Philosophy Philosophical question number 12

I think smoke has gone to sleep again, so just to keep your interest up we have question No. 12

Is the future predetermined?

Are we set on a course that we cannot change or, if we knew of future events, could we change them? Nostradamus predicted Hitler (suppossedly) and the rise of the Nazis. If the future is not determined how could someone predict the future? Surely any event predicted could be avoided, unless time does not allow that to happen. An alternative is that everything that has, is and will happen is one continuous circle. Therefore we have already done this before, so predicting the future is actually reading the past. Again could this been changed if you knew about it? Another theory is that everything that can happen, happens. In other words parallel realities exist next to our own and any predictions from the future that we alter cause a new reality to come into existance. There are more theories and explanations and I would love to hear them.

=> Is the future predetermined?

In my opinion yes. I believed both in the free-will and predetermination. They are just on different levels. As humans we have the feeling that all our decisions are ours. They are in some way, but we only take them because of our environment, past experience, biological condition (including intelligence and capacity to process information and make decisions). So as 'everything in the universe influences everything at all time' (like a big "energetic continuum"), there is only one future possible. It's all like a one-way chain reaction but we are just not conscious of it. All our experiences, thoughts or decisions are determined by the world we live in.

We are only a tiny part of the universe, part of the flow. So our decisions (free-will) is also part of the flow of the universe, and in this way there is only one future, but one that humans have no way to predict.

Only the knowledge of the 'whole (universe)' and all the interactions within could help forsee clearly the future in its infinity. But as it is impossible to be part of the universe and more than the whole at the same time, we cannot know the future with certainty.

I think fate acts on us up to a point, up to when we can act and think for ourselves. Then I beleive that our destiny is in our hands solely. Even small actions such as watching a movie about spies when you are 7 can determine your life. From it you maybe have the dream to be a spy, then later on in life you do, and end up getting yourself in a situation that's rather sticky and you can't say ohh fate had it in for me. Even walkin down to the street can have a very important outcome in one's life; look the wrong way and you get hit by a bus, look the right way and you see your future wife, and so forth..

In My Own Experience, Yes!

Good question and something I have read alot about. A predetermined future also proved itself to me some 38 years ago which I'll explain later. I hope I can make this as short as possible.

Please understand that this is what I have read and it may seem like alot of bull to some. I do not adhere to it per se nor do I discount it. I just base my beliefs on what I have experienced throughout life.

Based on what I have read, we determine our own future before we enter this plane of existance including our own deaths and the way we will meet our end. We select our parents, our race, our gender, and the country we will reside in. We select our lifestyle be it poor, working class, upper class, etc. All this selection is done because of things we need to learn or debts we need to repay. Some may need to learn patience so they are born with a quick temper. Some may need to learn humility, so they are born with a big ego. Others may need to learn compassion and they face quite a few heartaches, others may need to learn tolerance so they are discriminated against and so on. Some follow their "gut instincts" and learn their lessons, while others do not. Someone once said, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

If you murdered someone in a previous life the same will happen to you, maybe by the victim, in this lifetime. If you cheated on your husband in a previous life, maybe your wife will cheat on you in this life. Everything is set into motion before we are even born. Some may ask, well why do children die so young? Well their function in this lifetime was to repay a debt or maybe the mother, father, or both needed to learn some lesson from their death. I read somewhere, "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth."

However, the future of any one person or say, for a country as a whole, is
not written in stone. Our actions, and the actions of a nations' people, can change the future. Maybe that is why, the "committee of they" as I like to call them, through the mass media, try to keep our minds elsewhere while they continue to form a one world government.

We all have free will in our decisions and no matter what action we take when we come to a fork in the road of life, there is always a predetermined outcome. Countless outcomes throughout ones lifetime. Remember one thing: Your present position in life is the sum total of every single decision you ever made from the time you were able to think to the present moment. Whatever decision you, or a nation, makes in this reality another you or nation does just the opposite. In effect there are also countless parallell universes and realities. There is a reality where the Germans and Japanese won the war and one where Kennedy was not assassinated and so on. There is a reality where you studied and passed that exam when in this reality you partied and failed. Someone once said, "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." This law holds true for decisions and thoughts.

