Determinism vs. Free Will

[unknownidentityc]

All right well. What do you believe in Fate or Free Will?

Fate. Basically everything happens for a reason and you have no control over it. For instance, your pet runs away from you. You didn't cause it, it was designed to happen.

Free Will. You have CONTROL! :). For instance again lets take the pet. THe pet runs away from you. You might have contributed for it to run away from you.

So what are your opinions on this subject.?

[Pharcyde]

I see it through both ways, things to a certain extent are predetermined but if your drive is hard enough it can be altered

[jagged]

Thinking about these things too long is like listening to a half sentence like "... if it weren't for my horse I would of gone to college." Then that person gets up and leaves before you can ask that question and so that sentence that penetrated your ears and brain keeps repeating in your head trying to figure out the relevence and so when your at work your really not working your just thinking... if it werent for my horse if it werent for my horse. So stop dont think about it or else blood just might shoot out your nose.

Lewis Black = Hero

[Fect]

Life is something that has many facades and differences. Fate and free will are just ways we can describe life and how we react within our lives.

[akin_t]

Well in all honesty, you might think that if you try hard enough you will acheive anything (free will) but the truth is, there's just a limit to how far free will can get you. I believe some things are predetermined; I mean, the family you were born into was predetermined, you had no say whether you wanted to be born there or not.

[Kyouka Suigetsu]

Yes, some things are predetermined. Also, everything does happen for a reason. LOL, it's simply cause and effect. Action A causes result B to happen and it can get a whole lot more complicated than that. Is everything in a person's life laid out in some great master plan? No, I don't believe any thing of the such at all.

[SLVR]

I belive in free will. Its like luck to me. YA MAKE YOUR OWN.

[Silfrsyn]

Free will, because I would probably hate it if I knew my life was going to be ran the way my dreams are. That is knowing something is going to happen that's just in my reach and I can't do anything about it.

[akin_t]

I'm all for free will though, predetermination sounds creepy

[Kyouka Suigetsu]

A lot of people I know who believe in fate do so out of shame. Some of them have made bad mistakes and I suppose it's better for them to feel there's some greater purpose behind it rather than scewing up. I won't judge their decision to feel that way. We all need something to fall back on. Plus, life is more interesting with lots of beliefs.

[Anil]

I believe in both predetermination and free will...

How does that work...? Well I believe that people are given a choice with what to do with their lives... but as for the entire human race... I think that while individual choices have great impact, certain things balance out later...

Like choices ripple across time, but they affect other peoples choices as well... some ripples counter each other... in the end there are only a few set patterns that occur...

[Raku]

I think there's like a number of gates each day and you gotta go choose which to go trough, from what gate you trough, your life turns out different, know what I mean?

[Master-Cook-Sanji]

Well i think it is a little of both, yet i am more for Fate. I sometimes feel as if my free will has already been decided before i think it thus it is fate. But some of the decisions we make change the course of fate. So its like a combo plater, as if we are given the choice of where out fate will go but once that is chosen our free will end.....
But than again that is just this special person's opinion.

~ur fav cook~
Sanji

[Daeruke]

there r things u can change n therer r things u cant n matter how hard u try. it is like a lottery n a test. u might win the lottery if u r lucky but u cant get A+ on a test by just luck. u have to work 4 it. somethings r perdetermined but some u can choose

[captain_soifon]

i think fate is: where u are born, whose ur parents etc. and the rest is free will

[Neve]

You are making millions of decisions every second subconciously, and a significantly smaller number conciously. Every one of these decisions is based on your personality. Your personality is made up of two things, your genes, and everything you have experienced up to this point. You can change neither your genes nor your experiences, therefore you have no free will.

[bbyxgurl]

i believe in both cuz some things just happen for a reason that u have no control over and some things u have control over

[qball546]

fate implies that we have no choices. i could choose to kill someone right now or not to. by doing one or the other, i could change my own fate, so i would not be bound by fate. fate does not exist. its just another thing that humans created to try to solve some "why" or "how" questions

[fuoheru]

Definately free will. I don't believe that my life is all planned out already and that I can't do anything to change it.

[aerikh]

2 me...

free will = when everything goes right
fate = when life sucks.. :p

[Bakuretsu]

i believe that it is our fate to one day die and we have the free will to do as we please as long as we keep it in the lines of the law :P

[Caesar]

i think has fate this way to guide us to somewhere but the choices we make are all ourown!!! i have thought it that for sometime....

[vejitto3]

a little bit of both there's different to get there but the result will still be the same

t + t =T
- + - =T

[Tanya]

I think they're the same thing. All the choice's that we've made and decide to make, it's fate that we made those certain choices, but it is also us who chose to make that choice.

[SmallKid57]

i believe in fate... everything about our lives is already determined... and we're just playing out the story. some ppl think this is kinda weird if it is real and we're like puppets instead of life.

[fuoheru]

what do you mean by things are already determined though? I know we have no choice in what kind of background we want to be born into. But I think there are some things that we are able to decide for ourselves.

[Pipp-ORK]

Nothing is actually "pre-determined". That's just a way of saying that what we've already done, can't be UNDONE, and so forth. It depends on the way you look at it, I suppose. It's makes me feel claustrophobic to think that everything happens because it's "supposed" to. If we didn't make our own choices, than what would our reason for even BEING here be?

[Draffut]

Fate. Every person has complete free will to do what they want, but the universe already knows what you will do ahead of time.

And if you think you are crafty, and can beat the system by doind somethign wierd. thats unfortunate becuase the universe alreayd knew you would do that thing to screw around with it, and knows what will happen becuase of it.

[Neve]

Think about it like this: If you re-wound time about 100 years (say to 1900) and then played it back through, would anything change? No. Everything would stay exactly the same, everything would do exactly the same things, and we would arrive at exactly the same place we are today, 100 years from then. Now if you consider the future, the same would happen. If you played the next 100 years through a thousand times, nothing would change, therefore we have no free will.

[Specter]

A bit of both, I believe that God gave us free will, but ultimately he's already decided what path w'll take. Soooo yeah a little of both.

[M_A]

I believe in Free will. So, if you work and achieve something, it's not because it's your fate but because of your own will.

[Alkarzar]

So is it your fate to believe in free will or fate?

[InsaneShiyn]

um, fate is more of.... everything is planned out. Like a book or a story.

For instance, your dog example. it can still be fate, it was just destined you'd cause it to run away.

Fate is basically that god or some all mighty being already has your whole life written out, and your future is set.



Free will is not playing by the rules of god or the all mighty ruler. He doesn't control you, what you do or what happens around you, he just watches as you move, and make your own decisions with total control.

Its hard to argue about free will and fate because of quantam's and time travel theories about ones future, for what if our free will actions were meant to happen.

but i still believe in free will cause it's in me.

[Mizu no Kokoro]

hm... i dunno~ fate is like the ultimate... no word to describe~ sometimes its hard to figure whether things were meant to be or not... but, i dunno... cant type today><;; anyhows, truthfully saying i dont noe wat i believe in~ its kind of sad, but it's like that for me... yea

[Draffut]

I believe in Free will. So, if you work and achieve something, it's not because it's your fate but because of your own will.

if you work to achieve something, It was already known that you would work to achieve it. hense fate.

[M_A]

if you work to achieve something, It was already known that you would work to achieve it. hense fate.
But then all the hard work in't accredited to you. It's like you were supposed to do that anyway, so you didn't do anything special. Think about it: you spent haldf your life achieving a goal, and when you do, someone tells you, its just fate, its not really anything you did. If you think about it, then since something happens then it is fate? That makes fate an unnecessary concept, since it just describes any end result.

[MaskedDrifter]

I cannot believe that some predecided thing will rule my entire life. So I believe in free will. What happens to you happens because of what you have done.

[M_A]

Same here. I believe you get everything through hard work and wits, and because it was your fate.

[silverwolf801]

I beleive in free will because what ever actions you take in your life it changes what happens in the future

[Neve]

I cannot believe that some predecided thing will rule my entire life. So I believe in free will. What happens to you happens because of what you have done.
True, but you do the things that you do because of your personality, something which is beyond your control. Therefore all your actions are beyond your control and you have no free will.

[Lan]

Fate is omething I will never believe in.Never!
But free wil is one of the most important things.Everyone must have it so that hecan bild up his own character.I would never like someone who has no free wil

[Kozumou]

OK, I wrote this whole thing up to the point where I quote itsovernow in the thread debating the existence of God. Then I realized that I shouldn’t post it in that thread because it was way off-topic and instead post either my own thread or in one that already exists. I found the latter, and so I read it, and here ya go.

(Dang, too many smilies. lol. I'll try converting some of them to just text.)

Ah, but if God KNOWS what we are going to do, right now, then that means that our future is pre-set. I means that we cannot change the outcome of the future, no matter what. If we had free will, then we would be able to decide NOT to do something. However, if the future is pre-determined, then we have no such thing.

