ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the possibility that debates over significance are fundamentally misguided—a position defended by Duncan Pritchard. Debates over luck’s significance tend to focus not on Significance-generic itself but on its proper specification. Theorists have tried to fill in the blanks by noting some typical features of lucky events. In many cases involving lucky events, subjects ascribe significance to those events. Pritchard suggests that an event’s being significant for someone depends not only on whether it frustrates or satisfies her subjective interests but also on “the significance that the agent attaches to the event in question” Constructivist subjectivism also reaches the correct verdict in cases where someone fails to ascribe significance to an event simply out of ignorance. Recall Pritchard’s suggestion that “the very idea of adding a significance condition to the modal account of luck is wrongheaded”. Perhaps some accounts of significance satisfy Pritchard’s minor premise; at any rate, constructivist subjectivism looks to be the main target.
