Judge No Man Lucky till He Be Dead
“We must now imagine the dark and light hemispheres united, so that no empty space remains... Thus gentle reader we have tried to give an exposition of our doctrine concerning the material and formal pyramids, which is the true key and gateway to philosophy, and to every science.”
-Robert Fludd
There is an old Indian story that tells of a man who had a prize horse that ran away, which for this man was very unlucky. However the horse came back leading a herd of wild horses, which was very lucky. However, when attempting to break one of these wild horses the man’s son fell and crippled his leg, which was unlucky. However, when the military inscription officer came to take the son off to war, he found him unable to go, which was lucky. And so on. What I find interesting about this story is that it does not set up a dichotomy between good and bad luck, nor is it only about causal relationships, but rather luck here is like the spinning disk of a coin. A value judgment can only be made relative to where the observer stands in relationship to either side of the coin, until the spinning stops.
