Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

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nobspeople
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Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #1

Post by nobspeople »

Do you believe in fate* or destiny*?
Why or why not?
Are they even possible?
Why or why not?

*FATE defined here as: you do as 'something' more powerful than you has outlined for your life at every minute; DESTINY defined here: as you eventually end up at specific increments where 'something' more powerful than you designed for you to be.
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #2

Post by Miles »

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As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #3

Post by nobspeople »

Miles wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 4:09 pm .


As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


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As I age, I look back at life, I see things that happened seemingly on purpose (of course, what I don't see that didn't happen could be just as telling).
I wonder, if it's easier to see past events and place them in some sort of organization to understand them (X happened for Y reason) than to accept chaos?
The human mind seems more capable of understanding compartmentalized things then random things.
Last edited by nobspeople on Wed Aug 18, 2021 2:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #4

Post by Miles »

nobspeople wrote: Wed Aug 18, 2021 1:21 pm
Miles wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 4:09 pm .


As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


.
As I age, I look back at life, I see things that happened seemingly on purpose (of course, what I don't see that didn't happen could be just as telling).
I wonder, if it's easier to see past events and place them in some sort of organization to understand them (X happened for Y reason) than to accept chaos?
The human mind seems more capable of understand compartmentalized things then random things.
Indeed it does. The elements comprising order are always easier to comprehend than those of randomness.


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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #5

Post by Tcg »

Miles wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 4:09 pm .


As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


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Now all you have to do is provide verifiable evidence that your position as a "hard determinist" matches reality.


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I must assume that knowing is better than not knowing, venturing than not venturing; and that magic and illusion, however rich, however alluring, ultimately weaken the human spirit.

- Irvin D. Yalom

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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #6

Post by Miles »

Tcg wrote: Wed Aug 18, 2021 11:01 pm
Miles wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 4:09 pm .


As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


.
Now all you have to do is provide verifiable evidence that your position as a "hard determinist" matches reality.
Show me a human event that is uncaused and I might.


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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #7

Post by Purple Knight »

Miles wrote: Thu Aug 19, 2021 12:53 am
Tcg wrote: Wed Aug 18, 2021 11:01 pmNow all you have to do is provide verifiable evidence that your position as a "hard determinist" matches reality.
Show me a human event that is uncaused and I might.
I see determinism as the default, and free will as a unicorn that I'd have to see to believe.

I'm generally careful about being too simplistic in assessing which is the positive claim; I do maintain that there's more to take in than which is the positive claim and which is, opposed to it, the default.

In this case I tentatively think it's fair to assess that. Claiming that having consciousness makes you magic and somehow not obliged to follow the laws of the universe as every other object is bound to... to me, yeah... that = unicorn. That's the thing that if I don't see it, I'm comfortable not believing in it.

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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #8

Post by Tcg »

Miles wrote: Thu Aug 19, 2021 12:53 am
Tcg wrote: Wed Aug 18, 2021 11:01 pm
Miles wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 4:09 pm .


As a hard determinist my position is that the outcome of the world, wherever you care to place the finish line, is fated to be what it is and nothing other than that. A person has no more control over their destiny than they have control over the orbits of the planets. We do what we do because we are unable do otherwise. Free will is a comforting illusion with choice and choosing its operative fictions.


.
Now all you have to do is provide verifiable evidence that your position as a "hard determinist" matches reality.
Show me a human event that is uncaused and I might.

.
You made a claim. Are you suggesting you need my help to support the claim YOU made?


Tcg
To be clear: Atheism is not a disbelief in gods or a denial of gods; it is a lack of belief in gods.

- American Atheists


Not believing isn't the same as believing not.

- wiploc


I must assume that knowing is better than not knowing, venturing than not venturing; and that magic and illusion, however rich, however alluring, ultimately weaken the human spirit.

