirect support for the experiment's validity and the need-serving aspect of PMIR. A number of other exploratory hypotheses are discussed. The findings support the suggested relationship between luck and psi but further investigations should consider beliefs about luck and not just perceived luckiness
Beliefs around luck : confirming the empirical conceptualization of beliefs around luck and the development of the Darke and Freedman beliefs around luck scale
No full textThe current study developed a multi-dimensional measure of beliefs around luck. Two studies introduced the Darke and Freedman beliefs around luck scale where the scale showed a consistent 4 component model (beliefs in luck, rejection of luck, being lucky, and being unlucky) across two samples (n = 250; n = 145). The scales also show adequate reliability statistics and validity by ways of comparison with other measures of beliefs around luck, peer and family ratings and expected associations with measures of personality, individual difference and well-being variables
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Gambling, luck and superstition: a brief psychological overview
No full textFor what is generally accepted as almost endemic to many a gamblers' disposition - the ideas, practices and responses that combine gambling, luck and superstition - there has been surprisingly little scientific research in this field. As an indication of what can be undertaken subsequently, an intriguing picture emerges of how this affects players' character and motivations as gamblers according to the type of gambling engaged, including its relationship to chance and skill
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