Predestination is a religious idea, under which the relationship between the beginning of things and the destiny of things is discussed. Its religious nature distinguishes it from other ideas concerning determinism and free will, and related concepts. In particular, predestination concerns God’s decision to create and to govern Creation, and the extent to which God’s decisions determine ahead of time what the destiny of groups and individuals will be.
We’ve been watching the movie Luther in AP the past two days and just discussing the Reformation in general. Today Jean Calvin and Calvinism were briefly mentioned, and it sort of triggered some thoughts in my brain that have been brewing (as in beer) all day.
If you don’t know, Calvin sort of continued Martin Luther’s thoughts for reform and ended up forming his own division of the church centered on predestination. And hopefully you read the first paragraph.
If you have ever carried on a conversation with me in the middle of the night (which is basically like 3 or 4 people, of which 1 or 2 might read this), you may have noticed I become really… weird. I feel like I become much more open about things and more prone to discussing philosophy as it relates to life. And I have to say I really enjoy such impromptu, ravaging discussions. Ravaging.
I’ve really been struggling to decide exactly how much of this “Predestination” exists, though not really strictly in the religion/salvation area (would that be determinism?). If you honestly consider it, it can be scary how much of our lives are determined for us. Your parents, your surroundings, your social status, your habits, your appearance, your potential towards future success. More and more, studies show (that sounds so gay) that even behaviors are more influenced by genetic makeup than environment (separated twins).
Think about all the big milestone events in your life and the Butterfly effect created from that. Even small things are huge. What if you had made different friends your first day at school? Wore different clothes? Didn’t move? Thought before you spoke? The implications are huge, and a lot of things really don’t seem to be based on personal choice.
More and more society is becoming corrupt, and our little cover that’s been protecting us the last umpteen years or so is falling through. All that stuff they tried to teach us in Health is potentially useful. We have to grapple with decisions instead of just going with it. We have to choose friends and choose to lose friends who hold us back. Things are basically spiraling downwards and no one seems to care enough to do anything.
Lately I’ve been thinking a decent bit about where to move when I get older. I’m not even kidding; I’m sick of American culture, American politics, American society, American corruption, American stress, and more than anything American youth (no offense of course, you’re not included). Top of the list are Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Canada (yes, the country we’ve all been breed to hate for no good reason). Life is be coming so stressful it is outrageous. Everyone always works. No one really cares. People are more and more materialistic. Sure, half of it is just growing up and half of it is my nature to worry about anything and everything, but the other half, and the biggest half, (Kilgore would point out that my halves don’t add up) is entirely external pressure.
That didn’t really stay on topic or go along the lines I had hoped for, but I think I may have gotten a point across. And it’s time for bed.
How do you feel about Predestination, about social pressures, and the state of the world?
±armin
Predestination is a weird topic. I think that the religious aspect is poppy-cock, but the fture being determined by the present i absolutely believe in. Now of course there is a random element in the world (quantum uncertainty) but even it is fully predictable theoretically, because the quantum wave function of a particle is fully deterministic. Plus, on a large scale, these random effrects hardly matter. Sure they matter to some extent, but the universe is fundementally deterministic. Behavior in particular is detemrinistic. All teh events that have happened since the day you werre born (in fact since the instant the universe started) have determined precisely how you will deal wiht various stimulations and pressures forced upon you bytother people who’s behavior is also fully deterministic. So i reality, there is no such thing as free will. People are jsut the results of the conditions before them. So if you were smart enough, you could predict human beahvior with great accuracy. Bu, of course this eliminates any of the beauty of nature, plus, quatnum effects really do matter (the cosmic ray particles that caused the mutations of our DNA that mad eus human were fully quantum mechanical in anature, so a slight difference in the decoherence of the quantumwave function for that particle could have had an enormous imapact on the future course of human history, plus people are not perfectly predictable, our brains may have quantum nature to them, which would make us capable of free will at least within the laws of physics.
Social pressures are an incredibly influential part of our lives, and our futures are in large part (see above) by our reactions to them. Human beings will always havesocial pressures so we will all have to just deal wiht the pressures we are given and make logical choices in our lives in order to make them better.
The world is on the brink of self anihilation. No one wants to listen to fact and reason any more. Whenever i point out a logical fallacy in someone’s argument (let’s eat babies that we make (this was Meagan and Annie exhibiting the strangest reaction to social pressures ever (wierd activity in LA) i said that it was not efficient and in fact would cause negative returns in food resources) they become defensive or simply say i’m stupid. The US is heading for an econmic breakdown as the deficit increases, the trade deficit increases, Social Security hits the point of collapse, and taxes a being lowered. THe government is running out of money, and the people really don’t seem to care. All we seem to care about is if Tom And Katie are going to have a boy or girl, or if Paris Hilton partied last night and where. Our politicians could care less about the country, all they care about is getting reelected, and our president is a blithering idiot. Religion is encroaching on science and reason and religious extremists threaten the lives of innocent people. Europe is going to be in turmoil soon over the huge Muslim population, China is rapidly becoming the world’s next super power (move there, it’s the best place to be in about 20 years) and the US will at some point in the future initiate a disastrous war over Taiwan, because we think that it matters if Taiwan is “Communist” or not. India is not far behind in the race for the world’s super power either. All of these countries adn players, plus corrupt politicians, and even more corrput businesses, cannot coexist i peace. India and OPakistan will destroy each other in nuclear war. America will be attacked by terrorists with a nuke, and then we will over react, destroy a couple of innocent Muslim cities into radioactive dust piles, and the US will make 2.5 billion enemies after it’s war wiht China, which we will lose. America will collapse, India will collapse, Islam will create a single superpower, Europe will unify, China will attempt to dominate the world, and WW3 is absolutely inevitable. Mankind needs to get smart or else we will destroy ourselves. Religion, skin color, race, and political inclination, oh and sexual orientation does not matter. WE need to let go of our prejudices and unite together in peace and equality to create a world that will be able to survive forever. Reason should be the basis of our ehtics and law, and we need to accept science as the way to uderstand the world. Mankind needs to wake up and smell the destruction looming in it’s future, or someone needs to take control and force people to realise the results of their actions. Since the former is impossible, i think we should all band together to try and unite the world and do something with ourl lives, or else they won’t exist any more. Mankind wil be exterminatewd either by itslef or by some outside force (like an asteroid or somehting) if we don’t do what is logical with our resources. The world is insane and we sane people all need to try to make sane. That is the purpose wiht which we should all live our lives. “To make the world a beter place for those who follow.” which i know you heard me say last year in PE. Well, that’s about it. Sorry for my little tirade. Hope you read it all. I think i rambled for a little while there. Maybe i should review it but i don’t care. I’m concerned too.
Wow, i geuss no one else comments, huh?
Um, yeah…. ur really going to move out of the country when ur grown up? not me!!
that was a very in-depth post
Are you talking about me as the 1 out of 2 people who might read this, and i see you at least once a week at night so yes you do become abnormal
For being such an intelligent young person I find it very immature of you to use the phrase “thats so gay” when describing your own statement. If you want to discuss true philosophical issues I suggest you develop a socially more aware concsious, as well as vocab and leave the degrading slang to those less educated as you.