- Irvin D. Yalom

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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #9

Post by Newt »

The fate of man - as a phenomenon shrouded in an impenetrable fog of mystery, has fascinated for centuries, even millennia, the minds of inquisitive, reflective, research, as well as ordinary people, living with the tedious dullness of everyday life. It intrigues both the intellectual with above-average knowledge and minds neglected in their development. After all, neither the mental level of personal culture, nor social class, nor the level of civilization development, help people to free themselves from the wonder why one person's life is strewn with rose petals, while the other is trudging through thorn bushes all his life.
One person has everything he or she expects with little effort, while the other has to struggle hard to meet them. Often, being on the verge of success, he unexpectedly loses everything that was so desired, worked out with great effort, and so close to being achieved. Everything slips away, carried by the current of life into unexplored space, leaving bitterness of disappointment, helplessness, the regret of the unfulfilled. Why is this happening? What mechanisms influence the modification of the general course of our lives? What regularities govern human fate? Why is fate so unjust that it allows one person to be born into a family full of warmth, mutual love, creative support, and consolidation, while the other is destined for misery, starvation, abuse, the struggle for survival from childhood? Or, of two children brought up in the same family in identical conditions, one is destined to be a hoodlum, a drunkard, and a bully, and the other to be a respected citizen with stable family life? I was always loved as a child. As a child, I was often pampered by my mother, but my father spanked me. I was often confused as a child. I was often challenged and beaten as a child. I was often a sad girl as a child. I was often hugged as a child, especially by my father. As a child, I was often bottomed out.
As a child, I was often praised, as a participant in one of my seminars for unsuccessful people who wrote about themselves. Let's analyze these statements and consider how different emotional levels were the starting point of adult life for those people who consider it not successful enough, not fulfilling expectations, and which they think should be changed. And is it possible to change fate? Maybe it is assigned once and for all from the moment of birth by some unknown, mysterious forces ruling the world and man? How far, and if at all, does divine intervention intrude into the fate of the human individual? And how would this interference relate to the fate of ethnic groups: Indians, Jews, Gypsies, Kurds, Tutsis, Macedonians, and others?
Max Freedom Long, in his book The Magic of the Kahunas based on his own research in Hawaii, writes that these ancient sorcerers were able to change the fate of humans. Is it really for the better? What would be the criteria for a better fate and a worse fate? In a conversation with me, the manager of a juvenile shelter was looking for the reason why children neglected, dirty, cold, and starved by perpetually drunk or constantly absent parents fled to them at the earliest opportunity despite the fact that in the shelter they had clean pajamas, regular meals when, toys, a television, a tub of hot water, and other goods unattainable in their empty, dirty home. Why didn't they want to embark on a different path of destiny? Perhaps they intuitively felt that they would not realize their destiny then?

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Re: Fate. Destiny. Real or not?

Post #10

Post by Dimmesdale »

nobspeople wrote: Tue Aug 17, 2021 11:48 am Do you believe in fate* or destiny*?
Why or why not?
Are they even possible?
Why or why not?

*FATE defined here as: you do as 'something' more powerful than you has outlined for your life at every minute; DESTINY defined here: as you eventually end up at specific increments where 'something' more powerful than you designed for you to be.
Oh alright, why not one more go (on this, ever-so perennial topic..)? 8-) :?

I believe, at this point, that there is no time in the ultimate sense. Whatever is happening NOW has, in some sense, always been happening. And so, Reality can't be other than what it is.

BUT

Whatever we DO with our WILL now, that is free and unencumbered, affects, well, everything.... What I mean is, what we will, determined or not, has an effect on Destiny. It's like they run in tandem (a favorite word of mine, ha) next to each other. Our willing, no matter how small, has an impact. And our will is NOT totally at the mercy of ... "dominos". No. It is IN LARGE PART , SELF-ORIGINATED. Not that it is fully independent of influences, but that, it has an ORIGINAL contribution to make, even if that happens to be outside time and, in that sense, ALL ALONG.

Hope that helps.
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." - Albert Einstein

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