That is why I cannot believe in an all-knowing God. :eek:

I'm glad I read more (referring to the god thread). :P

This goes into a whole different debate that I've witnessed and participated in countless times . . . I even wrote a thesis paper that dealt with it. Fate. Is there a such thing as fate or destiny? Or free will? Or, even deeper, how much of our lives is fate, and how much is free will? We couldn't decide who gave birth to us, could we? We couldn't decide what gender we are (though some people are now finding ways to get around that . . . :sad:). We couldn't decide the environment in which we grew up, or if we inhaled second-hand smoke as children. Everyone has to agree with me on that, at least. (I think.) Even if you believe in free will, some things are beyond our control. But what things aren't? I mean, is it only things that were decided before you were born? I don't think so. If you get into an accident and die one day on your way to work, is that beyond your control? Maybe, sometimes. But probably not. You were probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time. What about if you were a passenger on a plane and the plane crashed? You couldn't control that . . . you could have chosen not to go on that particular flight, in most cases, but it's not like you would have known any better. So, is that fate or free will? Choosing to take the flight must be free will, but the flight was fated to crash from your standpoint. Maybe it wasn't if you take into consideration other peoples' free will or if you look at it from someone else's point-of-view. So, is fate the free will of everyone else? You might not have been chosen to be born in the way that you were, but your parents (along with uncontrollable factors for them, such as how they were born into the world) did, didn't they? I don't think there's a such thing as fate, per se. Fate is just the word we use for the factors that we find uncontrollable, because they are the result of the free will of other people or beings or, in some cases, physics or nature or whatever . . .

:o

You are making millions of decisions every second subconciously, and a significantly smaller number conciously. Every one of these decisions is based on your personality. Your personality is made up of two things, your genes, and everything you have experienced up to this point. You can change neither your genes nor your experiences, therefore you have no free will. Nice. :D This is easily the best argument in this thread, and it's something I've thought of myself. It's one of those ideas that makes me feel insignificant . . . it's like when I think about the infinity of the universe (or the possibility of a lack thereof). Anyway, I must agree. What you say is doubtless true. But, even if you don't have a free will, there's a will there, right? It might be beyond your control conscious control (or even if not), but all your choices are still according to your will (you used the word "personality", which, in this case, I'm taking to be synonymous, or I'm at least meaning the exact same thing as you when I say "will") nevertheless, so, does it matter if it's not "free"? What does "free" mean in this context, anyway? You're still making the decisions, whether you're freely aware of it all or not. Even if you're conscious in making a decision, your will determines what you decide. You will decide what your genes and your experiences have determined that you will. I know that people are obsessed with the word "free", but it's literally meaningless here, as there's no such thing as free will, as you yourself (itsovernow) said. But there is a will there, which you also said, even if it wasn't explicitly. But that will and fate are exactly the same thing. Uh, that's an interesting conclusion that I didn't think I'd come to . . . thanks, itsovernow. *smile* Now, whenever someone asks me if I believe in fate or in free will, I'll say, "What do you mean? Fate and free will are the same thing." *wink*

[Lex]

I've always believed in Fate, but free will has to be a part of it as well. It's not like you can sit still and fate will come to you, okay maybe if you sit in the middle of the trafic then your fate will come to you but that isn't the point. Free will plays a roll to guide you to your fate, whether it's to buy that lotto ticket or have one to many to drink. See where I'm going with this?

[Delta]

You are making millions of decisions every second subconciously, and a significantly smaller number conciously. Every one of these decisions is based on your personality. Your personality is made up of two things, your genes, and everything you have experienced up to this point. You can change neither your genes nor your experiences, therefore you have no free will.

Though I agree with you that "free will" as you define it doesnt exist, but thats a long way off from proving that fate exists. I think there is always some sort of choice, even if it is biased by your experiences and genes.

[Kurai-chan]

It may seem weird but I actually believe in.. both. Fate means that everything is already planned and free will is the ability to decide for ourselves, right?

Well... we think that because of free will, we could change the outcome of our lives and i believe that is only because we do not exactly know what our fate is or will be. but what if that fate, which is bound to happen, is based on what we are about to decide/choose and not just because God planned that outcome? Isn’t it that we can consider that we do have free will and fate at the same time?

[Aww… /me apologizes if ever her explanation isn’t clear..]

[akin_t]

How some can believe in fate is beyond me ... I mean, God himself gave us free will, it just so happens he knows what decisions we will make.

Well thats how I see it anyway

[Tokoyami]

It may seem weird but I actually believe in.. both. Fate means that everything is already planned and free will is the ability to decide for ourselves, right?
Well... we think that because of free will, we could change the outcome of our lives and i believe that is only because we do not exactly know what our fate is or will be. but what if that fate, which is bound to happen, is based on what we are about to decide/choose and not just because God planned that outcome? Isn’t it that we can consider that we do have free will and fate at the same time?
[Aww… /me apologizes if ever her explanation isn’t clear..]

Its clear to me.

I agree, i think that we all have a fate, but i beleive that that fate is determined by our free will. That can mean two things:

1. There is a predetermined path that we will walk and our free will to lead us down that path.

2. Our free will makes the path ahead of us, makes our fate, and the road is constantly changed with each choice we make.

I prefer to beleive which ever one suits the mood im in.

[Gyousei-Sama]

Fate or or not, I for one believe that I control my own destiny. Unless this world (Heh i said this world called Earth), turns out to be like a video game (Chrono Cross or Star Ocean), then I'll probably think otherwise. Hehe, I just like to make references.

[Akiha]

i agree with Gyo.....there may be fate, but our free willed choices can change that. i for one will not have my life planned out and set for me. i will do that myself, showing everyone that you make your own choices, no one else does.

[Kozumou]

i agree with Gyo.....there may be fate, but our free willed choices can change that. i for one will not have my life planned out and set for me. i will do that myself, showing everyone that you make your own choices, no one else does.
But you miss the point that itsovernow, Kurai-chan, Tokoyami, and I are all making. It seems like free will to you, it feels like it is, but, technically, what you will decide with that free will is already fated. Your will has been determined by other factors, and that will will cause you to make certain choices in the future. You can say, "I could go murder someone right now, because I'm free to chose," but only if you actually do it was it in your will to do it. Even if you say that, you're probably not going to. If you do, then that's because you wanted to for some reason, whether unconsciously or consciously. Your "free" will determines your fate, as Toko said. I said that your free will and your fate are the same thing, but, really, I meant the same thing as Toko, just saying it in a different way. All three of us were agreeing with itsovernow, only in our own words.

[kaede822]

as much as i want to believe in fate, its actually your free will that leads you. in a way though, they are interconnected.

see it in this point. you think that it is fate that you become the president of a large company? actually you wont become one if you just seat at home and do nothing. its your will to work hard to achieve that position. when you are in that position, you could say that it was your fate to have decided to work hard and achieve that position. in a way, that is why both are interconnected.

[tortuegenial]

I think for one thing that our actions are determined by our thoughts that have been formed and shaped through sociological factors because there is undoubtedly a connection between our thoughts and our actions.
Our actions are then morally significant meaning we are free to choose between a number of actions, for example good or bad.
Our ideas and thoughts aren't engrained in us but are formed, we then act freely on these ideas within certain limitations such as natural laws and laws made by man. All other actions are upon our free will that you yourself perform what happens to you are the consequences of other people's free will.
So for example it is not the case that it was millions of jews fate to be thrown into Auschwitz ovens. It was the choice of Hitler and his followers.
I don't think it is even a little bit of both, I don't see how the choices you make upon free will shall or can inevitably lead to courses of events or one event that will happen in the future.
I mean if for example my fate is to get married to a particular person then the only way for that to happen is through some specific actions that will lead us together that both she and I must pursue. Then that means I have virtually no control in doing other actions than those.
Fate is a course of events, it is not just one outcome.

"technically, what you will decide with that free will is already fated. Your will has been determined by other factors, and that will will cause you to make certain choices in the future." by Kozumou

If it is already fated that I will eat an apple instead of an orange for breakfast tomorrow morning how can I have free will in your case. That means I have to be alive tomorrow morning and I have to be present as does the apple. You are saying that I will eat the apple regardless of any other choice I make the previous day....?

[Nemesis0521]

Free will. If fate controls our lives whats the point in living if your already marked to die young. It makes no sense.

[Kozumou]

"technically, what you will decide with that free will is already fated. Your will has been determined by other factors, and that will will cause you to make certain choices in the future." by Kozumou

If it is already fated that I will eat an apple instead of an orange for breakfast tomorrow morning how can I have free will in your case. That means I have to be alive tomorrow morning and I have to be present as does the apple. You are saying that I will eat the apple regardless of any other choice I make the previous day....?
Hmmm, I'm not saying that it's fated as if everything in the future is predetermined or that it would be possible to predict the future. (I think that it's definitely not possible to predict the future, even if people can make good guesses; if they make correct guesses, then that's just them making good guesses, but they can't ever know for sure, because there are way too many variables involved.) I'm saying that, as itsovernow explained, the same thing would always happen no matter what. I believe that the same thing would happen over and over again if we were able to rewind time and give it the chance. There would never be any way to say that something is fated to happen until it happens. I'm not saying that you're not making decisions at all, or that you can't help to determine your fate. You will, but it's just that you would always make the same decisions to determine that fate due to things that are determining those decisons. I don't think there's a random factor, and so a certain thing will certainly happen in the future. There isn't anyway to know what that is beforehand, though. In other words, I have no idea if you'll eat an apple or not in the morning. You might decide to do just that the night before, and then end up not eating one for some reason, for any reason. Perhaps someone else ate them all before you got the chance, or maybe you just felt more like an orange when you woke up. If you end up eating an apple, then it was fated that you would eat the apple. If it was fated that you would eat the orange than you would eat the orange. But there's no way to know. I'm saying that there's a set fate that's determined by everything in the past. But since there is constantly more past then before, you can't determine what the fate will be. Fate is developing constantly. You can't freeze time to stop that development, and, even if you could, which is an impossibility, there would be no way to know literally everything, which is the only way that you could predict the future.

