Are all choices inevitable?

[Compassionist]

I have been wondering about this for 23 years. Are all choices inevitable? If any other living thing (e.g. a virus, another human, a cow or a bird) had my genes, my environments, my nutrients and my experiences (across my lifetime until this very moment), would they not be me and be typing these words right where and when I am typing them? Conversely, if I or any other living thing had YOUR genes, environments, nutrients and experiences (across your lifetime until this very moment), wouldn't I or they be YOU and be reading this post when and where you are doing so?

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

[Neatras]

The most important thing you need to remember is that things happen which are possible. Unless one can propose a possible path that would lead to a cow having your genes and typing words at a keyboard, then by all accounts it is impossible.

The thing about inherited traits is that while there is room for mutation and alteration from the original genome structure, there isn't a proposed physical conduit that would lead to a drastic live birth of a genetically human organism from a cow.

If I flip a coin infinitely, there's an infinite sequence of states, but they all result solely in the state of heads or tails. There won't be some mysterious third state with a previously undiscovered face. (I'm being dismissive and ignoring the occurrence where a coin lands on its edge, of course. That would constitute a re-flip.)

And let's analyze exactly how you put across the notion of someone else living your life. This presupposes that an experience is independent of the body, and is randomly distributed among living organisms. That somehow, the thing experiencing a cow's life right now would be experiencing your life if it had your genes/environment/experiences. I remember when I had this thought experiment ages back. It took me a while to realize that there probably isn't some collection of experiences being distributed among organisms. Instead, it makes more sense to assert that a consciousness is born from the experiences and environment an organism is in. The only thing that could ever live your life is you, because you're the result of these things.

Would it even make sense to ask that "any other living thing had my [life]... would they not be me?" I don't believe so. Because that presupposes that other living creatures can have another's experiences if only some kind of switch were thrown, and things got mixed up somehow. There's just no reason to think that, based on what we understand.

Causality is ultimately the influence of how physical objects interact with each other. Hard determinism gets more or less popular in waves, but if it's actually true, then everything we do is a predictable phenomenon. Even so, all that really says is that we're thrown into the world, we find ourselves developing into individual agents, and we act based on our own predisposition. The results we achieve in our lives won't be accomplished by anyone else, after all.

[Compassionist]

[Replying to post 2 by Neatras]

I love your post. It makes sense to me. I love the sentence: "The only thing that could ever live your life is you, because you're the result of these things." As far as I can tell, it is inevitable that you typed that and I read that.

[Monta]

I have been wondering about this for 23 years. Are all choices inevitable? If any other living thing (e.g. a virus, another human, a cow or a bird) had my genes, my environments, my nutrients and my experiences (across my lifetime until this very moment), would they not be me and be typing these words right where and when I am typing them? Conversely, if I or any other living thing had YOUR genes, environments, nutrients and experiences (across your lifetime until this very moment), wouldn't I or they be YOU and be reading this post when and where you are doing so?

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

Remember MATRIX - free your mind, Neo.

I believe in constant change and constant choices.
Some tings we can not change other things we can but for various reasons we do not.

[Goat]

[quote="Compassionist"]
I have been wondering about this for 23 years. Are all choices inevitable? If any other living thing (e.g. a virus, another human, a cow or a bird) had my genes, my environments, my nutrients and my experiences (across my lifetime until this very moment), would they not be me and be typing these words right where and when I am typing them? Conversely, if I or any other living thing had YOUR genes, environments, nutrients and experiences (across your lifetime until this very moment), wouldn't I or they be YOU and be reading this post when and where you are doing so?

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?[/q]

That is the whole 'destination verses free will ' discussion, as well as the 'nature verses nurture'. I don't see any way to test that.. and falsify either the proposition of free will, or the proposition of predestination. We at least have the illusion of choice, so, we might as well figure we have choice , and take responsibility for our own actions. Since no one has come up with a method for testing , it's a more philosophical question rather than scientific.

