Fate or choices?

[Taz]

Do you think things happen because of fate or choices?

[Stormie]

"I don't believe in chance, accidents, or coincidences. I believe in the delusional self,
which is to say that I believe the things I talk and think about change the world around me
and result in events that appear to be coincidental. I believe I am god.
I believe everyone is their own god."

- Marilyn Manson, and I 100% Agree with this statement.

[Taz]

So you choose choice?

[Stormie]

That would be correct. I believe fate puts us on a certain path, and the choices we make affect the outcome.

[C0FFINCASE]

@ discussion so far: "Language and thought alters the world around us" has always sounded like bullshit to me. I'm sitting in chair, it is a chair. I can call it whatever I want and even say its not there but at two in the morning when I walk into it, its there and its a chair. Reality is out there and you can find and understand it, but you can not make it.
I believe life and reality is possibility, so does science and most rational faiths and ideologies. There may or may not be something guiding some of those possibilities but ultimately an individual can make choices affecting the world and others around them just as the world and others can affect them. However no one can change reality. There are things that are going to happen regardless of what an individual does. We're all gonna die, the world is going to end, the universe was born, ect. This things are happening independent of choices of individuals.
Ultimately you can control your life to some degree, society and external actors will always have control over you as well, but you can't do much about any thing larger than the world and even altering the world is extremely difficult.
Fate, destiny, luck, truth, god in a sense they're all the same. The ultimate force of reality that is far beyond out control and is on a set path that we can't even begin to hope to alter or control.

[Taz]

I believe in fate since it's ultimately what decides what happens.
Choice is what your referring to as FREEWILL.
Read slaughterhouse-five and it will give you a good insight on fate vs freewill

I look at fate as i can sit in my house for ever and not even try to get a job and not go to school but my fate is to have alot of money.... i hope im explaining that right. If im sitting in my house not doing anything then im going to have no money because its my choice to do that.

[Stormie]

Coffin; I'm pretty sure he means in the context of everyday life, not in regards to the inevitable.

[CL0V3R]

Personally I don't believe in fate. Things happen because there has to be some sort of outcome regardless of what that out come is.
No fate involved, just outcomes.

[Aleena]

There are two possibilities.
1>
Time is an illusion which humans use to try to make sense of the universe.
2>
Time exists all at once in one spot.

Now. There are two main theories that I reflect upon with this.
When an object is moving faster or slower, It is passing through more of space, BUT, Time ends up going slower, or stopping entirely. Where as when you completely stop, Time around you is moving faster.

With this in perception, time is based on speed and relevant movement through space (Or in our case, The movement of the planet itself) and seeing as time is precieved by speed, At the moment, We do _NOT_ control our actions, But the speed of the earths rotation around the sun. Is what controls our actions.

In relevancy of the universe, space, and ect, The speed at which the surface of our planet, directly controls when in the universe`s overall timeline, we take out our actions.

We have free will, But we have absolutely NO say in when we carry out that free will in the galactic timeline, That is determined by physics, And uinless we get into a spaceship and leave the planet. But even then, We are still going with the laws of physics of [Speed x Time] = The rate at which the universe allows us to precision and carry out our actions.


So. We have a small amount of control for our actions, but if you wish to be technical, Everything we do is pre-determined. This is how we can predict how long it will take a beam of light to leave the next universe, How we can predict the earths rotation, And how we can calculated where a planet will be millions of miles away from earth and send a satellite to it, AND even predict where it will land on the planet. Its fate as determined by the galactic timeline and general physics.

Dont understand? Let it sink in. Then come back here.

[Artificial]

I think special relativity holds little sway in a debate of free will :p

I believe choice/free will is merely an illusion. To date, we haven't been able to prove that anything in the universe is true random. We've been able to observe seemingly random behaviour, but I would argue that has more to do with our lack of physical understanding of the universe. If nothing in the universe is random, but instead everything follows the laws of physics, how can our events and actions, be random? (i.e. if we 'choose' a number from random between 1-10,000, I would argue there was no choice involved, and given the same physical circumstances, we would have arrived at that number every time).

edit: by the way, time never stops entirely, unless travelling at the speed of light, which, need I remind you is mathematically impossible. And completely stop? Remember that motion is all relative, so you can't 'completely' stop, as you'll always be moving in relation to something else. You can stop relative to another object though. No offence intended, but I think that argument is a bit weak. Because it's all relative, we're talking about our movement through spacetime here on earth. The fact that time moves differently elsewhere is irrelevant.

[C0FFINCASE]

To date, we haven't been able to prove that anything in the universe is true random.

Things are random until you try to see they're random. Or at least that is what quantum mechanics would argue. So maybe we have free will till we try to see if we have free will at which point some force kicks in selects an occurrence for us to experience. The observer collapses possibility into reality via observation and what becomes reality is random. The world we live in is a lot less Newtonian that we used to think. If there is randomness and all events are random at the quantum level that levels space for free will because there is randomness in the universe and things we can't account for. So you can put the same person under the same circumstance and get them to pick a truly random number each time. Either because the is an actual random event occurring or the metaphysical mind of the individuals is picking that number outside of physical reality.
Even if we live in a pre-determined world to us it would seem we have free will. Ultimately it is beyond us to accurately predict human behavior with any sort of real accuracy because people have the proven capacity to act contrary to every sort of behavior they have exhibited before. You can't prove the world is pre-determined because its beyond your ability to perceive it but you can perceive the world as one of free will. At that point does the reality matter, since you can't hope to know it?