NationStates Jolt Archive

I had a big discussion last night with a friend of mine. She says fate does exist, I say no. I'm a staunch atheist, yet I would sooner believe in the concept of a higher power than in the notion of fate. What does everyone else think?

Yes and no.

I believe in predetermination, due to the irreversible algorithm that we are in, but not as a conscious determination on the part of a divine being.

I don't beleive in fate, but maybe I was fated to say that. I don't think it's a good idea to live your life on fate though. It may induce you to take stupid risks, or to do nothing and excuse yourself by saying failure was my fate.

I don't know...

I find Determinist arguments just fit better. Libertarian free will arguments are strage.

I'd like to think we have free will, but it's hard to say.

I do believe that there is only one definite future that is set, but I don't know if it has been determined by a higher power or anything, which is what fate would be, so I said no.
I just feel that there are no truely random occorences. If I was given a choice between jumping off a bridge, or eating a sandwich, I would always choose the sandwich option no matter how many times the decision was put to me. I believe the same is true with all choices. If the situation is exactly identical, including our states of mind, then we will make exactly the same choice every time.
As far as I can tell, it's still true that if you know where every particle in the universe is, and its current direction, then you could perfectly predict all future points in time. The Uncertainty theory prevents us from knowing both their location and direction, but I think these are still set. It's just impossible for us to know what they are.

Yes and no.

I believe in predetermination, due to the irreversible algorithm that we are in, but not as a conscious determination on the part of a divine being.
"Irreversible algorithm?" Now there's a mouthfull! Heh! Care to explain that a bit?

I don't believe in fate, predetermination, free will, or any of those. The universe and our place in it are far too complicated to explain with aporisims, platitudes, and ancient mythologies. Vittos, I'm not saying that's what you're using ... just commenting in general. :)

"Irreversible algorithm?" Now there's a mouthfull! Heh! Care to explain that a bit?

I don't believe in fate, predetermination, free will, or any of those. The universe and our place in it are far too complicated to explain with aporisims, platitudes, and ancient mythologies. Vittos, I'm not saying that's what you're using ... just commenting in general. :)

All of existence is nothing but a step by step process in which future events will befined by the rules of the system and the input of past events. We are like the variable inputs in the system, and even though we may think are making choices in our life, the decisions are decided by genetic make up, psychological development, and external stimuli. We are all cogs in the gears of the the clock of existence.

And if you want any evidence of this, too bad, I am too good at talking out of my ass to be worried with evidence.

All of existence is nothing but a step by step process in which future events will befined by the rules of the system and the input of past events. We are like the variable inputs in the system, and even though we may think are making choices in our life, the decisions are decided by genetic make up, psychological development, and external stimuli. We are all cogs in the gears of the the clock of existence.
quite possible. I've considered this myself.

this is how i perceive fate, if you beefed up a weather forcasting computer infinately you get a machine that can point and say "this particle is at co-ords X,Y,Z at this time T", since it would be able to predict everything that is going to happen based on what has happened, this takes into account BOTH free willl and pre-determination, since consiously you will always take the sandwich over suicide (unless you actually mean to kill yourself), based on your own previous experiences, but these are pre-determined since the 'computer' has been able to say you would do the route you took since the dawn of time.
To me the idea of fate is a GIVEN since i do believe that there is something underlying the entire universe, and there is some proof of this in string theory, the only factor in proving this is the sheer technology involved in its proof. (read up on it, its interesting for anyone with at least a modicum of physics curiosity)
And thats my 2cents

I don't believe in Fate or predetermination (that all events from "the beginning of time" to "the end of time" are fixed in place). I certainly don't believe in predestination (that God or gods have determined such events).

I believe that the future has not yet happened, and therefore that what happens in the present (the moment known as "now") can affect the flow of events we call "time".

All of existence is nothing but a step by step process in which future events will befined by the rules of the system and the input of past events. We are like the variable inputs in the system, and even though we may think are making choices in our life, the decisions are decided by genetic make up, psychological development, and external stimuli. We are all cogs in the gears of the the clock of existence.

And if you want any evidence of this, too bad, I am too good at talking out of my ass to be worried with evidence.
ROFLMAO! Um ... I refuse to comment on that last sentance of yours! :P

This sounds far too deterministic to square with what we now know about quantum physics, and definitely not with M-theory.

My personal take on this, after factoring in what I can understand of M-Theory, is that all sentient creatures represent the universe in the process of becoming self-aware.

ROFLMAO! Um ... I refuse to comment on that last sentance of yours! :P

This sounds far too deterministic to square with what we now know about quantum physics, and definitely not with M-theory.

My personal take on this, after factoring in what I can understand of M-Theory, is that all sentient creatures represent the universe in the process of becoming self-aware.

The M must stand for "Mistake," because I am never wrong.

The M must stand for "Mistake," because I am never wrong.
Yeah ... and SO fuckin' modest too! :rolleyes:

My personal take on this, after factoring in what I can understand of M-Theory, is that all sentient creatures represent the universe in the process of becoming self-aware.
What is M-Theory, in a nutshell? (I'm at work at can't look it up just yet.)

No.

The Big Bang set in motion certain conditions that eventually lead to us talking about this bs here....how one could believe that this all is somehow the will of some sort of intellgent god. It is possible that god is retarded.

I don't beleive in fate, but maybe I was fated to say that. I don't think it's a good idea to live your life on fate though. It may induce you to take stupid risks, or to do nothing and excuse yourself by saying failure was my fate.
I think Drunk Commies said it best, here. It's about how you choose to live your life; in other words, attitude. Whether or not Fate is an objectively real phenomenon, it's what the individual does with the idea that matters.

What real-ly matters is the subjective experiences of the individual. ;)

The question is not "Do I believe in Fate?"

The question is "Does Fate believe in me?"

What is M-Theory, in a nutshell? (I'm at work at can't look it up just yet.)

Some group of theories that have to do with strings and particles that attempts to correlate what we know about the four major forces, I think. It apparently states that there are 10 or 11 dimensions. Other than that, I don't know.

The simplest (but not even close to the best) way that I answer this question is the same as in the Matrix, just beofore Neo takes the pill. When asked why he doesn't believe in fate, he replies "Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my own life."

Of course it goes much more in-depth than that, but that's a nice, simple way of putting it.

Yes, because your future is your fate no matter what you do.

I believe in it...hell, I'm living it! Too much rich food and fancy desserts over the holidays, and I am one big love-handle!

In a nutshell, I believe in fat.

*reads title of thread again*

Ooooops....nevermind.

People all that belief in fate and god is just your genes fucking with you..they're bastards...they make you believe in these wierd things so you can go on being the gene replicating machine that you are designed to be. The belief in fate and destiny and such is hardwired into out brains, its part of our biological programming not because there is such a thing as fate but because it help in the replication process...it keeps you fleshy lumps humping...

*sips*humans are way too unprecdictable to have fate.perhaps theres some modocrum of it(ie certin events will happen,so sorry).but even then,what actors pick up the script prolly arent predetirmined.

Fate is humans thinking way to much of their importance..."I am Destined to do this and that", "We were Destined to meet my darling" and ""It was fate that he was struck down by that car..."

Fate is just the results of the trip. Destiny and Free Will are methods of getting there. Each person has a fate. Some people decide their fates. Others have no choice.

Fate is humans thinking way to much of their importance..."I am Destined to do this and that", "We were Destined to meet my darling" and ""It was fate that he was struck down by that car..."

Fate, in your sense, is a person's half-assed way of organizing events that seem to occur meaninglessly.

Fate, in your sense, is a person's half-assed way of organizing events that seem to occur meaninglessly.

Yes.

Negative; fate does not exist.

when something totally unexplained keeps happening over and over again, (little signs, so to speak) as if guiding me to a particular way of being, then i must simply believe fate is trying to take me somewhere, show me something. ultimately however, i think fate is our choice.

Put it this way:
You have a poole table with balls randomly scattered on it. You pick up the cue and hit one of the balls so the others bounce around, change positions, some get potted, etc.
Now if you arranged it EXACTLY the same way again and hit the same ball you hit before in exactly the same place with exactly the same force, all of the balls would end up in exactly the same places they had before, no matter how many times you do it. You might as well film yourself doing it then just play it over to save time ;)

(Obviously you wouldn't really be able to do this becuase you wouldn't be able to measure accurately enough, and have all the air molecules in the same place, etc).

