Christopher Hitchens - Daniel C Dennett - The Sopranos TV - 13 Assassins 2010 - Star Trek: Voyager - Alan Ball - Napoleon Bonaparte - Benjamin Franklin - F Scott Fitzgerald - Cricket’s Greatest TV - Eric Clapton - Gary Player - Tommy Trinder - Woody Allen - Branch Rickey - Derren Brown TV - William Shakespeare - McVicar 1980 - Tennessee Williams - Hunter S Thompson - Jimmy Dean - Werner Herzog - Donald Trump - Frank Sinatra - Emily Dickinson - Casablanca 1942 - Richard Dawkins - Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman TV - Lucky Lucky Lucky Me 1950 - Ferrari: Race to Immortality TV - Ernest Hemingway - Dirty Harry 1971 - Magnum Force 1973 -
George Orwell: The bullet had gone right through. It had missed his [George Orwell] larynx, it had missed his carotid artery, it had missed his spinal chord, and it only grazed his vocal chords. And all of them said the same thing. Can you guess what it was? That was lucky. And he said, If I was lucky, I wouldn’t have got shot in the throat at all. Christopher Hitchens, lecture Commonwealth Club 1981, ‘Why Orwell Matters’
Every living thing is, from the cosmic perspective, incredibly lucky simply to be alive. Most, 90% and more, of all the organisms that have ever lived have died without viable offspring, but not a single one of your ancestors, going back to the dawn of life on Earth, suffered that normal misfortune. You spring from an unbroken line of winners going back millions of generations, and those winners were, in every generation, the luckiest of the lucky, one out of a thousand or even a million. So however unlucky you may be on some occasion today, your presence on the planet testifies to the role luck has played in your past. Daniel C Dennett, Freedom Evolves
Isn’t it true that whatever isn’t determined by our genes must be determined by our environment? What else is there? There’s Nature and there’s Nurture. Is there also some X, some further contributor to what we are? There’s Chance. Luck. This extra ingredient is important but doesn’t have to come from the quantum bowels of our atoms or from some distant star. It is all around us in the causeless coin-flipping of our noisy world, automatically filling in the gaps of specification left unfixed by our genes, and unfixed by salient causes in our environment. ibid.
Everybody keeps telling me how lucky I am. The Sopranos s6e4: The Fleshy Part of the Thigh s6e4 starring James Gandolfini & Lorriane Bracco & Edie Falco & Michael Imperioli & Dominic Chianese & Steven van Zandt & Tony Sirico & Robert Iler et al, Tony, HBO 2006
With twelve men challenging a bigger enemy, no matter how much we plan, we must have faith in luck. 13 Assassins 2010 starring Kōji Yakusho & Takayuki Yamada & Yūsuke Iseya & Gorō Inagaki & Masachika Ichimura & Mikijirō Hira et al, director Takashi Miike, Shinzaemon
I don’t know about the rest of you but I feel lucky today. Star Trek: Voyager s5e15: Dark Frontier I, Janeway on bridge
I’m not a believer in luck, but I do believe you need it. Alan Ball
Great men become great because they have been able to master luck. Napoleon Bonaparte
Diligence is the mother of good luck. Benjamin Franklin
Nothing is as obnoxious as other people’s luck. F Scott Fitzgerald
Luck smiled on me at the right time. Cricket’s Greatest s1e12: Gavaskar, Sky 2015
I don’t know if I believe in luck. I think I’m very fortunate. Eric Clapton
The harder you work, the luckier you get. Gary Player
You lucky people. Tommy Trinder catchphrase
My luck is getting worse and worse. Last night, for instance, I was mugged by a Quaker. Woody Allen
Luck is where opportunity meets preparation. Denzel Washington
Luck is the residue of design. Branch Rickey, US Baseball administrator, 1950
What is this mysterious force and can it be harnessed? Derren Brown: The Experiments: The Secret of Luck
So I asked Dawn to go back and visit the seven residents she chose who don’t know that the lucky dog story is made up. ibid.
The difference between lucky and unlucky is simply to what extent they embrace opportunities in life. ibid.
Was there ever man had such luck? William Shakespeare, Cymbeline II i 1, Cloten
Be lucky. McVicar 1980 starring Roger Daltrey & Adam Faith & Cheryl Campbell & Georgina Hale & Steven Berkoff & Brian Hall & Peter Jonfield et al, director Tom Clegg
You know what luck is? Luck is believing you’re lucky, that’s all. To hold a front position in this rat race you’ve got to believe you’re lucky. Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire, Stanley
Luck is a very thin wire between survival and disaster, and not many people can keep their balance on it. Hunter S Thompson
You gotta try your luck at least once a day, because you could be going around lucky all day and not even know it. Jimmy Dean
Sometimes bad luck hits you like in an ancient Greek tragedy, and it’s not your own making. When you have a plane crash, it’s not your fault. Werner Herzog
Everything in life is luck. Donald Trump
People often remark that I’m pretty lucky. Luck is only important in so far as getting the chance to sell yourself at the right moment. After that, you’ve got to have talent and know how to use it. Frank Sinatra
Luck is not chance, it’s toil; fortune’s expensive smile is earned. Emily Dickinson
Leave him alone, Miss Ilsa. You bad luck to him. Casablanca 1942 ***** starring Humphrey Bogart & Ingrid Bergman & Paul Henreid & Claude Rains & Conrad Veidt & Sydney Greenstreet & Peter Lorre & Curt Bois et al, director Michael Curtiz, Sam
The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are slowly being devoured from within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst, and disease. It must be so. If there ever is a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in the population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference. Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life
Luck may be the most mysterious and capricious force in the universe. But what exactly is luck? … Does random chance decide our destiny, or is every role of the dice predetermined by physics? Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman s5e3: Is Luck Real? Science 2014
Lucky, lucky, lucky me!
I’m a lucky son of a gun.
I work eight hours, and sleep eight hours.
That leaves eight hours for fun.
Lucky, lucky, lucky me!
Even though I haven’t a dime,
I laugh and play in a carefree way
And I have a wonderful time.
I smile at the sun and when daylight is done
Ev’ry evening is loaded with charms.
I wish on the moon, and I whistle a tune
And I dream of a girl in my arms. Lucky Lucky Me, song 1950
Bad luck is the consequence of what we haven’t been able to do or foresee. Ferrari: Race to Immortality, Enzo Ferrari, Sky Documentaries 2020
He was just a coward and that was the worst luck any man could have. Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls