Fate - Does it exist?

[trident]

Had a discussion with a friend over the weekend over "Fate". She said it exists, that each of us has a plan laid out for our lives and that certain things are meant to be. I disagreed. We make our own choices - free will & all that jazz.

 

What do you think?

[chai714]

No, fate does not exist.

 

The decisions you make affect your life. Nothing was "meant to be," rather, you make it to be what it is.

[RayKay]

What course your life takes is not what you hope, but rather what you believe. It is that belief that affects your choices and actions, and thereforeeee your path in life.

 

You always have choices, and what choice you make will affect what ends up being your next choice, and so on. You determine your own destination.

 

I believe life is a journey and an opportunity. The only 'fateful' thing is that at some point it will be over, which is why you need to make the most of it while you are here.

[Day_Walker]

You are asking a question that has no real answer, it has been debated by scholars for centuries. I think you should consult yourself and find out what you truly believe. I believe that we dont know what is going to happen with our lives, from our perspective its hard to see if anything is predetermined or if it is just chance. People are comforted by believing that there is a plan from them, it makes them feel safe and secure. I dont believe that there is a plan for me or that anything is meant to be.

[AwdreeHpburn]

Yeh - I agree with Day Walker. Sounds a tough thing to prove or disprove.

 

But you did ask, "What do you think?" To which I will reply, I don't believe in fate....

[trident]

Like I said @ the start of the thread. I don't believe in fate. We make our own decisions and those choices lead us thru life. With each choice we chose a direction.

 

My friend believes in fate. It was quite a circular discussion because you can attirbute a "choice" from one position to be "fate" from the other "position" and vice-versa.

 

Just curious. Nothing more than a topic for discussion.

[agent1607307371]

I believe that we have a big strand of fate that runs through our lives and then other stuff that just happens with no rhyme or reason.

 

And I'm a big believer in synchronicity. I like to think that the universe rises up to help you.

 

 

If fate does exist, then every choice we make has been predetermined, right, so how do we know that we aren't making the choice we have to make? I don't like to think about it too much though because the thought just creeps me out.

[AwdreeHpburn]

I guess the reason I don't believe in fate is exactly because of what Agent described. And part of the same reason I don't believe there are any gods.

 

We make enough excuses for our bad decisions, bad choices, and mistakes as it is, we don't need to hide behind a theory of a predetermined fate.

 

If one doesn't believe they have a choice or hand in the matters of their own life, then they won't have.

[thursday]

If one doesn't believe they have a choice or hand in the matters of their own life, then they won't have.

 

I absolutely agree.

 

I'm pretty sure existence:

= free will power for 90%

= 10% fate. We're being influenced by an invisible consciousness, you might call it 'God'.

 

Why am I so sure? Blub, that's another story..

[truthbetold]

I believe in fate. I am a fateist. Many people think it's exactly what you guys are saying just making excuses for bad decisions and things. But I think we do make choices...they are just the ones we are supposed to make. It's a hard case to prove, but on the contrary I also don't believe there is a God controlling our fate. It's just fate, it happens the way it's supposed to whether you like it or not. It drives my mother insane that I believe this way she thinks it alters my decision making or something, but it doesn't. If you have a choice between one thing and the next you pick what you want to pick, but if that choice falls through was it not because you were meant to pick the other thing?

 

I dunno, but honestly I hate to talk about these things because I can go on and on for hours.

[AwdreeHpburn]

honestly I hate to talk about these things because I can go on and on for hours.

 

 

I totally agree, me too.

[Daddy Bear]

when you win the lottery or a meteor lands on your car, you believe in fate. in reality, these things are within the norms of statistical probability. but why does THIS person's plane go down, and not THAT person's? nobody knows.

 

did God plan for me to puff on this cigar from the time the world began?

 

don't care. *blows smoke ring*

[MollyElise]

An interesting twist on this is a discussion of "Free Will" we say humans have free will, but at the same time we are simply a chemical/electrical mix that must follow physical laws.

