The Problem of Moral Luck

When Michael died, I blamed myself. I had taught him in three classes; I had seen his brilliance and his trouble. I should have seen it coming. I should have done something.

But here is the uncomfortable truth: even if I had done everything exactly as I should have, Michael might still have died. And if he had lived, it might not have been because of anything I did. The outcome was not in my control.

Philosophers call this moral luck. Bernard Williams and Thomas Nagel identified it decades ago, though we have always felt its pressure. We blame the reckless driver who kills a child more harshly than the reckless driver who merely damages a fender, even though their moral failing, their recklessness, was identical. We praise the hero who happens to be at the scene of the accident more than the equally courageous person who stayed home. We judge ourselves for failures that were, in part, accidents of timing.

There are different species of this luck. There is resultant luck: the actual consequences of our actions, which depend on forces beyond our will. There is circumstantial luck: the situations into which we are thrown, the tests we face or avoid by accident. And there is constitutive luck: the temperament, intelligence, and upbringing that form our character before we ever choose them.

My father's Alzheimer's taught me about constitutive luck. The man who raised me, who taught me to read Plato and to make pierogi, was built from memories and habits that disease stripped away. Was he responsible for the person he became in the final years? Was that harsher, more confused self his moral fault, or his misfortune? We want to say that we are our choices, but we do not choose the equipment with which we choose.

Elena's illness was circumstantial luck. The diagnosis arrived without invitation, altering the moral landscape of our marriage. Suddenly I was a caretaker, faced with decisions I had not prepared for. Another woman, another illness, another time, and I would have been a different moral agent. Was the love I showed her a virtue, or simply the necessity of the situation?

Even in teaching, I face it daily. I grade students who arrived at my classroom with vastly different preparations, different levels of anxiety, different capacities for sleep and focus. Some were born to parents who read to them; others to chaos. Am I judging their character, or their luck?

The problem is this: we believe morality should be immune to fortune. Kant insisted that the good will is good regardless of its effects, regardless of the happiness or misery it encounters. But we do not live in a Kantian courtroom. We live in a world where outcomes stain our moral record, where the unlucky are judged harshly and the lucky are forgiven too easily.

Does this mean morality is an illusion, merely the rationalization of fortune? I do not think so. But it means we must be suspicious of our judgments, especially our self-judgments. We must distinguish between what we controlled and what merely happened to us. We must recognize that the difference between the saint and the sinner is sometimes only the opportunities they were given, or the temptations they were spared.

The better question is not "what did I achieve?" or "what did I suffer?" but "how did I respond to the hand I was dealt?" Can you separate your true moral failures from your bad luck? Can you forgive others for the harm they caused when you recognize they might have been you, had circumstances been reversed? Can you maintain the rigor of moral responsibility while acknowledging that the ground beneath us is never level?

We are responsible for our choices, yes. But we must choose with humility, knowing that the consequences are never entirely ours to control.

— Theodoro Collinsky_
Humanari Specialist in Philosophy and Etics, Arcosmia Philosophy