Thesis: Moral luck is basically a philosophy similar to the philosophy of moral judgment presented by “Kantians Theory” of “Moral Judgment” presented in the original work of William. However, Nagel believes that individuals should be judged with personal morals keeping in mind the role of personal intuitions instead of adopting an impersonal approach to make any judgments regarding the actions and events occurred by individuals beyond their control. Therefore, Nagel believes that moral luck is responsible for the actions, which are not in the control of an individual.

While expressing the basic concept of moral luck, Nagel believes that any problem or issue that is considered to be influential to us, eventually nothing is under the control of the person related to it. Basically he means things and events that influence us and results into some positive or negative implications, any person related to that happening is not morally responsible to that very act. It is luck that has to play the most influential role. Therefore, he maintains that people should not held responsible for the things that happens around them or by them which are not under their control, thus they cannot be held at fault morally. However, he believes that moral luck basically is born out of the conflict between human practice regarding any behavior and moral institutions. Consequently moral luck can be at the same time good for some people and bad for some people. However, the nature of the moral luck depends upon the characteristic features of the events occurring beyond the control of people. At the same time he also argues that we generally develop our personal judgments regarding any event or factor that was beyond the control of the people involved though we ignore our moral institutions that can help us realize the role of moral luck in that very incident.

On the other hand Nagel divides moral luck and institutions into impersonal morality and personal morality, which motivates an individual towards the basic feeling of commitment of an individual. Therefore, he encourages that individuals should always build their personal standpoint regarding any factor when moral judgment is required. He believes that we should not follow impersonal judgments regarding any factor, which is beyond the control of any person or us. However, he realizes that it is really difficult to attain honesty in human life with out any persistent neutrality or overpowering force to demolish the impersonal viewpoints in regard to what should be morally right to opt by personal means.

Therefore, he strongly argues that a person should not be held responsible for the factors and acts that occur beyond his control or for the factors or happening that result due to some previous circumstances of some ones actions and behavior. At the same time he also supports that idea that the various aspects and elements of the very nature of any act or event that occurs beyond the control of an individual, which is resulted out of some forerunner circumstances also needs to be judged by institutions and personal morality. Encouraging moral and personal judgment against impersonal judgment is due to the fact when a person judges morally he judges the person over all and the factors along the circumstances.

Though Nagel is influenced by the Kantian theory of moral judgment where Nagel calls moral judgment as moral luck. However, Nagel strongly believes that what ever we do is dependent upon our moral luck and circumstances have nothing to do with it.
At the same time, he also maintains that while judging morally, one cannot confidently say that certain event or happening is fortunate or unfortunate for a person. Basically he means we cannot predict before the occurrence of an event or action that it will result into good luck or bad luck to that very person or the other factors related to that individual. So the element of prediction and ifs and buts are excluded form the dictionary of Nagel when he explains moral luck. What matters when making any moral judgment is the things that are beyond control of the individual when a particular event occurs which leads to some negative implications to another individual.
Moreover, Nagel divides moral luck into four main categories, which are the Constitutive luck, circumstantial luck, casual and resultant luck. By constitutive luck he means that moral luck depends upon the very nature of an individual and his tendency and capacity towards any action, which if done deliberately and results into something good or bad. Where circumstantial luck means the nature of problems and circumstances an individual faces that results into something beyond the control of that individual. However, when previous circumstances determine persons luck and something occurs beyond the control of that individual than it is considered to be as casual luck. On the other hand when luck favors an individual’s action or projections that are not in his control, it is known as resultant luck.

Conclusion

Nagel in this article not only explains and defines what moral luck is but also argued various aspects of moral luck and concludes the role of moral luck for incidents that are beyond the control of an individual. However, he explained his views regarding moral luck with the help of examples taken from daily life. At the same time he also criticizes the viewpoints of the original writer of “Moral luck” and presented his idea related to moral luck in a very convincing manner.