Challenge me! I believe in Predestination.

Bring it on.
This is not a "Ask me why" thread;
this is a "This is why you're wrong" thread.

I would like my views challenged so I can find the faults in my logic.
I intend to patch up those faults and come to a solid conclusion about Predestination.
Either that, or a few of you will completely assault my perspective with accurate view points and concepts that destroy what I thought was Truth.

We'll see...

Note: Don't expect me to respond immediately, especially if you're explanation gets sloppy, obnoxiously long, or loses all logic. Try to keep your view points as simple as possible, if you can't organize your own thoughts, how do you expect me to?

First of all, I'd like to ask you, to make sure, whether you're viewing this from a theological perspective (everything is done by God's will) or from a general perspective (the world is deterministic in structure; the initial state this universe was in when it was created determines every part of the then-future, including our-present and our-future in such a way that, given the initial values at the creation of the Universe, it could have already been deduced that I would write this very post).

The fact that everything is already in the perfect motion and there can only be one end.
God interfering in between would either be considered that he rolled everything in motion to do so or that everything already rolling in motion makes God interfere just as you were made to type that.

So I take it you don't believe in free will?

I believe in free will.
I just believe our choices are predetermined.
Hmm, maybe that doesn't make sense...
But I believe we choose the choices we do based on all the effects that have happened perfectly up to our decision processing.
If that makes sense.

Well, there is no god or supernatural forces driving anything in existence, so predetermined anything driven by an intelligent force is strictly held within our three dimensional world on earth. If you're talking about manipulation from people with schemes and plans of their own making, that's another story, but that's held to a small area and their power over such a thing is limited in both time and scope. Outside of natural animal needs and urges, most of us make decisions based on the options available.

What you're claiming to be true is an extraordinary claim, and to quote Carl Sagan, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

You can't believe in Determinism and Free will simultaneously.

But since you're not arguing for Casual Determinism (which is actually a pretty concrete philosophical idea) and you're arguing for a deity setting the world into motion, I'm pretty much not going to give this argument any real merit.

Personally, I'm an existentialist and I think life is inherently meaningless, and we're free to do what we want with our life and make meaning out of the nothingness. I do not believe in "predestination" because I dont believe there is a deity of some sort to predetermine my outcome for me.

Now if you want to argue Casual Determinism, frankly there is no real way for me to dispute it and therefore I wont get into that. Btw if you take out the whole "god" thing, then that's what you're claiming.

I have some serious NT friends that are complete nihilists and will argue Casual Determinism to the end of time, and then get on me for believing in free will "on faith" because of my argument for "metacognition" that is akin to arguing for the existence of a soul. However, I would like to let any and all determinists realize that they're basically arguing for a deity.

I knew this thread was going to come up.

Man may do as he wills, but he may not will as he wills, or will he?

free will and determinism? depends on your definition of free will, theres something called compatibilism out there which i find impossible to agree or disagree with. but was that me or fate?

Originally Posted by Tsidakis

But I believe we choose the choices we do based on all the effects that have happened perfectly up to our decision processing.

Although this is correct, likely anyway (by average), that is far from something one would call "predestination", or "fate" for that matter though. Dependent on mood decisions can evidently fluctuate, even to the point where people decide against what they normally do. An extreme example would be a person in his/her depressive state compared to the person's normal state.

Each framework, once understood, can be exploited to provide the desired results, that however is manipulation, rather than fate.