[BlkHairIchigoXD]

this has been on my mind n im deciding of making a story surrounding this topic do u people believe in fate that things happen cuz its fate or do believe that u r the one who makes ur own future

[Delta]

Personally I think fate is crap, you make your own future. I have a feeling this is also going to turn into a free-will vs. ummmm... not free-will, you know what I mean.

[_strangechild_]

Ah, well, there's always the debate about Free-Will versing Fate.

I'm more of a fate person myself, but I don't believe it's all down to that.. and I don't use it as an excuse either. I believe that in our genes we are almost set to be a certain way, it's not completely our choice as to what we like and don't like, etc (I think they tested this on twins seperated at a young age too - most of them liked the same thing and all that). So, I don't think we have a complete choice on that, thusly, I'm not all for the free-will thing.

However, I haven't really looked anything up in detail, so I don't have a set opinion.

[blah]

I believe that Fate affects events, not people's decision. Fate just sets the stage, and we are free to stumble about as we wish.

[phantom_ko]

I think there isnt anything called "fate", i believe everything happens because you or some one else has casued it and therefore it is not like you were programed to do something and threfore you end up doing it. Although i do believe the "thing" that is causing us to cause these things to happen is programed so in a way i am supporting the idea of fate, but i would not call it fate but its like your destiny. I believe that if you were some how able to create a time machine that would allow u to change the pass, beacause then you will be altering the "thing" that is causing you to cause these things happening.

When you use the word 'fate' it sounds like as if it is luck, but i beleive in fact that nothing is luck. For example you winning the lottery out of a billion other people, you may call it luck but i would call it chance that it so happened that all the elements happening just so happen by 'chance' just suits you. For other people who lost the lottery for that time, it is that the combination of all the elements did not suit them well for that time and it is not their fate to loose.

[chiking1]

there would be no way to know literally everything, which is the only way that you could predict the futur
Even if you knew everything, you still can't get it 100% of the time, because by predicting the future, you have to tell someone, and that alters what they know. If they are involved in the prediction, and the result is bad, they will try to change it, making you incorrect.

[p0rkfri3drice]

Even if you knew everything, you still can't get it 100% of the time, because by predicting the future, you have to tell someone, and that alters what they know. If they are involved in the prediction, and the result is bad, they will try to change it, making you incorrect.

that took soo much thinkin for me to get that >,< am i slow or was that confusing as hell??

-- life is based over a mix of fate and free will. your control is limited, while fate determines most things humans cannot. that's the simplest i can try to put my opinion, so we dont get confused =P

[MasterWordSmith]

My personal opinion is that there is a form of fate, Death. The path to death is free will. So it is my opinion that free will exists throughout, but is ultimately turned aside by death.

[g1g5]

Fate, luck and fortune is a misguided concept produced by the weak and incompetent to cover for their general failure, misfortune of bad decisions.

[SolBeowulf19]

I have to say that fate is more, in my view, toward events for us in life. Everything happens for a reason, like when you meet someone on the street who happens to be a friend of yours you haven't seen in a long time, then that's fate.
However, when it comes to making decisions in your life, that's free will. You decided to go out onto the street that day or to do somewhere walking rather than driving a car. Each decision you make changes the course of your fate. Fate merely controls the events that happen in your life, however your free will dictates that path your going to take. Fate merely controls the events in that path.

[nikuwadoko]

what is the difference between fate and free will? to me, it's all the same. At the end of time (your life), there is only one ending, one answer, free will or not. I believe that free will makes up what's called fate, or the end. we are ourselves, and we end being ourselves.

[Z_Blitz]

/Merged with Fate

[Ollson]

Neither...
Scientists recently discovered that free will doesn't exist.
Apperantly, our brains makes every decision before we are even conscious about the problem (i'm saying problem because i'm using that as an example).
Therefor, we can not decide for ourselves, our brain decides for us.
And i don't think that everything is planned out, cause that would mean that some sort of intelligence would be behind everything.
And i doubt that anything is capable of that.

[Delta]

Neither...
Scientists recently discovered that free will doesn't exist.
Apperantly, our brains makes every decision before we are even conscious about the problem (i'm saying problem because i'm using that as an example).
Therefor, we can not decide for ourselves, our brain decides for us.
And i don't think that everything is planned out, cause that would mean that some sort of intelligence would be behind everything.
And i doubt that anything is capable of that.

So our brain isnt part of us? I dont think it matters wether we know what we decide to do or not, some part of us did decide what to do, plus the things we decide to do may affact how we decide to do things later.

[*Hollow*Ichigo]

hmmm every1 of ur comments all are making sense but it makes me think dat maybe its just another wonder if ur brain makes all ur decisions den cant u just deny it? or are we just "things" doing wat our brain tells us

[Kozumou]

Even if you knew everything, you still can't get it 100% of the time, because by predicting the future, you have to tell someone, and that alters what they know. If they are involved in the prediction, and the result is bad, they will try to change it, making you incorrect.
Haha! True. Nice. That makes it doubly impossible. Of course, you could technically predict the future to yourself, but then there would be no meaning in it . . . not that there ever would be in the first place. Predicting the future would do nothing, even if it were possible. It'll happen all the same whether you know it will or not.
hmmm every1 of ur comments all are making sense but it makes me think dat maybe its just another wonder if ur brain makes all ur decisions den cant u just deny it? or are we just "things" doing wat our brain tells us
What "our brain tells us"? I refer you to this argument:
So our brain isnt part of us? I dont think it matters wether we know what we decide to do or not, some part of us did decide what to do, plus the things we decide to do may affact how we decide to do things later.
As I said, I believe that there's a will, even if it's not what you would normally think of as being free . . . I agree completely with Delta. I kind of said the same thing myself earlier, I think.

[Vampyrelord]

I don't think we have a lot of free will at all. If you look at determinist philosophy, it argues that everything we do is simply the logical result of a long chain of events which can be traced back to the creation of the universe. Apart from causal determinism, there is also logical determinism. If we take a statement like "tommorow it will rain", it is either true or false, and regardless of whether we can predict it, surely it is true or false NOW. That is to say, if you are married to a particular person, surel it was true before you were even born that you would marry this person and that you had no real choice in the matter. Earlier determinists also argued that the finite universe is trapped in an endless cycle, which is bloody depressing...

However, some of these arguments may be put into a certain level of doubt by research on electron movements and quantum mechanics.

[arancar]

you can change your destiny by your free will.

[shadow_of_89]

I see life as a road leaded by destiny that at some points splits ....at this points you decide with your will were to go

[tha sandman]

i feel also like its a mixture...sometthings u cant control while others u can
ex...u cant contolr if someone gets into a car wreck and is hurt.....but u can control whether u are gonna pass ur next test by studying...

[Kibe]

its a draw for me... :redbiggri

[elendil15900]

i think that fate is what happens...and free will is you reaction to what happened. Lets say fate was your dog running away. the free will part of it is your reaction to it, in other words what to do next.

[~*StÓÑy RèL0ÂÐeD™]

i think that fate is what happens...and free will is you reaction to what happened. Lets say fate was your dog running away. the free will part of it is your reaction to it, in other words what to do next.


yes that's wad i think so too.. fate can play a part, but its yur free will that is wad u think or do... n how u react to something that is fated...lol

[ravenx]

Fate does not exist there isn't any great plan for the univers.
If your pet ran away from you it's not because it was designed to happen but because of a series of incidences produced by your decizions or by the decizions taken by other people.
Ex. Your cat ran away because you forgot to feed it or you play with it to rough.
You can't blaim things on fait. There most be a logical explanation behind it's actions.

[Esedess]

Fate is what happened before, I guess you could interpret it like that.

But I think the decisions we have and the choices we make are reactions ot choices others have made and the results of their actions and reactions to other people's free will. So there isn't fate, just a web of consequence, if that makes any sense.

[Insight]

i believe that mostly we all have free will and that this allows us to control our own lives.
however i also believe that sometimes things happen that we can't control and can't avoid or prevent. call this fate if you want but it dosn't have to be an omnipitance presece or anything it could just simply be the universe's response to what you did through natural physics. if you do one thing then that is your choice but what happens to you because of that choice is unavoidable

[Seren]

Fate is the end result of free will.

