Is there such thing as "luck" in chess?

^^ Excellent

But this is much better.

Then one player was lucky to get away with cheating and the other player was unlucky that the cheater did not get penalized.

I also agree that there is luck in chess, in the usual case when a player is not strong enough to notice all the facts of a position in the alotted time.

So far, no human or computer can understand every fact about the starting position in chess. There are often a set of facts about a position that are unknown when a player takes a turn because human computing power is pretty limited and games are often played quickly. Then construct a probability model for additional facts about the position that the player did not recognize when they decided on their move. For example, oops, that loses a bishop!

Whether there exists a bishop-winning reply can be mathematically modeled as a probability.

This is very complicated for me to evaluate and I am getting a headache so thank you and bye!

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Not bad. It isn't a game of perfect information, though. It is a game of perfect evidence where the evidence must be properly interpreted to obtain the information. It cannot be properly interpreted by any known means, as yet.

Therefore .....

Also, probabilities aren't accurate because they don't refer to specifics.

I’ve had both. Breyer’s is better IMO. Of course, taste is subjective. Also, Dreyer’s is better than Lucerne, and whoever is making the Safeway store brand, and …

None of the mass market brands compare well to what you can find at WSU creamery.

The judgements made in roulette and chess are quite different and based on different things, what is in common between them is that both are choices from multiple options to be made with lack of information.

If broken down enough the similarities become evident. If I'm not mistaken you did not dispute this logic before, maybe you even referred to it? Did you have a change of heart?

I like the Southern Scottish style. Quite light in flavour. We had a local ice-cream manufactury in Egremont, where I was born. When my dad took me fishing with him, maybe when I was seven or eight, we used to call in and often stand and watch him making it, in a kind of aluminium mixer about the size of a tumble drier. Watch him adding the ingredients. Now Billy Hartley is long gone and the firm is much bigger, although still based in the same part of the small town of Egremont. I think I recall him telling me it was a Scottish recipe, which is all he would say. West Cumberland, where Egremont is situated, to the West of the Lake District, is accociated with Scotland and was considered part of Scotland only a few hundred years ago.

Now, some national supermarkets like Asda sell Mackie's icecream, from Southern Scotland. It's nearly identical. Hartleys was just a little richer. Another well-known and much loved ice-cream was Tognarelli's of Kendal, just outside the other edge of the Lake District. I remember talking to a very old lady, with long white hair, in their cafe in Kendal in the 1950s. She very rarely spoke to anyone, so I was honoured. In the early 80s, I was working for some builders in the area while I had my house rented out because I'd spent a long time in Canada. We were clearing out the offices in the cafe and I have in my possession a sepia picure of the old lady as a 20 year old. Marjorie Tognarelli. When I was seven she had told me she used to be beautiful. She was being truthful.

I don't eat a lot of ice cream, but there is a small creamery about six blocks from me which has made their own ice cream for more than 100 years and attracts customers from all over Oakland/Berkeley/Piedmont. It's product is naturally much better (and expensive) than anything at the supermarket, but the drawback is that in warm weather the line is very long.

When I'm in Italy I eat more gelato--it's lighter than ice cream so a small cup is refreshing even after a substantial dinner.

Just a couple of points:

When it is impossible to make any prediction as to the results of a play--as in roulette--the outcome is determined by luck. Where the prediction of outcomes can be determined with some degree of accuracy the skills of the players will determine the result. It isn't bad luck that causes you to lose a theoretically-drawn rook ending, it is your own inferior choices coupled with your opponent's superior play.

I have always maintained that some luck exists in chess, but your poor or brilliant choice of moves is of your own doing, the Goddess Fortuna is not involved.

As to luck being "just a word", in an earlier post here I mentioned the 15-20 different definitions of luck that can be found in the Oxford English Dictionary, some of which are obviously inapplicable to chess; others can be used to support different views of "luck" affecting chess. Many here have chosen the definition that best supports their preconceived ideas and insist that only that definition is applicable, "proving" their opinion and making any disagreement "wrong".