My experience with predetermined outcomes is thus: Around when I was 12 years old I remember sitting in my kitchen looking out the window while my mother was washing dishes at the sink. Out of the blue and for some unknown reason I asked my mother, "Ma, what if I became older and I joined the Army and they sent me to Japan and I married a Japanese woman?" She turned to look at me and said, "You don't want to do that because they can't be trusted." "Who?" I asked. "Japanese women", she replied. End of subject.

Why I asked that I still do not know. Why not China or some other oriental country? I had no interest in Japan at the time and probably couldn't even find it on a map. One strange interest I had though, when I looked back on my life, was that I was always attracted to oriental people and felt like I had an affinity with them. No explaination as to why there.

Well you know what? It all happened as I "predicted". Explain that! I know it's true because I wrote it in a diary I was keeping at the time and when I looked back at that diary some 10 years later I was shocked by what I had written and what had happened in my life. I did join the Army, although I should have been released on a medical condition and almost was. No one could believe I was allowed to stay in. I was sent to Japan, through some mistake on the Army's and my own part. And I did marry a Japanese woman while in the military! The processes that got me into the Army and to Japan are too many and detailed to go into here, but trust me, when I look back on it, it had to be predetermined. There's no other answer for it..

When I arrived in Japan, I had the strange feeling that this was where I belonged and I ended up staying for 16 1/2 years.

Therefore, to me, yes, the future is predetermined, but it is predetermined in so many ways that we cannot comprehend it on this plane. We just have to trust our instincts to make the right decision no matter how small and insignificant it may seem to us at the moment. And if the correct decision is not made by us, it seems to me, based on my experience, that it may be made for you.

I don't see how that is predetermined, it is the direct outcome of your decision. You decided to follow through with your gut instinct or inclination or attitude towards your future and it turned out fine. But let's say one one of those years you were in Japan, before you met your wife you may have gone to place and met a western woman, she could have possibly been your wife. I'm not sure I understand the first part about us chosing race country and what not. What do you mean exactly, like reincarnation ?

I don't believe in predetermined future at all.

Just looking at physical events that can be peceived through the senses, it may help to classify objects and and predictabilities.

Objects:
1. simple objects with no action/reaction involving information flow nor decision

2. intermediate organisms with little action/reaction involving information flow and decision

3. complex organisms with action/reaction involving greater information flow and decision

Predictability:
a. completely predictable

b. some uncertainty involved due to either many possible outcomes or lack of detailed knowledge

c. great uncertainty involving many choices available and too much information

Comparing a free-falling object in a vacuum (for celestial bodies in non-accelerated motion) or colliding solid bodies (or an object in acceleration) with an earthworm trying to find its way out of a maze would serve good examples for discussing the topic. Physical bodies, regardless of whether it can process information, all follow the four physical forces of nature: in that sense they are perfectly predictable in so far as we can obtain initial constants with increasing accuracy.

As for interactive beings, such as the earthworm or 21st century humans, they are also bound by the laws of physics, chemistry, and biological reflex patterns. But an earthworm can learn how to combine its reflexes, memory of past failures and successes, so as to find its way out of the maze. The general pattern of learning can be observed, and the earthworm will become successful with increasing probability in escaping the maze.

If, as some underinformed American scientists assumed in the 1900's, ALL human behavior were predictable and manipulable on the pleasure-pain principle, i.e. the reinforcement of specific behavior by punishment and reward, then history may be calculable just like tracking the celestial bodies. It is interesting also, to observe, that the hypersimple materialist model of higher-order organisms defined as Pavlov's dog became the model for American psychology.

The humanist psychology proposed in the 1960's by Abraham Maslow brought in more complex ideas about what makes people do certain things, and as the urgency of actions regarding such fixed areas as physical safty is fulfilled, individuals are shown to excercise a wider range of behavioral decisions that is not very predictable. The unpredicatability involves both the huge number of possible outcomes and the uncertainty with which a person struggles (or not struggles) to define oneself and one's actions.