Yes, we all have free will, but our choices are somewhat limited by the actions of those around us. So it's our reaction to things that defines free will. Fate is a fancy way of saying 'WTF just happened, I don't understand.' Destiny, on the other hand...

[Mavvy]

I don't like the idea that you're kinda like going through life like an already written out storyline like in animes/books/games. I like to believe you can make your own story. Although not everything will go the way you want it too.

But sometimes I think it is kinda like a game. Theere are seperate paths to take and different storys and actions will take place.

Im half and half about fate and free will.

[yumisan]

yea...i'm like nomadic taichou.i believe in fate and free will.
it's our life and our life is not like a story that is written out.we can change it.it doesn't really have to follow the fate.maybe we are fated to be like this but we still able to change it.it doesn't mean it have to follow our fate.maybe things follow according to our will but in the end, when things go wrong according to our will,we try to say it is fated to ease ourself down.
that is what i believe and thats why i believe in both.

[Ghost Bios Bane]

On this issue its simply this...what you believe in is what controls you, if you believe in free will your controlled by it and same goes for fate personally i say free will

[elendil15900]

...i wonder if it would make a difference on how you lived your life if you lived your life believeing in free will or if you lived your life believing in fate...

[sto67]

i believe that some things are destined to happen, but its up to you to control how the situation turns out. so a mix of both imo.

[Kuukaku nee-san]

I think fate is a nice concept in some ways and in others its not. like a person who rises through the ranks and becomes a highly established member of society then it was his fate that made that happen. But a 50 year old man working at burger king who can barely afford to feed himself, its was his fate to never ammount to anything in his life?? thats just wrong i think. i think people are what they make themselves

[RyuuKiba]

I believe fate is a concept created by man to deny the truth that it was himself who made him or her end up in the situation he or she is in. After the concept was made, instead of admiring and giving a succesful person credit for all the dificulties they had before acomplishing such a high goal, we say it was "fate". So that means the man could've just stayed in bed reading porn and suddenly he would be a great, succesful leader/ businessman/etc?
In conclusion: I think fate does not exist, it's your free will which enables you to make the right descicions in life, or at least the decisions YOU feel are the best decisions.

[grieversangel]

I believe that fate and destiny are two things you can not escape. Free will is the result of fate in my opinion.

[DestinyBlade]

Fate and Destiny are two things I think god cannot control... Why?
Reason: If god controls Fate and Destiny, why didn't he kept satan from turning from his right-hand angel to the Devil? Why did he let humans fight humans for money, power, fame, etc.? Free Will is how you respond to Fate. My signiture says "Your destiny is already determined. Your future, is not." Why? all living things make up the future. Your Free will makes up the future. for example: you see a nice game you want. But you also know that they are coming out with the next-generation system. you cannot afford both 'cause you only got enough for one. What do you do? Fate/Destiny affected the situation, Free will is your decision on what to do next(sorry if it's not a good example).

[yanagi_28]

i believe in fate . . . I mean, there are some things you wish to happen (free will) but there's some sort of 'force' which just interferes and then what you do just backfires . . . I guess, there must be something that controls and oversees what happens in the lives of every individual...come to think about it, everything would be a mess if we each get what we want. . .However, I think our FATE can be powered by our choices . . .we have the opportunity to do what we think is good for us . . .

[Miss M]

I agree with yanagi-chan....
Every thing we do has a meaning.... some things we do goes wrong and then we think that we did the right thing but then it went wrong coz there was something keeping us from doing that.... but fate can be changed if we did the right choices....^_^

[raisins]

to me, fate and free will works together. =P what you choose to do today will affect yr fate in the future and yr fate affect yr choices too. As long as we have tried our best to do something it's enough...
=D

[Avenger]

I find this topic verry funny.People arguing about free will and fate.Everythink is Free will.Cause and effect.U study and become a high member od society.U studies with your own free will.U don't study and u become a loser.Winning the lottery is not fate os somethink else.Someone must win the lottery.U have a chance of 0,0001% the same as others.And u won.Everyone that believes in fate is someone whose life sucks and he says "fate is cruel".I studied and am in the university now.Someone else didn't and now he is working in some minor works.Right now I can choose to post or not this message.Free will is the only answer.

[Neve]

It depends what you're talking about. If you're talking about fate as in 'Whatever I choose to do, this will happen' - that's rubbish. However, there is no way to change what happens. It goes like this:

1. Every decision you make is based on your personality. Therefore two people with exactly the same personality in exactly the same situation would make exactly the same decision in exactly the same way.
2. Your personality is made up of only two things - your hereditary constitution and your experiences.
3. You cannot change your hereditary constitution. You cannot change your experiences. You therefore cannot change any of the decisions you make.

You may argue that you can change your experiences by directly making choices, but remember, those choices are already set, because they are based on your personality, which are based on your past experiences and your hereditary constitution, which you cannot change.

[someGOD]

Heres my stance on the universe right now.

Everything you've ever done, had to happen. Right now, im typing this cause millions of years ago, at the dawn of time, I was destined to. Every action you take, had to have happened cause it did. There was no way you could not have been born, theres no way you could not have died. Its that simple.
Every time you drop a stone in a pond, its gona ripple. Do you know why? Cause it HAS to.

But now you say, "well what if I dont drop the rock?" Well thats all well and good, cause thats what was supposed to happen. No denying it. If you tap your computer screen, its gona make that sound. If you smash a guys face in, its gona bleed.

There is no free will. Only preprogramed set of events put in motion at the beggining of time. Everything that happens when you are born to when you die had to happen, cause it did. You are destined to live out your life till you die, what happens in between was destined to happen too, cause it did.

Free will is abstract.

[lula m]

fate is a way the weak people use to justify their weakness.
god gived us free will not to do crap, but to be wise to se what is true in this word or not.
can u really believe in someone who says that heve the god´s true?
does he really talked to god?
can he say what is good or not?
u must decide your life. its not only a right, its a obrigation.

[Smaug21]

Everything in life is determined.

You say you make thousands of choices every day, and you imply that it means you have "free" will. Free implies that you were not influenced, or basicly that you choice was made right there by you, and we all know that is simply not true. Every choice you have ever made, and will ever make, is decided based on your history, genetics, personality, and experiences. There is no "free" will.

My favorites arguement follows the causality explination, basicly everything has a cause, and things that don't have a cause are meaningless concepts..

Suppose you woke up one morning went out, and your car wouldn't start. So you take it into the shop and the mechanic tells you "there is nothing wrong with your car it just won't start". Well, you'd take it to another mechanic, or think that mechanic is wrong, or think that he just lacks the information to tell you what was wrong with the car, you'd never think that "oh, well the car just dosen't work FOR NO REASON". Things don't work that way, it's simple cause and effect.

My second favorite one is the one i pull out for Free will + opnipotent god people. Basicly, if god knows what you are going to do, then you can do nothing other then that, so you have no free will. This is true, because if you did something else then what god said, thought, whatever, then you would be proving him wrong.

Example: You get up in the morning and go to school and at school you come to a hallway with a right and left turn. Free will would imply that you can choose to go either way. So lets say god knows you are going to go left (because god must know everything), so it follows that you HAVE to go left, If you went right, or even had the option to go right, you would be proving god wrong and that is impossible. So either god dosen't know everything...or you have no free will.

This is basicly philosphy stuff, i'd imagine it'd be alot trickier if you pull in things like the Uncertianty principle and you could draw some correlation between being in both states like schordeingers cat, but for basic arguements this still is pretty good.

[backwardsnemo]

this is just a quckie but i must quote the last samurai
"Do you belive in Destiny?
I belive a man dose what he may until his destiny is revealed"

[L'Arc Enzeru]

Um... I really believe in fate. Cuz' fate is something that really affect our life...
And free will... example you have a free will to become the best in your class and you worked so hard even though you know you stupid... but you always believe that you'll meke it.... and finally you fail... that's fate... Fate can be cruel sometimes... but Humans can change their fate if they work hard... but it's always God that make the decision.

[Guy]

I believe in both, but I think fate is more prominent. Not everybody can achieve an IQ of 150 or higher; there were some people that were destined to go to Harvard or other really good colleges with very little effort and studying; then, there are other people who were never destined to go to Harvard, even if they study their ass off every night.

Free will also affects life, because your choice can screw up your future, such as getting addicted onto drugs, gambling, etc.

[Princess Tofu]

I believe Fate is controlled by free will because you take your steps to achieve faith, and even if you were manipulated to achieve your fate, you were still guided to your fate through your own actions of free will.

If your fate is dieing in a car crash, you chose to be in the car to be brought to your fate through your actions. if you were kidnapped and put in the car to be sent to your fate, wherever you were when you were kidnapped was chosen by your own free will to be there at that time. So on and so on. Only time when I question fate vs. free will is when children are born, because they are not developed enough to know whether being born is right or just to them later, and is the only time free will is truly manipulated into creating your fate.

[Hannah]

for me its more on fate. life is a mystery itself so you'll never know what will goin to happend. that's life, live with it. yes i know we have minds to think but still certain instances happend for a reason that we cannot control. even if we dont like what happend we cant do anything coz our fate is not in our hands so that why i choose fate over free will. its like when its time for you to die you cant do anything and escape your death plus you dont know when will you doing to die. what ever happen, all we can do is accept it and continue living, hopefully to a better life.