[Compassionist]

I have been wondering about this for 23 years. Are all choices inevitable? If any other living thing (e.g. a virus, another human, a cow or a bird) had my genes, my environments, my nutrients and my experiences (across my lifetime until this very moment), would they not be me and be typing these words right where and when I am typing them? Conversely, if I or any other living thing had YOUR genes, environments, nutrients and experiences (across your lifetime until this very moment), wouldn't I or they be YOU and be reading this post when and where you are doing so?

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?[/q]

That is the whole 'destination verses free will ' discussion, as well as the 'nature verses nurture'. I don't see any way to test that.. and falsify either the proposition of free will, or the proposition of predestination. We at least have the illusion of choice, so, we might as well figure we have choice , and take responsibility for our own actions. Since no one has come up with a method for testing , it's a more philosophical question rather than scientific.

Thank you for your observation. We experience making choices according to our limited awareness, values and abilities. To make free choices which are not constrained by our limited awareness, values and abilities, we would need to be all-knowing and all-powerful. Sadly, we are not all-knowing and all-powerful.

[ttruscott]

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

I contend that we are indeed chained but not by our creation. Rather we are chained by our free will decisions before we got our bodies constrained by our dna, our family environment and our cultural realities. All the constraints of human life, our dna, our family environment and our cultural realities, reflect our decisions we made by our free will when we chose our eternal relationship with YHWH.

So the lime mold for Arcturus that creates a clone of you doesn't get your essential you, only your human you. This essential you is what survives our death and is either banished to the outer darkness or is wed to GOD HiMself and all others in the heavenly state. WE are cleansed from the sin we chose before we entered our human state, and cease to be prisoners to our sinful state so we are able to enter the heavenly state, but those who are not under HIS promise of salvation are indeed prisoners of their own choices for eternity.

imCo

[ttruscott]

Thank you for your observation. We experience making choices according to our limited awareness, values and abilities. To make free choices which are not constrained by our limited awareness, values and abilities, we would need to be all-knowing and all-powerful. Sadly, we are not all-knowing and all-powerful.

A free choice means the result is not forced upon us by any outside power and that none of the options pertinent to the choices are withheld from us by some external power.

But it does not mean that we must be all knowing (power has nothing to do with choice) since all we need to know is the details of the consequences of our decisions well enough that our choice is real, that is, not a guess as to which option we most want.

[Compassionist]

Thank you for your observation. We experience making choices according to our limited awareness, values and abilities. To make free choices which are not constrained by our limited awareness, values and abilities, we would need to be all-knowing and all-powerful. Sadly, we are not all-knowing and all-powerful.

A free choice means the result is not forced upon us by any outside power and that none of the options pertinent to the choices are withheld from us by some external power.

But it does not mean that we must be all knowing (power has nothing to do with choice) since all we need to know is the details of the consequences of our decisions well enough that our choice is real, that is, not a guess as to which option we most want.

I want to prevent all suffering but I can't. So, what I said about our limited awareness, values and abilities constraining our choices, stand.

[Compassionist]

Could I have done something else? If so, why didn't I do that instead of doing this? Could you have done something else? If so, why didn't you do that instead of this? I would really like to know for sure. Without our consent, we are thrust into existence and we keep riding the river of causality until we are plunged into death. Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

Can we be free of the chains of causality or are we doomed to be its prisoner from start to finish?

I contend that we are indeed chained but not by our creation. Rather we are chained by our free will decisions before we got our bodies constrained by our dna, our family environment and our cultural realities. All the constraints of human life, our dna, our family environment and our cultural realities, reflect our decisions we made by our free will when we chose our eternal relationship with YHWH.

So the lime mold for Arcturus that creates a clone of you doesn't get your essential you, only your human you. This essential you is what survives our death and is either banished to the outer darkness or is wed to GOD HiMself and all others in the heavenly state. WE are cleansed from the sin we chose before we entered our human state, and cease to be prisoners to our sinful state so we are able to enter the heavenly state, but those who are not under HIS promise of salvation are indeed prisoners of their own choices for eternity.

imCo

What proofs do you have for your extraordinary claims?