At each branching point, an individual can opt one choice over others for various reasons. Some look predictable, some aren't. The sum of reflexive decisions and interactive decisions involving higher order information chunks makes human history unpredictable in general terms. As new ideas about one's self and one's group which one identifies oneself with arise, newer states of awareness will give more psychological levers to work with. The general trend, if we don't destroy each other, would be towards a more rational and creative society. Extinction or continuation is not determined, but longer existence will generally enhance the chances of a more humane, intelligent, equitable, and objective state of being.

Mass Extinction Chart of 12 Classes of Vertebraic Animals
Specialists are divided in why several species experienced mass extinction at certain points in geological history.

A: Paleozoic, B: Mesozoic, C: Cenozoic
unit: 1,000,000 yrs


1. turtles
2. ichthyosaurus
3.
4. lizards, snakes
5. birds
6.
7.
8. pterodactyls
9. crocodiles
10.
11. mammals
12. mammaloid reptiles

Duo said:

I don't see how that is predetermined, it is the direct outcome of your decision. You decided to follow through with your gut instinct or inclination or attitude towards your future and it turned out fine. But let's say one one of those years you were in Japan, before you met your wife you may have gone to place and met a western woman, she could have possibly been your wife. I'm not sure I understand the first part about us chosing race country and what not. What do you mean exactly, like reincarnation ?

Click to expand...

I know it all doesn't make sense to some. I just still find it strange that I would even say something like that back then. I'm still searching for the answer as to why I knew in advance where my life would head even if I didn't know it at the time.

What I ment by "predetermined" is that my lifepath must have been decided by me before being born or something like that. (Remember, this is based on what I have read) So regardless if I met a western woman or not, I probably would not have married her as that was not my path. If I did, out of lust or something, then I would have to suffer the consequences of a bad marriage or feeling inside that something was missing from my life.

Again, based on what I have read, yes it is reincarnation. We select our life path based on the things we need to learn in this life. Whether this is true or not, I do not know. But research is making mean lean more and more towards the reality of reincarnation.

Mycernius said:

I think smoke has gone to sleep again, so just to keep your interest up we have question No. 12

Is the future predetermined?

Are we set on a course that we cannot change or, if we knew of future events, could we change them? Nostradamus predicted Hitler (suppossedly) and the rise of the Nazis. If the future is not determined how could someone predict the future? Surely any event predicted could be avoided, unless time does not allow that to happen. An alternative is that everything that has, is and will happen is one continuous circle. Therefore we have already done this before, so predicting the future is actually reading the past. Again could this been changed if you knew about it? Another theory is that everything that can happen, happens. In other words parallel realities exist next to our own and any predictions from the future that we alter cause a new reality to come into existance. There are more theories and explanations and I would love to hear them.

Click to expand...

I'm awake dude.

Interesting question.
I think this does come down to whether you believe in fate.
"There is no fate but what we make for ourselves" (to quote - loosely - from Terminator 2).
I'm a big believer in fate and that everything happens for a reason. If you look back on the major things in your life (a partner, a close friend etc) they probably stem from another event and one that may not neccesarily be as joyus as the outcome. For example, about 4 years ago, i went out with a hideous example of a girl. I'm not just talking about looks, her personality was shallow and all she was concerned with was herself...even getting a cuddle was like drawing blood from a stone (sorry to use an old cliche). However, if i hadn't gone out with 'it' i wouldn't be with my current partner of almost 4 years. Sometimes the reasons for things happening aren't immediately apparent and it can be difficult to find good out of a bad situation but as they say 'Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger' (yet another cliche).

as for predictions...well they aren't a definate outcome. On a basic level, i could predict that next wednesday it will rain and of course it may but there is an equal chance that it won't. predictions are quite personal and individual and they can be made on a basis of knowledge. By studying form and conditions i could 'predict' what horse would win a race and again there is an equal chance that i would be right or wrong but i'd have a basis of knowledge to back up my 'prediction'.

As for nostradamus, well either his predictions were so ambiguous that they could be loosely linked with any event or he was a weirdy beardy genius, but i never know the guy...