[leprousharry]

I personnaly believe Designed Fate is crap (since there is no designer). Also, I think that every decision you do is only affected by your heredity and your experience. Thus Free Will wouldn't be true either. What maked much sense to me is that all that happens happens because of what happened before (like fate). ALTHOUGH, since nothing as proven the existance of any super-designer for the Universe, I will considere it doesn't exist. Thus, all that happens, even if there is nothing else that could happen, wasn't decided, it just happened that way, and nothing could have changed it.

I will just try to proove that Free Will doesn't exist, because the Designed Fate hypotesis is based on the existance of a super-entity that is subject to many other debates.

Imagine that a human is born, without sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, balance, etc. In other words, he's born without any external perception. This can seems unlikely to happen, but just considere it is possible, and it happens. Does someone think that this human being could still make a choice? Would he/she even think at all? If Human had Free Will, surely this human being could make a choice. Though, because he/she can't, it means he/she doesn't have Free Will. Someone would say : "He/She doesn't have Free Will because he/she doesn't think (because of his/her lack of sense). Thus, he/she's not a real human being, hence the lack of Free Will." to what I would answer : "How would you define what is a human being? As long as I'm concerned, I considere that to be a human only require one thing : being child of other humans."

To conclude, if experiment is the only generator of choices (heredity being only an modulator), then there is no Free Will. If there is no Free Will, nothing can be changed from what will happen, thus Determinism would be right. The rest of the debate would be about if God exists or not and, if he exists, if he realy thought about what he was doing while creating the world.

Some people would bring arguments against determinism, based on the fact that quantom mechanics have proven that there was event, at the sub-atomic scale, that seems to have no origin, assuming that those sub-atomic events create the Free Will. If it was the case, it wouldn't be Free Will, because it would still be the effect of a previous cause. Moreover, for the little bit I know, lacking information about some parameters doesn't mean those parameters don't exist. Thus, the argument : "Determinism is crap because we don't understand the cause of some sub-atomic events." sounds wrong to me.

(For those who are interested, I have an hypotesis about the origin of those events. I think it can be something that acts throught 1+ dimensions that we are not aware of. Thus, those events wouldn't contradict the 2nd law of Thermodynamic, because the 4 dimensions we know wouldn't be in a closed system, but in a system that implies more dimensions that would interact with the 4 first throught those sub-atomic events. This is, of course, just an hypotesis, but it makes sense to me.)

[diamondedge]

In the gaming and movie industry, there is a lot of different sayings that define fate or destiny in life.

"Do you believe that man can change his destiny?

I believe a man does what he can, until his destiny is revealed."
---
"Do you believe in fate, Neo?
No.
Why not?
Because I don't like the idea I'm not in control of my life."
---
"Fate - just a childish excuse for giving up if you ask me."

I do not believe in fate, in something being predetermined. It takes away the very thing that was given to us - the free will. I do not wait and see what will happen to me, I do not rely on fate, I do not allow it to control my life. To me, everything is simply coincidence. Like Neo said in the Matrix, I DO NOT believe in fate because i DO NOT like the idea I'm not in control of my life. If there is anything I want to have control over, is my OWN fate. If everything would be pre-determined then it would be possible to tell it. Fortune telling, was it actually ever proven to be true?

Why does everyone wish to see their own fate, the future so badly? A strong man doesn't need to read the future. HE MAKES HIS OWN.

And that is exactly what I think. Anyone offended or not, fate and karma is for the weak. Those who are afraid of taking their own decisions and blame higher forces for their mistakes. Of course, not everything can be influenced. But you really think if there was fate, that fate would toy with life of every individual? Things happen Shit happen. All that is up to us is to accept the things that hit us in life and deal with them.
"All that is left for us to decide is what to do with time that is given to us."
I may be just a puppet in masters hands. But as long as I believe and work towards having control of my own life and not being spooked by stupidities like fate, I can say i am alive.
It's called life. Life is no fate, it's no destiny. Life is simply a series of choices between bad and worse.

@leprousharry: You deserve rep for that. I am in FULL agreement with what you said. ^^

[KingKong]

Everything in life is determined.
You say you make thousands of choices every day, and you imply that it means you have "free" will. Free implies that you were not influenced, or basicly that you choice was made right there by you, and we all know that is simply not true. Every choice you have ever made, and will ever make, is decided based on your history, genetics, personality, and experiences. There is no "free" will.
My favorites arguement follows the causality explination, basicly everything has a cause, and things that don't have a cause are meaningless concepts..
Suppose you woke up one morning went out, and your car wouldn't start. So you take it into the shop and the mechanic tells you "there is nothing wrong with your car it just won't start". Well, you'd take it to another mechanic, or think that mechanic is wrong, or think that he just lacks the information to tell you what was wrong with the car, you'd never think that "oh, well the car just dosen't work FOR NO REASON". Things don't work that way, it's simple cause and effect.
My second favorite one is the one i pull out for Free will + opnipotent god people. Basicly, if god knows what you are going to do, then you can do nothing other then that, so you have no free will. This is true, because if you did something else then what god said, thought, whatever, then you would be proving him wrong.
Example: You get up in the morning and go to school and at school you come to a hallway with a right and left turn. Free will would imply that you can choose to go either way. So lets say god knows you are going to go left (because god must know everything), so it follows that you HAVE to go left, If you went right, or even had the option to go right, you would be proving god wrong and that is impossible. So either god dosen't know everything...or you have no free will.
This is basicly philosphy stuff, i'd imagine it'd be alot trickier if you pull in things like the Uncertianty principle and you could draw some correlation between being in both states like schordeingers cat, but for basic arguements this still is pretty good.

I disagree. Determinism. bah. Easily ridiculed by telling people the colour of their great grandfather's hair has a great effect on the study trajectory they will end up in.
1st argument: There is no way you can compare the intricacies of the mind, gazillions of connections made every second, with the mechanics of a car. That's like comparing Bush to Strauss, only a stupifying explanation will do...
2nd argument: I came across this little gem while reading up on the struggles between calvinists and protestants. This struggle would play a part in the the events leading up to the French Revolution, however, given their different interpretations of christianity an interesting argument arises. THAT IS, if their is no free will and life is determined by God at birth, part of this determinism encompasses whether a soul goes to heaven or hell. You see where this goes, if going to heaven or hell is determined at birth, then it should not matter how you live your life. If born with a free pass to heaven, determined by divine will, you'd be free to, say, get down and dirty with hot nuns all day any day.

And to leprousharry, serious scientists have never attempted to link psychology to quantom mechanics, rather they have strongly advised against.


Centuries ago we had the concept of Fortuna. She'd watch over your fortune, ie succes and great achievements were either granted or denied by a divine entity. In the less mystical house of science this has evolved into determinism, cause and effect.
Centuries ago the greater minds developed the concept of forebearance, ie within reasonable possibility fortune could be shaped by analyzing situations correctly and acting to your greatest benefit. Nowadays, man, people shape their lives how they want to. At least 5% do. Research on basic psychology has shown that about 5% of us lead their lives in terms of what they want, not what they don't want. Call it positive intentionalism. Intentionalism is directly opposed to determinism. Incidentally, these 5% are the most succesful in their life.


Like what diamondedge said:
A strong man doesn't need to read the future. HE MAKES HIS OWN.

[leprousharry]

Well... maybe I wasn't clear enough on what I thought.

Determinism (at least the way I see it... maybe I use the wrong word), isn't directly opposed with intentionalism. Resuming the experience of a person in the colour of the hair of his/her grandfather is wrong. The fundamental principle of determinism is that all is causality. We may have a kind of "free will", but it is only in a subjective point of view.

As an example : From his point of view Mr X has the Free Will to kill Mr Y. From an objective piont of view, he would kill Y because of his past experiments and his heredity.

Intentionalism is based on the intention of a person to do something. Is it wrong to say we have intentions because of our experiments and heredity (example of the senseless human in my previous post)? It makes much sense to me. Also, the opposite (we can have intentions without any reason for it) sounds kinda weird. Why is it weird to me? Because all that we experiment, as human, always seems to have a cause, even if we don't know or understand it.

Could you have "free will", if you were the senseless person I was describing in my previous post? Of course not. So, how can you explain "free will" in an objective way? Let's define it : "Free will : the ability of a conscious being to take a decision without any influence of any form (no memory, no physical heredity)."

As I already explained it, without memory (experience, including physiological alteration) or physical predisposition (heredity), it is impossible to make a choice. How could I choose between a "zungsoud" and a "aasojgno", since I don't know what both they mean?

Maybe I am wrong in understanding determinism and/or intentionalism, in wich case I'd like you to explain it to me, so I could see what doesn't work in my idea.

[Chepakazol]

Today I'll keep my post sweet and short...

Everything depends on what one views fate as. Everything that is chosen before one's birth is the same one's fate. Every choice out of one's reach is the same one's fate. As such, fate is not absolute. It is flawed, and thus can be "changed".
That, too, is fate for another.