I wouldn't pay much attention to definitions. Just write what you think is right and leave it up to the reader to work out what you mean or what kind of luck they think you're talking about. Personally I think there's one kind of luck. I might have a look at these 15 definitions and see if I can see much difference. The compilers of dictionaries may be apt to get carried away with their own pedantry.

If I were to agree with your first paragraph though, I think I'd need it to be explained. I don't see that human agency removes the existence of chance or luck.

This is the first one in Oxford:
1 <<good things that happen to you by chance, not because of your own efforts or abilities>>
Definitely unimpressed by that since it completely ignores the old adage that we make our own luck. So that's a fail for a start.

If I were to define it, good luck would be more about things going your way. The "not by our own efforts" isn't a definition of luck since we'd then need one for "due to our efforts but not in any predictable or controlled way". Definite fail for Oxbridge, because Cambridge does the same. I prefer Merriam-Webster as a rule, these days.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/luck#:~:text=intransitive%20verb-,1,through%20chance%20or%20good%20fortune

... and as luck would have it, Merriam-Webster happens to agree with me.

The compilers of the OED don't just make up the definitions out of thin air, they describe the ways the word has been used in the English language. They do not get it wrong or "fail" because they quote instances in which English speakers do/have use(d) the word. Your picking out one definition from the many available in many dictionaries just because it most closely corresponds with your own opinion and saying "this is THE correct definition, others are wrong" is no more convincing than Coolout's insistence that any activity where ANY bit of skill might be involved wholly negates the possibility of any bit luck playing any part.

I would suggest that they TRY to describe the way words are used and they don't always get it right.

Just look at the way Cambridge follows Oxford or the other way round and yet Merriam completely differs from them. How can that be, if what you say is right? I believe that Oxford is no longer a good dictionary. 25 years ago it was good. Then problems started. It used a heavily prescriptive definition of "agnostic" ... not describing how people thought but much more describing how a small percentage of people thought that people SHOULD think ... that is, the belief that "no knowledge of whether God exists or is real is possible". As a very firm atheist, I completely disagree and reject such definition of agnosticism. I also strongly sympathise with those who are agnostic on the believing side of the coin. They seem to have options removed also: and just because someone is trying to think for the rest of humanity.

So I do think that the "no human agency" opinion regarding luck is childish and silly. If it's adopted then it's as I said, that another definition is necessary for "including human agency". They have to attempt to maintain some kind of intellectual standard.

To put it another way, I expect they manage to define "bucket" adequately. And probably sand. And steel. And "and" and "or". We shouldn't trust dictionaries with anything more complex. They're good for obscure words but definitely not for those that could be the subject of a book on philosophy by themselves.

Therefore it's best to ignore dictionary definitions of things like "knowledge" (I bet they can never come close in 50 or so words) or of "luck".

The first (oldest) definition of "luck" in the latest edition of the unabridged OED is "gain, profit, financial advantage"--admittedly rare and obsolete. The most common meaning is "the chance occurrence of events either favourable or unfavourable to a person's interests".

The Merriam-Webster definition to which you direct us is "a force that brings good fortune or adversity", clearly labeling it as some sort of directed supernatural phenomenon.

Again, everyone choosing their own definition, whether from a dictionary or their own imagination, and insisting that theirs is the only valid interpretation, has been the major cause of disagreements among the thousands of posts in this thread.

So from now on you will accept my interpretation of all terms used is these forums as correct? Or will you insist that your opinion (I don't wish to use a term as undefinable as "knowledge") deserves the greatest credence?

"Where the prediction of outcomes can be determined with some degree of accuracy the skills of the players will determine the result"

This is simply a faulty definition and it would rule that luck and skill cannot both be factors in the same action. If chess is too complex, we can prove this to be false with an easier example.

A paper plane is thrown by human - result can be predicted to a degree and skill is always a factor on where the plane lands. We also know that the wind is always a factor as well. Now we have luck and skill both playing a part determining the result, even tho we can predict the outcome to a degree. Is the definition out the window already?