This lecture examines the conceptual evolution of svabhāva (own being) and yadṛcchā (chance) in Indian philosophy. Originally framed as cosmic first causes in the Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad, svabhāva gradually shifted from signifying causality to chance. Between the sixth and eighth centuries CE, svabhāva-as-causality became assimilated into the atheistic Cārvāka/Lokāyata materialist tradition.