[KingKong]

I understand very well what you're saying, from what I get your thoughts on determinism and intentionalism are correct as well. Although, intentionalism does not rule out learning, be a it from a mentalist perspective (John Locke, mind=Blackbox, anything can be recorded) or from that other one I forgot about...
Also...
The thing in all this is that determinism is an absolute philosophy. Like in your example of Mr X the killer, it really wouldn't be his fault, but thats hardly acceptable to society. That's why its easily ridiculed, although the example I gave above is of course not a valid argument in any way.
As is intentionalism. If you watch One Piece, Luffy is the personification of this philosophy. In the end we're dealing with mental constructs by most likely shrewd philosophers and it really does take a fictional character to portray their ideas. In real life its never that clear cut. Its more a matter of perspective, and your world view depends on the way you look at things. Thats why I shared the results of that psychology experiments.

The free will part, Fanta 4 had this brilliant skit of Einstein on their Album Lauschgift:
"Schopenhauer's word, man can do as he pleases, but cannot want as he pleases, follows me in all of life's situations, and gives me great relief."
yeah ok its freely translated out of memory, but I hope it still makes sense. If you cannot want to want, or want what you want, you need not worry too much about your actions. In the end you have no influence on what you want, or why you want what you want.
However, you do have a major influence on your actions. Even if its impossible to trace the origins of what you want (most of the time), you do have free will in choosing what actions you take and well what kind of stuff you'd rather refrain from doing. [Note Einstein was a really good guy,sohe probably wasn't worried too much about wanting to kill or w/e, probably never came up]

Personally, I like the Bhuddist take on this matter. We are born due to potentialized existence, due to our karma gathered in a previous life time. One would expect a deterministic approach to life as a result of this. However, even in a religion where existence is explicitly due to the causal nature of things, there is room for free will. Karma can be nurtured or exhausted, depending on how you choose to live your life.
So basically, looking back we see a chain of causality, looking forward we are responsible for making our own choices affecting our own karma.

[Sono i Lupi]

i believe in free will
but it depends
some times ppl are manipulated and used
and in that case there is no free will
but thats not to say that free will doesnt exist
yes, laws, govt, social norms all influence us so we dont have complete free will
but to say our life is already determined from b4 were even born is insane
god or w/e wouldnt create us then give us a set path
wheres the fun in that, wheres the adventure
whats the point of creating a world full of living thinking capable beings and then predeterming thier fate
its like writing the script for a movie and then having it performed exactly as its written, u already know whats gonna happen, its only a good movie when improvised


idk i could never believe were destined to do things, and that our life has already been set out in stone

[Nood]

Lets see.
You do know that free will exists.
You can stamp "Fate" on anything you do.

So which should I believe in?
The first one ofcourse.
If I do something it happens because I did it, and then it is fate that I wanted to do it.
I see no point in Fate when human lives are completly pointless, so I'll just believe in my free will, and don't care about the rest.
Fate is just a way to justify what you do by your own free will that collides with others.
Or a way to put weight off ones shoulders when making decisions.

If the Fate so many people believe in, that it predetermines ones lifepath would exist, I could sit down and not do anything in my life, fate controls my life, if I choose to sit down, that is fate, but didn't I sat down just because I thought fate would allow it?
I choose to sit down, discard the reason only one thing remains that I chose my fate.
Its like when discussing aliens, you can never get a clear answer, but make one for yourself.
Mine is free will, if coincidences would come from Fate, and would have a purpose or meaning, then peoples life would have a meaning, but it doesn't have.

[leprousharry]

The thing in all this is that determinism is an absolute philosophy. Like in your example of Mr X the killer, it really wouldn't be his fault, but thats hardly acceptable to society. That's why its easily ridiculed, although the example I gave above is of course not a valid argument in any way.
Then, what means fault? Does it mean "dirrect responsibility of an unwanted event"? "Unwanted" is subjective, thus has no value in an objective argumentation.

Even if it wasn't his fault, in an objective point of vue then, for our own sake, we still punish him, so this could influence his next actions (to convince him to not recidive).

We considere that killing (yet in the same example), is a bad thing for our society (in a subjective point of view) because we experienced bad feelings about Death. We act against murder because we don't want Death to happen again.

Well... if determinism phylosophers realy thought they could do anything without responsibility, then they haven't pushed their thoughts far enough. Also, I don't share their opinion about the responsibility, because I think it's subjective and thus, involves the experience and heredity of other humans, animals, plants, bacteries or whatever.

i believe in free will
but it depends
some times ppl are manipulated and used
and in that case there is no free will
but thats not to say that free will doesnt exist
yes, laws, govt, social norms all influence us so we dont have complete free will
but to say our life is already determined from b4 were even born is insane
god or w/e wouldnt create us then give us a set path
wheres the fun in that, wheres the adventure
whats the point of creating a world full of living thinking capable beings and then predeterming thier fate
its like writing the script for a movie and then having it performed exactly as its written, u already know whats gonna happen, its only a good movie when improvised
Like I was saying, a Designed Fate depends on the existance of a Designer (ie: God). If there is no designer, there is no designed fate. The kind of "fate" I can conceive is an unpredictable, uncreated, strict list of causal events. In other words, all that happens had to happen, but wasn't meant to happen. It just happened because that was the only logical possibility of happening, nothing more, nothing less. Thus, being based on an entity that is yet subject to controversy, your argument on the insanity of thinking that "everything is a logical effect of a previous cause" doesn't have weight in an objective debate.


Edit :

@ Nood :

You're assuming that fate is an entity that force us to act like we does. But I don't see it that way. You're right thinking fate is ridiculous if you see it that way. But you're wrong in the way to interpret it (at least in the version I wrote).

When you're saying that our Free Will gives us the possibility to make decisions, you're also implying that we don't refer to our experiences and heredity when making decisions.

As an example: I have the choice between going to a party with friends and going to the last representation of a show. I'd prefer being with friends, but it's the last time I can go to this show. I will have to make a decision, because I can't be at both events. I make a decision, say "going to the show". It will have impacts on future events. But the question is "how did I make this choice". Is it a divine light that gives me the ability to choose between the good and the bad path (assuming that good and bad exist in an objective point of view, wich I doubt) or is it the experience I have, mixed with my ability to think (highly influenced by heredity)? The second one sounds more likely to happen, at least, for me.

[KingKong]

Then, what means fault? Does it mean "dirrect responsibility of an unwanted event"? "Unwanted" is subjective, thus has no value in an objective argumentation.

Even if it wasn't his fault, in an objective point of vue then, for our own sake, we still punish him, so this could influence his next actions (to convince him to not recidive).

We considere that killing (yet in the same example), is a bad thing for our society (in a subjective point of view) because we experienced bad feelings about Death. We act against murder because we don't want Death to happen again.

Well... if determinism phylosophers realy thought they could do anything without responsibility, then they haven't pushed their thoughts far enough. Also, I don't share their opinion about the responsibility, because I think it's subjective and thus, involves the experience and heredity of other humans, animals, plants, bacteries or whatever.



What I meant with fault is accountability.

Your use of subjective an objective is confusing and seems random, to support your argument. Objectively, its not ok for anyone to kill anyone else. Subjectively, you might have a severe grudge, who knows, I could see myself killing another human being for subjective reasons.

Think over your argument again, its more than a subjective matter that we deem murder "unwanted". There are sound logical principles to forbid murder, to begin with the moral principle of reciprocity, ie do onto others as you expect from them. Or would you argue that the entire judiciary is based on a whim, the profession has , after 2 millennia, not brought forth individuals capable of objective reasoning?
Moreover, the pain family members feel when a father/mother/brother or sister dies is very real. Frequently this has an adverse effect on the development of the family who then contribute less to society. It is objectively fair to say that people should not kill.

Just to clear this up, determinism was never meant to be an excuse for acting immorally. However, applying the theory to the example you brought, it implies that Mr X did not have a choice when he committed murder. Common. Try to picture that scenario: 'Yeah I shot him! I didn't have a choice,I was meant to do this:toocool: !' right... sounds like smt a crazy person would say

Honestly you have some nerve.
Look I will give you this. Medical science is finding out more and more about the way brains of psychopaths work. It appears there are predispositions which can result in a person being incapable to judge rigth from wrong. If a guy with this predisposition (not all do) turns out to be a serial killer, you could say he's hardly to blame, he never had a chance to develop an understanding of reasonable morals. But these are extreme cases, exceptions, one in a Billion.



Hey by the way I editted my previous post but lost the text.

It was about your definition of Free Will.
By your definition, free will can only exist with a clean slate.
I disagree.
Let me explain. Granted, all people have preferences and biases which they base their choices on. So from a moments perspective, any choice would be determined by previous choices and is thereby, as you say, not really free.
However, all choices taken in the past are based on preferences, biases, rational, etc as well. This means that as long as you live you shape your life. Your choices strengthen or weaken your preferences and biases. They influence the framework for your rational. They change. You change it. In this evolution of your character, every choice you make will have repurcussions for your future preferences. The action you take will have an effect on the choices you take in the future.
So as you see it is a matter of perspective.

