The problem begins right there: 1) the element of risk or chance involved, 2) the motivation or purpose which is involved.
Well,
Venture capitalism is to take a calculated risk for monetary or personal gain
Heck, even
Farming is to take a calculated risk for monetary or personal gain
Lysistrata got to my point first, But Scarecrow, you have to keep in mind that many a farmer lost it all to a bad year, and many more a small business owner lost his home for his business. Risk\Reward for gain is built into nature (By God) and only emulated in gambling. But like farming yields many times the basic investment and banking yields a small percent of it, Farming has a much bigger chance of success than man-made gambling.
If it is only for fun why not use toothpicks and give the money to a worthy cause?
Because, in my case, raising racing dogs is a lot of hard work and while the middle man always gets a big chunk of profits the trainers do make their living of the tracks profits. It's not zero sum, it allows the raising and training of some really great animals and provides some real entertainment.
There are two moral ways to gain property: by giving money or something else in exchange for it, or by receiving it as a gift.
Where on earth do you get that? Producing something from raw materials is the primary way to gain property and promote wealth and that isn't even on there. Finding something (like surface mining) is legit, acquiring something by litigation is legitimate (and that is not the same as a gift). Like most things, there are far more moral ways to turn a profit than there are immoral. The only immoral ways to turn a profit are via actual theft (hypothetical theft does not count, theft is necessarily non-consensual, and gambling is by consent) or through actual, pre-defined, illegal activities.
Distributing property (your term) by chance is legitimate, and your damned if you disagree. Joshua 18, you're going up against God's own method of determining who gets what.
Keith,
How much skill has to be involved for it to be moral versus immoral.
My I submit an overhaul to that sentence? How stacked the chance of winning is against you determines weather it is wise or unwise.
A game of pure chance with odds in your favor is smart to play, and a game of pure skill against a markedly superior opponent may be more foolish than even dropping a dollar in a slot machine. Weather the game is of skill or not the heart of the matter is the risk\reward trade-of that are so central to good economics.
I think the game designers may be sinful in the way they have set up the game
Casino designers are certainly manipulative.
I'm not a Calvinist, but I'll say this discussion has nothing to do with chance, but ROI, Vegas casino's for instance are required to give 2% of income payouts, I think everyone here can see how pathetic that is. Lotteries on the whole range from 40-60%, but they mainly return to a very small number of people. Still, a lotto ticket is way better than a dollar in a slot. Dogs and horses tend to pay out around 10%, but then you have to account for how many idiots bet on the long shots thinking they will hit it rich (and thats a lot...). I don't feel bad putting 5$ on a 1.44:1 payout on a dog that just dropped a class if he's the only one that is used to the longer runs in his track history (so, he is better than the other dogs on average and used to the conditions). If I lose, I got to see a race I would have paid to see anyway. Then when playing blackjack with friends there is a little skill involved, but since everyone knows how to play thats pretty much mitigated, the odds of winning are always going to be proportional to the pot since there is no 'house' to take its cut, so your risk is always directly proportional to your potential rewards. Totally 1:1.
Its always going to be foolish to put a risk on a 2% chance of return, but no less foolish than several of the people I know that mortgaged their house to go into a business they didn't understand with a very poor business model. It would be fair to say their chance of success at those skill based endeavors was around 2% anyway. The end result is (sadly) the same... But neither are sinning per se, just not yet wise enough.
