Is Chance Important?

[Fire_Fly 499]

I just spent the last hour or so arguing with myself about this, and I couldn't seem to choose a side.

 

Is the concept of chance important, or is is just another thing to bee seen and ignored for other "more important" things?

 

My argument for chance being important:

 

Chance is existence. Common biology brings life, but chance defines it. Everything in existence, living or nonliving is exactly the way it is down to the last minute detail simply due to chance. Everything we are and everything we know is an existential dice roll. Being born/created, existing? Those are facts. What makes them what they are are pure chance. If we were to be born again, how slim are the odds that we'll have 100% of the exact same experiences we've had in this life, meet 100% of the exact same people, have 100% of the exact same ideas, be born with the 100% same chromosome formation, IQ, personality, likes and dislikes? Extremely slim to none. Everything we are, and everything that made us what we are is formed by chance.

 

My argument for chance NOT being important:

 

Chance is an everyday occurrence. We see it constantly, and once we're developed enough to realize it, we can think about what would happen if outcomes were different, and they wouldn't change the way we think or act very much. Lots of things are left up to chance or luck, and all we can really do is hope for a beneficial outcome, making it more an opportunity to see how the dice of our lives roll than anything else. Any situation left up to chance will happen, an outcome will occur, and something changes, but there are some certainties that are always fact, which are what our main focus is usually on.

 

That said, I'm interested in hearing what everyone thinks!

 

Do you think chance is an important part of life, or just something we see all the time that doesn't hold much real meaning?

[thor9356 540]

I like this as its got me thinking so I will say what I can on this. Chance can be an important part of life but if we were leaving everything up to chance then like a double edged sword the results can be good or bad or both. In order to avoid that and put chance into our favor we have to make choices in life that will affect chance and make it beneficial to us. Ironically yes this is taking a chance but its a chance that we CHOSE (sorry for the caps) to take and there are things that factor into chance as well.

 

One of the main factors of it is experience for said chance you take. If you had a bad or good experience based around that chance then you can use it to better your odds for that chance. An excellent example of chance would be poker (obviously) cause as everybody knows that game revolves around chance and the choices you make to affect your chances. This is of course how I see chance.

[Fire_Fly 499]

I like this as its got me thinking so I will say what I can on this. Chance can be an important part of life but if we were leaving everything up to chance then like a double edged sword the results can be good or bad or both. In order to avoid that and put chance into our favor we have to make choices in life that will affect chance and make it beneficial to us. Ironically yes this is taking a chance but its a chance that we CHOSE (sorry for the caps) to take and there are things that factor into chance as well.

 

One of the main factors of it is experience for said chance you take. If you had a bad or good experience based around that chance then you can use it to better your odds for that chance. An excellent example of chance would be poker (obviously) cause as everybody knows that game revolves around chance and the choices you make to affect your chances. This is of course how I see chance.

 

Interesting point!

 

I understand what you mean by making choices based on experience, and I agree, but when it comes down to it, the experiences we use to make those decisions; aren't they all chance, too?

 

For instance, if you're bitten by a dog, it's a negative experience, and it could make you decide that you don't want a dog. But if you live your life over from the beginning, the chances of you getting bitten by a dog again under the exact same circumstances that drive you toward that decision are extremely slim. In that case, your decision would change completely.

[Regality 233]

I view chance as a haphazard give-and-take; meaning while sometimes I think of how lucky I am; while other times I wonder, why did it have to happen to me. Therefore, I usually don't take it in to account in my day-to-day thinking, and just live life, adapting to whatever's thrown at me next.

~~

[I used to be a stranger 7,994]

Probability dictates that if if throw a loose deck of cards in the air, chances are against it landing on the ground, all cards with the back side facing up, and sorted by suit and number.

That doesn't stop it from happening however. The chances are against it happening, but it's not physically impossible.

Science is great at figuring out how to explain things that happen repeatedly, but very poor at explaining how things happen that only happen once, or are otherwise not feasibly repeatable. Hence, miracles.

I believe in a religion that takes predestination as well as free-will hand in hand. We are entirely responsible for all the decisions we make, but such intention by all peoples throughout the world does not preclude divine intervention within our limited perspective of time. (Limited perspective, as in the infinity minuscule ever-changing viewport we have called "the Present")

[Flying Whales 311]

Chance is hugely important. Life as we know it is so tenuous that without chance the world as we know it wouldn’t exist. A simple personal example here: The only reason I know my closest friend is because my dad had a BBQ one day and invited a friend of his and his family over, my dad’s friend had his son come over even though he didn’t really want to. Him and I played a little Skyrim together and the rest is history. Had he not shown up I wouldn’t even know him now. In short I’d say not only is chance important, I’d go as far to say that it is essential.

[Titan Rising 2,156]

I think it depends largely on whether or not you believe in some kind of existence after death.

 

Chance and probability are calculated by the likelihood something is bound to occur. It is easy to say that living right now in this point of time, being able to observe and think and be self aware makes us special because the probability of it happening is low - but if the universe was created purely by random chance then are we special really? Time will forever move forward, and no matter how low the odds of this happening were it was bound to happen, and by that same logic it is bound to happen again, and again, and again, and again.

 

If you think about it, if time really exists forever we could have had this same conversation with the exact same people billions of times already with the exact same thoughts and reactions. In fact, if time continues forever we are bound to repeat the exact same events in the exact same order with the exact same consciousnesses an infinite amount of times. I see nothing unique or special or important about this.

 

But that's if you believe in things like chance and luck, personally I don't. I believe in destiny and fate - destiny forged by the decisions we make for ourselves and fate being the consequences of those decisions on the field of the unknown.

 

But whose to say really...

Edited August 27, 2012 by Hollowshield

[Dusty Soul 2,611]

I think Chance is important to an extent... I think chance is important for probability, but I'll never let chance rule my life.

[Fire_Fly 499]

I think it depends largely on whether or not you believe in some kind of existence after death.

 

Chance and probability are calculated by the likelihood something is bound to occur. It is easy to say that living right now in this point of time, being able to observe and think and be self aware makes us special because the probability of it happening is low - but if the universe was created purely by random chance then are we special really? Time will forever move forward, and no matter how low the odds of this happening were it was bound to happen, and by that same logic it is bound to happen again, and again, and again, and again.

 

If you think about it, if time really exists forever we could have had this same conversation with the exact same people billions of times already with the exact same thoughts and reactions. In fact, if time continues forever we are bound to repeat the exact same events in the exact same order with the exact same consciousnesses an infinite amount of times. I see nothing unique or special or important about this.

 

But that's if you believe in things like chance and luck, personally I don't. I believe in destiny and fate - destiny forged by the decisions we make for ourselves and fate being the consequences of those decisions on the field of the unknown.

 

But whose to say really...

 

I've considered a case where even if we were to live our lives over again, the exact same events could happen ant the exact same points, like predetermined points in time. I don't really buy into the idea, but it poses a good argument against chance as a constant.