[leprousharry]

About the subjectivity/objectivity thing, I would simply say that no, there is no human that is able to see things in a pure objective way. Why? Because all that we know, we know it because of our senses. Because those senses are limited in capacity and subject to hallucination, we simply have no absolute objectivity. We can try to be more objective, but we will never be 100% objective. It would need to be omniscient (knowing all) to have a chance to be objective.

When you say that a murder is objectively bad, I say it is subjectively bad for the society. When a lion kill an antilope, is it bad? Unless the murderer doesn't know what he's doing at all (in wich case I would say it's almost an accident), a murder is always meant to be good for something or someone, but generaly not for the society (if it's a human). Think about all the cows, the chickens, the pigs that are killed to feed us. Is it bad? Is it good? It's realy a subjective matter.

About your example, on the murderer who say : "It's not my fault, I couldn't do otherwise. I was predestined to do it." I answer : "Maybe, but by putting you in jail, you won't do it again, or it will make murderers think twice before killing." That's the first intent of our judiciary system. We don't have law to punish criminals (it gives nothing good for anyone at all... or almost), we have law to avoid criminality.

Finaly, I agree with your definition of free will. Although, these choices we makes that influence our world have their origins in the causality system (in my opinion). Also, you can imagine what could have become if you had made a choice differently. But could have you made it differently? I think no, because the physiological and psychological situation you was at the moment of choosing. Could you say that there was something else that was making you choose other from you experience and genetical predisposition? Obviously, this possibility is reposing on the faith of free will. Faith is, by definition, trusting something without empirical evidence. Thus, without any empirical evidence of a free will, until you have found some reliable evidence, I will not considere it as true, at least (like said before) not in an objective way.

I might be unable to convince you that free will isn't true, but ask yourself this question : "What is easier, proving that something exists or proving that something doesn't exist?" Proving that something doesn't exist is almost (if not entirely) impossible. On the other hand, proving that something exists is easy (if it is true, obviously).

By the way, don't say yourself that you would waste your time proving that free will exists, because I would realy want to know it exists, if it is the case. Thus, consifere me as sceptic, but I'm not stupid as not accepting evidence when they are shown to me.

Post scriptum : I'm not english from origin, so if there is something that seems strange or that you don't understand, or if you see any fault at all, please say it so I could precise, restate or correct it.

[KingKong]

Your english is OK! no problems there

Look you can't compare a lion killing an antilope or us killing live stock for food to a guy picking up a gun and shooting someone else in the head. Not in the context of this debate. Animals do not have a consciousness, at least not as developed as human's. People do.

I see how killing is subjective from the perpetratores point of view and I agree. From a societal point of view, there is objective reason to condemn murder. Again, it seems you didn't think about it, the principal of reciprocity is very sound logic, regardless of subjective feelings.

Also the judiciary has 3 main intentions with regards to legal consequences for crimes:
- Deterrence
- Protecting society from unwanted elements
- Redeeming the culprits from their evil ways...
ALSO, the judiciary works out laws according to moral principles in most parts of the world and according to the first ruling on a comparable case in the UK and the US.

Look over all I see what you're saying, but the debate is going nowhere like this. The arguments you offer are in no way going to convince, rather I'm trying to get you far enough to realize you at least have the choice of perspective.

So one final rebuttle.

I might be unable to convince you that free will isn't true, but ask yourself this question : "What is easier, proving that something exists or proving that something doesn't exist?" Proving that something doesn't exist is almost (if not entirely) impossible. On the other hand, proving that something exists is easy (if it is true, obviously).

In the house of science a mini revolution occured when Karl Popper came up with FALSIFICATIONISM. The idea is to no longer gather evidence (usually empirical, given the stringent nature of scientific method) for the truth of a theory, but rather testing its robustness and validity by trying to disprove it.
His idea cleaned up a lot of outdated theories. It appears it was easier to prove these theories were false (ie did not truthfully exist) rather than finding out the actual truth about the subject theorized about.

Now free will and causality (in human actions, not mechanics) are theoretical constructs. They do not rely on empirical evidence, they rely on sound reasoning.
Problems with the logical implications of determinism have been abundantly stated.
As said before,
Personally, I like the Bhuddist take on this matter. We are born due to potentialized existence, due to our karma gathered in a previous life time. One would expect a deterministic approach to life as a result of this. However, even in a religion where existence is explicitly due to the causal nature of things, there is room for free will. Karma can be nurtured or exhausted, depending on how you choose to live your life.
So basically, looking back we see a chain of causality, looking forward we are responsible for making our own choices affecting our own karma.

[leprousharry]

This will be my last post on this topic, because I agree with you that we go nowhere with it. Although, I will take the time to read your answer if you do so.

You're assuming that animals don't have consciousness, but what is counsciousness? The first thing that comes to my mind is "the ability to interpret its own senses and to react to them". Then, even a computer has a kind of consciousness (stuff for another debate).

You're assuming that murder is objectively wrong, but objectivity means no biaisis. Murdering can mean protection for one being, in the situation "kill or be killed". Think about it : when someone kill another person, there is two possibilities. First : he did it to protect himself, or another person(s) that he thinks must be protected (and he thinks it's the best way to protect). Second : he's not rational (ie: has psychological lacks). Someone don't kill without reason (unless he's psychologicaly undevelopped or missdevelopped).

When a society have laws on moral principles, it's because we (members of the so called society) want to satisfy what we've been teached as arbitrary universal laws (dicted by a so called God or any religious authority), in the only intent to go to heaven/raise ourserlves in the reincarnation ladder/improve our meta-situation in any way (meta stands here for the situation of the soul and not the body). Because these so called arbitrary universal laws are based on faith (wich is the abscence of any evidence and is generaly subject of controversy) and because faith is subjective (otherwise everyone would have faith in the same thing, wich is not the case), these laws (based on "universal" moral codes) are as subjective as the others (wich are meant to improve the situation of the members of the society, or a part of it).

We, like every organism known at the moment, simply try to improve our situation, as individuals and as species. When someone or something go in the oppostie way, he/she/it isn't conscious it is going in the wrong way. As an example: someone that hurt himself does so because he thinks it's good for him, for someone or for something, thus an improvement in a situation. When someone kills himself, he thinks it's going to improve he's situation (once again, at the condition he is awear he's about to terminate himself).

Objectively, there is no good that is not bad for something, and there is no bad that is not good for something. Doing bad stuff can avoid other bad stuff, doing good stuff can also avoid other good stuff. And all these good and bad stuff is purely seen subjectively. Objectively, destroying the Earth isn't either a good nor a bad thing. In our obtic, it is obviously a bad thing, but this is subjectif. Giving "good" and "bad" objectivity is assuming there is an absolute "good" and an absolute "bad", but once again, it is based on faith. Thus, it fails at having an argumentative value.

You're giving subjectivity a pejorative meaning and I don't think subjectivity is a bad thing (because there is objectively no "bad" nor "good", so it applies to subjectivity too).

What you don't seem to understand in my point (probably because I didn't put emphasis on it yet) is that I'm included in this subjectivity thing. Thus, I always (like everyone here) do what I think is best. I subjectively (for me) do bad things, but it wasn't with bad intents.

All this objectivity and subjectivity question is only to bring the fact that, since there is no objective good nor bad, then there is no objective free will (wich is meant to distinguish objective good and bad, that don't exist), only subjective free will (determining what is good for us and bad for us, depending on our experiences and heredity). Thus, it's objectively all causality and there is no free will. There is also no designed fate. What we do creates the future, but is created by the past, and there is nothing to add to this.

I should add a precision about determinism phylosophers. They thought that if one can know everything at a moment, he will know everything after, and I think it's true. Although, it's useless to think about it, because knowing all (omniscience) is simply impossible, as proven many times, because of contradictions it would imply. Well... after all, I don't really think determinism is right. I think it's as simple as causality.

Anyway, I liked to debate with you and I wish we will have other opportunities.

Edit : Sorry for the long post... but it takes 1000 words to represent a picture (as in "1 picture = 1000 words"). Well... I have about ¾ of a picture... but an abstract picture is harder to draw than a concrete one. Well... just sorry for the long post.

[KingKong]

OK Just watched the Departed yesterday, no doubt, Jack Nicholson is the man. Anyhow:

"I DON'T WANT TO BE A PRODUCT OF MY ENVIRONMENT - I WANT MY ENVIRONMENT TO BE A PRODUCT OF ME!"

[dawin45]

well it's called fate, man, in this year, I got, a few visions of my own, this year, I saw, in my dreams, a pm before even I read it,Ichigo, rukia, kon, in the same scene, before I even saw the series, note I saw the series in the last month,it was before like 3 months ago when i saw this...and I looked for a imaginary band name about 7-8 years ago, and I dreamed of coldplay, and i became fan of codplay, last year, man, this fate stuff is seriously f@#$@# cool! I really like it!

[Haseo_Antares]

I believe in both. Some things can't be controlled and some things can. It's is simple as that.

[momo-taichou]

If this makes sense....I believe in fate. But i also think that you can change your fate. I dunno thats what i always thought. I think life already has its answer where your going and everything but i think people have the power to change it XD

[Motorola]

Do people choose to die?