But what I'm trying to say is, once something's been set in motion, it carries on "automatically" (for want of a better word) and can't be changed.

Now imagine a poole table the size of the universe, with a million trillion bajillion+ particles.
This is the universe and all the atoms in it. And once something has started them moving, there is nothing anyone can do to bend them from their path.

So yes, when I think about it, I come to the conclusion that fate Does Exist(tm), but when living my life I largely ignore it for sanity's sake ;)

I believe in the ability to choose. Yet there may be other forces that encourage certain actions. For example, I'm trying to set up some friends of mine. One of the two knows about the attempts, while the other does not. If they do hook up, it is not because of fate. It is because of subtle hints and casual mentions. If the actions aren't taken, then they may never get together.

Many people have that kind of agenda. What some people call fate could by a puppetmaster of sorts, creating tiny changes in the atmosphere that in turn promote more, larger changes.

I'll stop rambling, sorry. It's a very interesting debate.

Put it this way:
You have a poole table with balls randomly scattered on it. You pick up the cue and hit one of the balls so the others bounce around, change positions, some get potted, etc.
Now if you arranged it EXACTLY the same way again and hit the same ball you hit before in exactly the same place with exactly the same force, all of the balls would end up in exactly the same places they had before, no matter how many times you do it. You might as well film yourself doing it then just play it over to save time ;)

(Obviously you wouldn't really be able to do this becuase you wouldn't be able to measure accurately enough, and have all the air molecules in the same place, etc).

But what I'm trying to say is, once something's been set in motion, it carries on "automatically" (for want of a better word) and can't be changed.

Now imagine a poole table the size of the universe, with a million trillion bajillion+ particles.
This is the universe and all the atoms in it. And once something has started them moving, there is nothing anyone can do to bend them from their path.

So yes, when I think about it, I come to the conclusion that fate Does Exist(tm), but when living my life I largely ignore it for sanity's sake ;)


Wow that Heisenberg guy is so like totally wrong...I knew the Uncertainity Principle was a load

As far as quantum mechanics goes, not even the universe is sure of where the balls are. When you are talking about stuff happenin' at the atomic scale all you have to work with is probablity, we cannot calculate where the electron is, we can point at an area and say:"it'll be a fair guess to say it's in this area". but we dont know excatly where it is...and neither does the electron.

doing the big bang all over would result in a massivly different distribution of matter.

that of course is just quantum mechanics.

Who can explain how each cell of every living thing has information in it that equals over 120 SETS of encyclopediae? Yes, every skin cell... every cell on your body!
If I show you a computer with an operating system, a self-correcting editing software and a software language...would you ask, "who built that?" or, "How did that computer come into existence from nothingness without any help from anyone?" Duh. That's DNA!
Remember SETI? The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence with hundreds of giant radar dishes pointing into space and "listening"?
Do you know what they were looking for to establish the possibility of intelligent life? A pattern. Any type of distinguishable pattern, because that would indicate intelligence was needed to create it. Well HELLOO!! DNA!? All you people who intellectualize beyond your actual capacity about the big bang...the big bang is no more responsible for planets and galaxies than a bomb in a brick yard could yield a neighborhood of brick houses. If you knew anything about anything you would know the 2nd law of thermal dynamics which, simply put, states that all things tend toward entropy. All things are moving toward disorganization and destruction - not spontaneous creation and "evolution."
I feel sad for those who are athiest, agnostic or just insane. The definition of fate aside - you're living a meaningless existence that was only made possible by a lightning strike on a mud puddle 40 billion years ago. You're no different than any other animal on earth and your end is absolute.
Fate is what people who don't believe in anything debate on a message board.
Go here for real answers: http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v25/i2/dna.asp. And when you can explain DNA without confessing that it is only possible through intelligent design, then reply to this message.
I don't need fate, nor am I at it's mercy...God has a plan for my life that is better than anything I could come up with on my own.

And for all you control freaks out there who say "I don't believe in fate because I want to be in control of my own life"...how you doing with that so far? Why not let God have control and finally feel free that He's got your back. It's not all on you.