 

Everything we feel and think is a chemical reaction, those chemicals all have predetermined roles and limits. If these roles and limits have been predefined then how much room is left for "free will"?

 

In a basic example, your cells become dehydrated, they then send a neurological signal to the brain to release a chemical to your body, these chemicals that are released have a predetermined role that make your brain desire water. thereforeeee, typically, another chemical chain reaction occurs which leads you to water, gathers the water, and lifts it to your mouth, swallows and absorbs into your body. NOW one could choose a true path of free will and NOT drink water, but you cannot sustain life under those conditions. If you break it down to an atomic level these particles are bound by natural laws, both the actions and the limitations. SO how does that affect free will?

 

Personally for me, I strongly believe that "everything happens for a reason", I also do not believe that we possess true free will as we are constrained by the physicallity of our being. I do believe in "Fate" as meaning that certain points in our existence are pre-determined, though our reactions are not; honestly, though I cannot find a logical way to explain this; b/c how can all reactions be free and have fate at the same time? A free willed reaction would not necessarily set the stage for the next fate written moment. Id like to think that I have more control over what happens in my life, maybe its just my ego.

 

This is an idea I got worked up on a while back after watching 'Waking Life', if you enjoy this type of conversation, or lucid dreaming, I highly suggest it.

[Beyondthesea]

Wow! Surprised at how many people do not believe in fate!

 

I believe in fate 100%. We make the choices in our lives, but those times that we think "I just HAVE to do this" without any logical explanation...that's fate pushing us in the right direction.

[thursday]

Everything we feel and think is a chemical reaction, those chemicals all have predetermined roles and limits. If these roles and limits have been predefined then how much room is left for "free will"?

 

Everything we think and feel is indeed a chemical reaction, but are they predestinated to BE?

 

Let's say the Creator just wanted to experiment with free will, he created this physical universe to measure the effects of free will.

 

Then there must be some rules of physics. We are all made of the same material, but are all unique in our own way and create new things and ideas (thanks to this free will). IMO life on Earth alone, at this moment in time, more than 6.6 billion people can't live by fate alone. For me it seems impossible that Something (for the lack of a better name) is keeping itself occupied with outlining so many lives.

 

It just doesn't make sense to me, what's the use of existence if it's already known to Something & the Creator. What's the use of being created then?

[Beyondthesea]

Ok I just thought of an example of fate:

 

Lately I've been telling myself I'm going to just take a quick online certificate rather than go back to school full time for teaching as I know I should do (it's all I've ever wanted).

 

SO yesterday I went to a hiring agency and the woman in charge of human resources kept me there after hours explaining to me why I shouldn't do it. I never told her anything about my life or plans, just that I wanted to take the certificate. Everyone else agrees it's a good idea.

 

But this woman would not budge saying it was NOT a good idea for me, and I'd be wasting time taking it. Why would a woman in HR be telling me this? She LOVES her job...

 

Because fate is kicking me and saying "go be a teacher idiot."

[Kyoshiro Ogari]

Fate - Does it exist? No.

[lostNspace]

I believe in fate to an extent. Do I believe that everything that happens to us in life is predetermined at birth and we have no conrol over it? No. I guess the better question for me would be "do you believe things happen for a reason?" To that, I say yes.

 

Yes, life is all about choices, but sometimes there are unknown, underlying things that make us choose one direction instead of the other. Sometimes why you made the decision you did isn't clear until later on. Then it all makes sense. At that point, I always look back and think - Fate.

 

I think the older you get, the more likely you are to believe in it. After you've seen it a few times, it gets kinda creepy. I could tell you guys some stories (personal experience) that would just about make anybody believe in it.

[AwdreeHpburn]

Rubbish - it's all rubbish. Just a feel good answer for those who don't care to admit that there's nothing to anything. We live, we die, that's the only thing predetermined. What we do in between is completey randomly arbitrary.