I think it is a matter of fate; we do get to choose our actions. Fate is the consequence.

[Kimochi]

people choose to do somethings. i mean people can choose to study hard and score well and end up with great jobs. do we say it's fate? it's our own actions. what we do is what we get. cn't say my fate is i'll pass and do nothing, you think i'll pass if i do nothing? if marriage i believe is fate. if you're not fated to marry a guy and you marry him, you'll get a divorce sooner or later. i'm not saying it is. just what i believe. death is fated upon us.
someone may look good and healthy today but maybe he'll die tmr.

[nighthawksw]

I believe free will is an illusion.

At birth, i'll allow that we all have a slightly different personality, that intakes information differently than the next baby. After you're born however, you grow purely based on what you see, what you hear, what you feel, and how those around you interact with you; you grow based on what you can absorb. Babys are cute little sponges of information!

Now, fast forward to today. Every decision we make is based on a MASSIVE EQUATION of weights and balances, over everything we've seen and learned since childhood. If you're walking down the street, and you see a cigarette out of the corner of your eye; although you don't think about it consciously, more than likely cigarettes will be closer to your consciousness. What does that mean? It means nextime you see somebody who looks semi-like a smoker, you may jump to that conclusion faster; or you may get an urge to smoke for no reason as far as you can tell; perhaps it just means when somebody brings up the topic of "commercial" a moment later, a cigarette commercial will be the first type that pops into your head.

Now, let's assume there is an all-knowing, all-powerful, Eternal god for a moment (that's a few of the main traits to the primary religions' idea of god). If he's all knowing, he knows what you will decide before you decide it. But if we have free will, how can that be? To us, we are constantly interacting with the real world, and making our decisions. To a <i>god</I> however, what if all our decisions are a very simple equation? He's seen us since birth, he knows the personality we were born with, and he knows how that personality will integrate everything occuring around them. Why? Because he's all-knowing, and he created us; in theory.

If you think about it, everytime you make a decision, you rationalize it based on your history, and what's "good" or "evil", "moral" or "Immoral", "polite" or "Impolite", "fun" or "not fun". All of those things are defined by our culture, and you will likely find very real differences when you look across the globe.

Free will is an illusion. We're trapped in fate, whether we like it or not. Simply by reading what i just wrote, i have effected your post, your thoughts on this subject, your opinions of me, and i have changed your mood. Those are the "guarantees"; there is even more i may have changed in your day, as it would have progressed had i not posted this. Yet nomatter how many times i go back in time, i will make this same decision to create this post, word for word...so long as the situations leading up to this point remain unchanged.

[Hajar]

Personally I believe that Fate and free will come into play in your life because there some things that are designed to happen like death but also your Free will can cause you to die early in your life. So I think theres a balance of both in life.

[nighthawksw]

But the question is, was it really your choice that led to your early death? or was that the point you were destined to die at?

[cappy3]

I see it as only free will because i dont see that some one or something can control my life at all. I just believe that what i do is my own choice and nothing else.

[Pipp-ORK]

Jesus Christ, you can't even have a fucking thread without some idiot coming in and screwing it all up.

Urghhh, go find some other forum to harass, you goddamn loser.

Post deleted + reported.

[nighthawksw]

As i see it though, only being able to see our own choices is the greatest trick of "Free will"; does the mouse realize it's in a trap? or does it simply think it's lost? It chases the smell of cheese not because it's the goal of the experiment, but because he wants the cheese for himself.

Similarly, you could argue we make our decisions under the guise of free-will, when really we're taking the only choice available to us, given our history and personality.

[Dexter]

This thread would be better renamed Determinism (or Fatalism) vs Free Will. When ppl think of "Fate" they think more of fantasy terms rather than actual doctrines.

And as nighthawksw has outlined, yes, there is little, if ANY free will.

/Hard determinist

[leprousharry]

@ nighthawksw :

We also could add a genetical factor, but in the end, it's all and the same : there's no free will. Thus, I agree with you.

Oh... and there is probably much more unknown factors, but... heh... we don't know them so... there's no point saying it... but I had to do so.

--

@ Decado :

I agree with what you said, it shouldn't be about fate but about determinism.

--

@ This thread creator or any moderator :

I propose that this thread is renamed "Determinism vs Free will". Do as you wish, but I had to say it.

--

@ Everyone, as everyone is concerned :

Some people don't agree with determinism because they don't believe in a "Force" that control their lives. I say that there is no such "Force", but that everything is just part of a logical chain of events. Also, what makes them believe in a "Force" that gives them the ability to escape the cause-and-effect principle, I don't know, but I don't think it has more credibility than a "Force" that control our lives.

There are some people who say that quantum mechanics prove that determinism can't be possible. I answer that the fact that we don't know why particles decay doesn't mean there's no reason for it.

Finaly, I'd like to precise my opinion. I believe that determinism is true (note that I used the therm believe, since I don't have a proof but I still think it's the more credible theory). Thus, I also believe that there is no objective free will, when a subjective free will can exist. Because subjectivity means that it's related to our perceptions of the facts and not to the facts themselves (as would do objectivity), a subjective free will would be equivalent to what nighthawksw describes as a free will illusion.

--

Please note that if I said anything that could sound harsh to anyone, I didn't intended it to be, so please forgive me and, by the way, also forgive me the fact that English is not my first language and that, I must say, I didn't have any good English teacher at school.

[StormsFury]

I accept all..Fate, Free Will, Predetermination, active and latent concionseness(your drive to do something or nothing). There are things you can control or influence but there is also things that are completly out of your hands.

[lil'Bleachie]

I think one's free will leads to fate. You make a decision or do something and something else will happen as an effect to that. Fate doesn't really have anything to do with life since you pretty much create everything around you.

If your friend were to step on your foot, that is not fate. It came from your free will of choosing a friend that is a clutz.

If you work at a dead end job that you hate because you aren't doing what you really wanted, it's not fate that made you a loser. It's your choice to have worked there.

It just seems like the there isn't free will since everything has an effect that is kind of know as fate. I think you chose everything that happens to you other than what science has made impossible (birth parents and natural death and such).

[.Fate]

One thing on this subject..

You think you are doing everything on free will, but what if its fate that your doing? You think everything is your decision what if it is mean to be? Ever given that any consideration. You work somewhere you quit it was your choice, but was it meant to be? It would have been fate working all along.

[leprousharry]

@ lil'Bleachie & .//Espeon :

I think you're both wrong.

On one side, lil'Bleachie, you're forgetting the "what made you make those choices" factor. The reason you choose that friend is because of everything in your life and because of your genetical predispositions. Same thing for the job. When you say that everything that happen around us is because of free will, but what is free will? Free will is the ability to make decisions without being affected by external factors. Well, you're saying that you choose that friend or that job without reason? I don't think so.

On the other side, .//Espeon, you're saying that it could be fate that is doing everything, or that everything is just fulfilling fate. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to imply that there's an entity that decided all at the begining. There's absolutely nothing until now that prooves the existance of this entity. Also, there's nothing that prooves that there has been a begining in the first place.

My point is that everything is just a logical chain of events. It wasn't meant to be that way, but it couldn't have happen differently, like 2 comes after 1 and before 3.

In other words, there's nothing that could make me think that there's free will or any illogical factor, the same way that there's nothing that could make me think that something planned everything. Thus, until proven wrong, I'll be assuming that there is none of both that are true.

[Sushi]

I think it's a mixture of both.

Fate guides you to certain choices, and you use free will to select a choice out of the ones handed to you. Then fate guides you to another set of choices based on your last one and so on.

However, having free will, we can also say "screw all these choices" and start over again. Fate leads you down a path based on the choices you make in life. The choices we make determine the consequences we recieve, and eventually the ultimate fate, our death and "afterife"

[TuRm0iL]

K, I know this threads been dead almost a month now, but there is something I'd like to contribute.

It makes most sense to me to say that everything is fated to happen because of free will. Since you can only make one set of choices (that is, you can't undo something already done), the choices you make decide your fate. And ultimately, the choices you make are predetermined by your character and circumstances. And Ultimately beyond that, your character and circumstances are created by choices others have made that affect you directly or indirectly. You could refute this logic by saying that you went against your character on a certain decision, but that decision to go against your character was caused by something which was caused by something etc...
The only circumstances out of human control are those that are natural. But we as a species seem to be controlling/contaminating all of those natural balances anyway, thus asserting our will, and making circumstances come to be by our actions.

[Dexter]

As I and some others mentioned last year, the thread would be better entitled as people seem to associate vague concepts when dealing with "Fate"

/ thread title changed from Fate vs Free Will to Determinism vs Free Will


Btw good post Turmoil. I entirely agree :)

[xiphosforr]

i like to think i have a choice- but it's also comforting when you can blame something on fate--
i think we have guidlines of things we are supposed to do, but we always have a chose- even if it doesn't feel like it, we always have options and nothing is ever written in stone people can suggest you do something but in the end you can always do something else
if there was such a thing as fate then all humans are being tricked by it, but having a brain and thinking we are proving that we can make our own choices.