I don't want to beleive I am in control of my own life, that what decisions I make now will alter me and the world in some way

I don't want to beleive I am in control of my own life, that what decisions I make now will alter me and the world in some way
Sure does absolve you of any and all responsbility, doesn't it! Tsk!

I do not believe in fate. I believe in causation and consequences. The choices I made in the past affect the choices available to me in the present. The choices I make now will affect the choices available to me in the future. That's all. No fate but what I make for myself.

And for all you control freaks out there who say "I don't believe in fate because I want to be in control of my own life"...how you doing with that so far?

I'm doing well. I've a job that lets me earn a comfortable living, and I have a lovely wife who loves me as passionately as I love her. And I did it without believing in some mythical sky demon.

Why not let God have control and finally feel free that He's got your back. It's not all on you.

Is this the same God who fucked over Job in order to win a bet with Satan? Fuck him.

i dont think fate exists, i think people have the ability to choose what they do with their lives. and i dont like the idea of fate either, i dont like the thought that i am not in control of what i do, thats like me having no free will at all

I'd go for the selfish gene theory. If faced with a choice at a certain point then you would always make the same decision, even with the appearance of randomness and the intention. The next time you're faced with it, you may choose differently, but you would always make the same choice first time, always make the same other choice second time... etc.

It doesn't fit with advanced theoretical physics, but it slots into advanced theorectical biology perfectly. And it has that depressing inevitablity and is impossible to get round.

It's worth noting that temporal physics won't allow such a thing as fate. It's also worth noting that temporal physics can't produce shit all of any use to us, other than yet more theory and yet more lack of time machines.

Fate doesn't exist. I have my own free will to do what I please

Fate is humans thinking way to much of their importance..."I am Destined to do this and that", "We were Destined to meet my darling" and ""It was fate that he was struck down by that car..."

Fate is just the results of the trip. Destiny and Free Will are methods of getting there. Each person has a fate. Some people decide their fates. Others have no choice.
Question, for everyone: what is the difference between Fate and Destiny?

Put it this way:
You have a poole table with balls randomly scattered on it. You pick up the cue and hit one of the balls so the others bounce around, change positions, some get potted, etc.
Now if you arranged it EXACTLY the same way again and hit the same ball you hit before in exactly the same place with exactly the same force, all of the balls would end up in exactly the same places they had before, no matter how many times you do it. You might as well film yourself doing it then just play it over to save time ;)

(Obviously you wouldn't really be able to do this becuase you wouldn't be able to measure accurately enough, and have all the air molecules in the same place, etc).
That's the key, though. It's hypothetical, not real.

I'd go for the selfish gene theory. If faced with a choice at a certain point then you would always make the same decision, even with the appearance of randomness and the intention. The next time you're faced with it, you may choose differently, but you would always make the same choice first time, always make the same other choice second time... etc.
There's no such thing as time travel. ;) The first time you encountered it was a one-time thing; there is no "always making" of a same choice.

The better question is... "Do you believe in magic?"

This is going to make little sense, so bear with me:

First of all, Destiny is the idea that your life is being used like a pawn. And so is Fate, only, fate truely means that there are points on the road off life you have to take.
It is your decision how you get there.
Meaning, that, Fate says, 'you will fall in love,' but how/who/why etc. is all up to you. And one more thing I'd like to say to anybody who believes in Destiny and Love:

THEY. DO. NOT. EXSIST. PEROID.

So, in the end, yes and no. I don't think its God that control Fate, I believe that it is merely time in and of itself. Because somethings have already happened, something have not. The Timeline is written in stone, but that's just it:
It's a Timeline. Only the Major Events of the Past, Present and Future are there.

this is a yes and no answer. some things are gonna happen... the purpose to life... whether it is to write a word on a sheet a paper that gives another person the will to compose a song which makes one person propose to another and they have a child who one day destorys all of mankind... that sort of thing is fated... where no matter what you do you will accomplish it before you die just normally u dont know what that is... otherwise its more of a free will. Sheez what else would the gods want to do other than watch humans with their free will make complete fools of themselves... lol.

I believe in destiny and fate to a point. God has a design for us, but the choices we make in between are largely our own.

I don't know.