Sculptor: Critical thinking is an analysis that does easily allow beliefs. It does not even necessitate a conclusion. It has more to do with casting doubts on beliefs.
Peacegirl: That was his second sentence. I think you just want to find something to argue about when there’s really no argument.
If you really want to know what fatalism is then watch Lawrence of Arabia, there is a scene in which L of A is obliged to execute his own servant, despite showing him mercy beforehand. At the time it was said “it was written”, that the boy should die. And so despite L of A’s care and intervention the boy was doomed to die…
This is fatalism; an incoherent ideology in which the acts of man have no determining or transforming power, where the will is meaningless, because an all knowing Allah has already written the future, and every thing has a course and meaning.
It is perfectly sensible if you believe in a omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent god. But that is for the loons.
Determinism is not that at all. Determinism means that acts of will actually change the future. The future is not known, we are creators of the future. Each of us pushes forwards and we interact with the wills of others, to make what we can of our existence, but that does not make it “written” nor predictable.
Thank you! People get confused over these two words. I used an example that if a child was running in the street to catch a ball and a car was coming, and you ran to save him but you were too late and he got hit, then you could say it was fate. But you would not throw your arms up calling it fate without even making an effort to help. The boy was not fated to get hit in advance, which would give us all a feeling of complete resignation that any effort at all would make no difference. But our choices do make a difference!
Can you please explain the connection between these two terms in reference to the meanings of ontological and epistemology? Does this prove either free will or determinism through these words? Help me understand. After all, that is the central question of this entire thread, do we or do we not have free will…
The real question here, Magnus, is how would you know?
It seems to me that you just ask yourself in passing what “fatalism means to you.” I don’t detect a single minute of study or research. Just… whatever happens to have stuck from what you heard on the streets.
What is the difference between determinism and fatalism?
From the MyTutor website
This is something that has always baffled me. How can determinism and fatalism – destiny – not be interchangeable if one starts with the assumption that the human brain itself is but more matter wholly in sync with the laws of matter?
Okay, for all practical purposes, the same result. Our life unfolding in accordance with factors/variables beyond our control…but still able to go in different directions? Now, the different directions might make sense because sure, look around you…nature is always going in different directions. Look at the path of a hurricane. But how is that the same or different from the paths that humans take if in the end the same laws that govern the matter in hurricanes govern the matter in human brains?
Explained thusly:
Hard determinism in other words. On the other hand, why speak of “one true ‘fate’” instead of one true fate?
Then the hairs are split: the “versions”:
Cue how some then reconcile an omniscient God with human autonomy?
That sound you hear is me pulling out my hair.
Please…
Someone explain to me how one’s life can be destined/fated but go in different direction. In such a way that matter in the human brain like matter in the hurricane is not wholly behind any new direction?
Given this:
Only not in theory. How, given the behaviors that you “choose”/“choose” in a no free will world, is your life is destined/fated… but not determined?
No intellectual contraptions, in other words. Real behaviors examined please.
No pinheads please. Well, unless you’re fated, destined and/or wholly determined to post, of course.
Acts of the will contribute to the result of the future -
they apply their influence on reality.
However, they can only do so as they were themselves were influenced.
So if one’s will, and will-based acts, are necessarily defined by prior states,
and the current state will naturally unfold in accordance with the patterns of reality,
then can it be said one is changing the future?
Or are we akin to puppets on string,
with respect to our capacity to influence the direction of the play?
I think they’re saying, some people who believe in fate,
think only the end is set in stone, and not the steps to get there.
Like there are multiple ways to travel to a location,
but in this case, ‘fate’ declares you will go to this location,
regardless of any attempt you make to avoid it.
But yeah, I think all the steps are set in stone too.
So there was only ever one path that we’d take.
We have no control over what options are available, or what options we will find preferable based on our history and genetics. But to say we are puppets on a string makes it seem as if prior states force our hand against our will. If you understand that a prior state is a past state which exists in the mind, you will see that this definition is problematic because “prior states” imply the past is a real thing and therefore can cause …. The word cause has created a lot of confusion.
Prior events can only be used to help us recall through memory as we consider our present options. This has been the confusion all along because the past is but a memory; there is no natural law; there is no prior state that can compel us to do what we ourselves don’t want to do. We have the ability to reject what we don’t want to do. IOW, there is a problem with the definition of determinism for it implies that if we are not forced by prior events to do what we do, we must have a free choice, which is false.
Then back to this: how is what we believe itself not in turn wholly determined by the laws of matter?
The part where there was no possibility that I would not type these words in my “here and now”, that you would not read them in your “here and now”…but “somehow” there was a different path to that for each of us?
Good question, and I’ve yet to see a convincing answer to it’s contrary.
There are many possible answers, few persuasive.
The best argument so far, perhaps:
Our understandings are false. Determinism is inaccurate. Our will can produce new effects, unchained by history.
The mechanisms by which are unknown to us, due to ignorance.
[I don’t believe this, but it’s probably the strongest argument]
I do. I prefer moreso, ‘contribute to the future’, as we do not make the future alone.
We can act in accord with our will, but can we willingly act against our will?
I think our will was determined by factors outside our control,
so I wouldn’t take credit away from earlier origins -
we are not the masters of existence,
existence is our master.