 

Why are you here?

 

Because your mum and dad fertilized and egg. Nothing more. There's no magical, "you were supposed to be" reason, unless you want to invent one, then...more power to you.

 

You tryin' to tell me that I was predestined to be a frustrated house wife? What a cruel sense of humour fate has....

 

Or wait, maybe this is where I ended up because I decided to drop out of uni early......oh, my bad -er wait, I guess that was fate's plan, to have me be unhappy.....

[Braphins]

well if you believe in a superior being who guides all of our lives, then you believe in "fate". I do believe this, however I believe that we also have free will. It's a complicated subject.

[Kevin T]

Fate? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm......

 

I believe we can choose our own paths in life, be it good or bad, and that everything happens for a reason.

 

I believe that life is what you make it, yet there are things out there beyond our control.

 

I believe that God has a divine plan for each of us, but it's up to us to find that path and walk on it continually.

 

So a little from column A, a little from column B. I know we have wills of our own, but there is a grand scheme behind even the smallest of events too, so it's not that simple to blame everything on ourselves OR "FATE." It's a combination of both.

[brando]

I learned some time ago one saying that keeps me focused on fate..

 

Want to make God laugh, Make a plan.

[eMICHELLEa]

I agree with you actually..We can't have just one way things are supposed to be...There are so many different paths you can take and so many that will be right for you. Only God knows how we will go. But that isn't becasue it is what we are meant for..It is simply becasue he knows all the actions we will take and where we will end up.

[Sword Breaker]

No offense to anyone who believes it, but I think its a pretty bogus concept. It's basically saying that EVERY little thing we do has a giant significant purpose to what will happen in our life. But this means that all of the hard work and determination we go through looses value, I don't like that idea one bit.

[trishcollins]

I think our subconscious is the bigger player than fate. I think the way we react to situations and go forward with our lives is very much based on information we process at a much deeper level than conscious thought.

 

When I hit a freight train with my SUV two years ago (right before my boyfriend dumped me), my counsellor said that maybe I intended to run into the train, because there was so much going on below the surface in our dysfunctional relationship that I needed to do something to bring it all to the surface -- and there is nothing like hitting a frieght train to bring out the best (and worst) in people. I am a fairly intelligent grownup, and at no level do I think I would intentially run into two locomotives doing 50mph, however, in some ways I do agree that it was quite possibly my subconscious was giving me a wake-up call and trying to get me to pay attention to what's going on in my life (which is still going - thankfully). The train hitting incident ended a relationship that had already started to go south and no one would talk about it. If I hadn't hit that train, who knows how long it would have dragged out.

 

Anyway, my point being that I don't believe in fate, but I do believe that as others have pointed out, it's what we believe deep down that shapes what happens in our lives. If we don't believe we are worthy of something, then chances are, we don't get it, and vice versa. I believe we send out subtle positive and negative messages through words and body language that affect the way others perceive us, and in return the way things "appear" to happen.

 

I look at the three aspects of my life -- family/friends, work/money, and love. In the first two, I am extremely lucky. I have great family and friends and feel I deserve that. My work, as well, has been very rewarding and extremely lucrative, and although I never felt I deserved all of that (and I sometimes even feel that I "fell" into a lot of stuff that worked out for the best), I never felt I didn't deserve it. I also worked very hard and fell that is a big factor -- fate really had nothing to do with it.

 

Now here's is were there seems to be a disconnect -- in my love life. I am not quite convinced at a base level that I will have someone in my life, or that I really deserve to have someone, and I think that thought process (and not fate) has kept me from connecting in that area of my life. The Catch-22 is just because you know why something is happening, doens't necessarily mean you can change it, but at least you are aware of it.

 

So, no, I don't believe in fate. I believe in overcoming deep down issues that block you from believing you can do whatever you want, and not attibuting the good fortune of being in the right place at the right time to fate.