FORTUITOUS (Latin, “by chance”) differs from FORTUNATE (Latin, “fortune”). Fortunate always assumes a positive outcome, while fortuitous is simply a chance result, either positive or negative. It is the contemporary informal use of fortuitous – that something good happens because of chance – that has led to the frequent joining of fortuitous and fortunate as synonyms. Imagine that a ball bounces oddly, resulting in a loss for one team (unfortunate!) and a win for the other (fortunate!). The bounce itself was fortuitous, but the result was fortunate for only one side.
Posted on: Thu, 25 Dec 2014 17:00:50 +0000
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