I just wonder in Macbeth would he have killed Duncan if he had never met the 3 witches? Was his future predetermined or did the witches set him on the course of his self destruction by telling them his future?

I didn't read everything, I just skimmed, so forgive me if I'm repeating.

If you believe fate is predetermeined, then you reach a paradox. If the future is predetermined, then there is a definite future you could "see". However, once you see that, you could change your decisions so that future does not happen. However, it may be argued that even if you decide to sit absolutely still, there will be a series of events that indirectly force you into that position you saw "in the future". So no matter what, you will reach that point in time. This provides an interesting theory: certain points in the future are predetermined for us, however, the paths we take to get there are up to us and can be completely different.

I'm not going to delve too deep into this...I just don't have the stamina right now . But think of this: if the future isn't predetermined that means we can choose to live our lives how we want and do what we will. This means that there is only one thing in life that is certain (with the exception of finding a miracle "cure") - death. Therefore, once we are alive, the only certain event in our life is our death, but until then, we can live our lives out however we wish. But this goes back to the point-determined future: certain events or points in our life are predetermined, but the paths we take to get there are different. So depending on how you see it, you either live along a completely linearly-predetermined future or a point-predetermined future.

I think there has to be some degree of predetermination, as we are all born into circumstances that in some sense we cannot change, and they are bound to partly determine our future. I once read that true freedom comes in recognising that your choices are limited. But I think complete predetermination is too paradoxical, and more importantly too depressing, to accept.

I think like a Calvanist: everything is predetermined, but I act like an Armenianist- I still have free will. But I guess you knew I was going to say that...or did you?

sabro said:

I think like a Calvanist: everything is predetermined, but I act like an Armenianist- I still have free will. But I guess you knew I was going to say that...or did you?

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I think the idea of providence does not exclude free will. Whereas from God's point of view everthing may be "determined," it isn't so in the eyes of a human. Or perhaps the way this particular world was created, there were many undefined variables built in, so that there would be the struggle between good and evil, God and the divider, if we follow the dualist theologians. I've heard the "Armenian School" of faith being criticised by Presbyterianism, but never understood the deal. What do they find problems with Armenianism :?

Chinese has a believe that a personal's life is determined by the following 5 factors.
?ꖽ?A??^?A?O?????A?l?ωA???A??椏??B

?ꖽ - nature/life, if you are born short you are short
??^ - luck
?O???? - fengshui, the environment you're in, people you're with.
?l?ωA?? - karma, your family/and your karma.
??椏? - study, your effort in life, how hard you try.

1 and 2 you have no control over, 3 is half-half, 4 and 5 is somehting you can do about. In a nutshell, life is determined by nature and nutture.
?m??, ????, ?R?㑢??, know life, follow life and then make (your own) life.

Deep stuff.

Time

I guess it all depends on your frame of refrence in respect to time.

The way I see it is this: Time is a line, not a line with a definate start or end, just a one dimensional plane running ad infinitem in all directions. You may be able to state that your existence is at a certain point on the line but you never will be able to prove it, because each frame of reference you use is based upon another and another. So thus you can only prove your existence in the 'time line' by a comparison with another event. This time line can never be broken or inturrupted or redirected, it is constant and unmoving. I do believe in the supernatural as a convenience to an explination in how to tie everything together. Imagine the afterlife or whatever you subscribe to as a realm existing outside the plane and bounds of time. This means that in ejecting from the time line/continuum you now exist at every single point in time, yet at no single point because you do not exist in the bounds of a formal line. That means that at any time you can choose to 'visit' any point in time at any place (4 dimensions) because you can from an outside refrence frame plop yourself down upon any point and time you wish, something I believe you cannot do from inside the time continuum. Thus the fact that a pseudo fate arises. That because the time is infinate in both directions, that the time continuum has and always will exist. Thus because it has always existed that means that everything has already fallen into place upon the line ad infinitem. Thus fate does exist, in my terms, only in this world. The reason I can say this is that in my time continuum everything that has happened and will happen has already happned an infinate times before since the line never began nor will end.