The thought has occurred to me too, Jason -- and interesting contrast you note to our accepting a lost shot on a heavily contoured green with more equanimity than a lost ball in the water off the tee. I think the water ball
feels more drastic, the punishment
seems more harsh,
too harsh in fact. (Who wouldn't want his mistakes and sins to be treated with at least a bit of compassion and forgiveness?). But I also think, as I've raised recently, that it's the 'hand of man' issue again (though few seem to agree with me), i.e. the heavily contoured green, especially if it appears to have been 'found', simply
is and so seems to be neither trying to reward us nor to punish us; whereas since we're sure that an architect has
put the water hazard there,
on purpose, to hurt us and to demoralize us, we get mad at him and at the water hazard, and bemoan the lost ball. We're mad, in short, because the hand of man had the audacity to hold up a mirror to our shortcomings. And who needs an architect do to that on a golf course when we all have our wives and girlfriends and significant others doing it the rest of the week!
Peter