Fatism, Destiny and Fate Options

[xXYouMeBedNowXx]

I don't know many people that are Fatists, people that believe in Destiny, and a set course in path and in life. It may be either they don't want to believe it, or simply don't see the benefit, or maybe they don't understand it enough about it to think that it could work.

All choices are governed by factors, by influences. These factors are cancelled, reduced, and summed to calculate the end decision. The result of the choice reacts, and causes other factors, which then influence more choice. This endless cycle of cause and effect; of factor and choice is known as Fate -- Destiny.

Everything that has ever happened, happened the way it should have. There are no mistakes, simply, because Fate does not pose as a question with variation, but a statement. Fact, not opinion. Cause and effect are the only constants. All factors, when calculated out and completely influenced the sides of a decision will create the outcome. The outcome is then another choice. These factors are direct causes of choice, making variation an impossibility.

This is the essence of the inevitabilty. To think of Destiny as a helplessness, a weakness of non-control, it can be thought of on the contrary. It can be a strength: to know that what you do is with purpose, with pure decision and meaning; with an ultimatum of complete solidarity. It provides us with meaning in all actions, creating every movement, sound, and touch an art form within itself.


FOR MOVIE GOERS
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Now, it might sound familiar. "Our choices are predetermined" only the "illusion of choice". Well I swear to you that there is one peice of culture that can actually explain the concept well. You've all heard of it before. Bullet-dodging, flying kicks, black leather suits and tight jackets. The Matrix. Right. I know. But they do it well.

Probably the largest portion of the movie that can coincide with these things are scenes with the Merovingian, the Oracle, the Architect and Smith. Mostly in Reloaded. If you listen to them carefully, and actually try to understand what they say, it can make sense.

IN A NUTSHELL
Opinions?

[Jhaks]

Ooo very interesting ideas. I agree with you very much xXYouMeBedNowXx. Actually you bring up an argument for God (I don't believe in "The God" actually) called the cosmological argument.

Cosmological Argument:
Every event has a cause.
Causes precede thier events in time.
Either a causes is it's own causes or there is an infinite chain of events extending backwards in time.
Because there can not be an infinite chain of events there must have been a first causes and this (as the argument says) is God.

Now let use an analogy, the pool table:
We have physical LAWS that govern motion.
If you set up a pool table and hit the ball and stop freez time for a moment you could use physics to predict the motion of the other balls and as it turns out this of course works.
Now the pool table is like the universe and is goverened by laws of cause and effect so each event has a cause, but this means there must be a root cause which we cannot seem to comprehend or explain. Some believe this is God. I believe this root cause is at least is some "thing" we cannot explain. Maybe it's a monkey. Who knows.

Some Problems:
A problem with cause and effect though is that our laws of the universe are only apporximations because as far as we can tell the complexity of space time interactions could be infinit. There are many branches of physics which account for different situations of our universe. There is the traditional Newtonian physics which is what has been around for a long long time and then of course Einstein's theory of relativity which came along b/c the universe doesn't quite work the same way at velocities near the speed of light and also very new theories to explain quarks and such and such.

So one problem is although we know a lot we don't know it all; there could be some random factor in the universe we have not discovered. Maybe it is so minute at certain levels it doesn't matter but on a grand scale the randomness has an effect.

If There Are Laws
Ok now lets say there is absolute cause and effect. Then yes we are subjected to fate. BUT the sheer complexity of our univeres is so impossibly incalculable by any means of ours that in a sense it might as well be random. To us certain things such as feelings choices although might be caused by chemical reactions are in a sense random us or maybe a better term is pseudo random. We cannot explain these things maybe not b/c we don't understand the concepts behind them but maybe because the complexity of situations would require to much calculating power.

Here is another analogy:
In computers there is no such thing as random. Period. A computer is made up of reliable hardware and (sometimes not so reliable ) programs. People first must understand computers on a basic level have very very basic functionality such as true or false logic and arithmatic. Programs are very clear instructions to perform these basic operations. Complexity arrises when people find ways to use these basic hardware and basic computer operations to form much more complicated tasks. Now as you can see from your own computer sometimes it may seem like there is randomness BUT THERE ISN'T. All things happen in your computer for a reason that is why software companies spend millions of dollars in debugging thier software. That is why if you take someone who is very knowledgable they will know what is happening in your computer. But to you it seems random because it's complexity is so great people (even computer scientists most of the time) can not directly tell what are the causes.

Final Thoughts
Yes I do believe somewhat in fatism from a logical stand point. But from a pratical stand point I believe for all purposes that are important randomness exists. If you want to talk sociology there's the whole thing of "the path of least resistance" and the social structures that push us to certain paths in life but that's a different discussion. The thing about purpose well I don't agree fully with that. Lets say someone did kick start the universe. Well how do we even know he cares about us when there is the rest of the universe. Hey the starter could be Lisa SImpson who shocked a petri dish with her tooth in it. And she sure doesn't seem to care too much. I think purpose comes from your own experience and your own understanding of the world.

Here's a quote from the movie K-Pax:
"I want to tell you something Mark, something you do not yet know, but we K-Paxians have been around long enough to have discovered. The universe will expand, and it will collapse back on itself, then will expand again. It will repeat this process forever. What you don't know is that when the universe expands again, everything will be as it is now. Whatever mistakes you make this time around, you will live through on your next pass. Every mistake you make, you will live through again, and again, forever. So my advice to you is to get it right this time around. Because this time is all you have. " - Prot