The fact that we dont know what our fate is, gives us free will.

Everybody has a fate. Fate is simply whatever happens to you over the course of your life. Does it really matter if it was all pre-determined, if you consciously thought about everything you did, weighing each choice, and then making a decision? The entire notion of having a "Fate" is you don't know what your fate is. You might be fated to die tomorrow in a car crash. But if you KNEW you were going to die in a car crash, you would avoid cars, right?

I believe in free will and I think Fate is a construct of the mind to try and a typical way for people to try and explain things beyond their grasp.

@Timmah!

I pretty much agree with what you say, which is not so different from I've been telling on the whole though can differ in details.

@shams

Yeah, evolution is a wonderful bitch which does nothing but lies :) Im sure it makes a lot of sense to claim that  brain, for example, a state of the art "genious" design, far more superior than any human could achieve so far, has been existing all alone accidentally! Every single living thing all around you is a super hyper computer with magnificient design, and without some conscious design, it is just a no brainer not to believe in it. Atheists are just cowards or confused people, afraid to lose their "freedom" of earth lives :)

Its so pathethic to see that people do NOT believe that a human sculpture can be made by the nature, though the very same people do believe a trillion times more complex organism is assumed to be existed all by accident! Ridiculous!

When someone says Evolution, he probably means "Macro Evolution", (Evolution of one species totally to another one) which is yet to be proven, which I doubt to ever happen, cos it does not have any rock solid scientific basis (while there are a vast array of contrasting evidences). Microevolution (evolution within the same species), on the other hand is pretty much proven and experienced. Most people call it "Variation" to avoid confusion with the Macro evolution", which is the actual point of conflict. Most religions and schools of thought does not only accept Variation but obliges it. This is how Adam and Eve begot to various races ranging from black to white.

Fate sounds to religious, like there is a plan or something, Free Will is overrated, there is only action and reaction

Well, I won't post my opinion on this because I'm really confused about this matter; I usually love to be extremely open-minded about these psychological subjects.

However, I'll say one thing. To the guys who said something like "Fate exists, and what you think is free will is actually fate but you don't know it", have you played the game Tales of The Abyss? The story revolves around something called a "Score" which is similar to Determined fate. Then at the end of the game, they explain that free will doesn't exist because the "Planet Memory (the essence of the Score)" is already written, and in order to have free will they'll need to destroy it. I find it interesting that that game utilizes this philosophy.

Keep those wise/knowledgeable answers coming in.

 bold text: huh?  i can't fathom the humor in that sentence.

 macro vs micro: i have no idea what you're trying to say here, but macroevolution is pretty much taken as a fact by scientists.  which isn't 100% contradictory to what you're saying, but you do strongly imply that macroevolution, which falls perfectly under the concept of evolution, is actually still something that's being debated.

 if you can't understand it... than it's certainly not the best explanation you've ever heard.  how could you just take it for granted then?  

you're much better off saying you take it as a matter of faith--which is universally accepted to be okay as something to "take for granted".

no it doesn't. it just replaces one word with another.

EDIT: actually, it simplifies things, since we have a reasonably good definition what "god" is.  as opposed to "fate". 

Fate or freewill is nearly irrelevant.

If there are things that you are destined to do, fate is all pre-ordained, then concerning yourself with denying your fate is futile, since in the end, that would be your fate.

With free will, there is no fate, but you will still work towards the same thing you would if you believed in fate. Any person who spends his time trying to counter-act his fate is wasting his time. Most people really just work for their goals, whether they believe they are ordained or not.

If you wish to believe there's a divine plan for you, tis fine. Something bigger, fine. Nothing at all, fine too. Everyone will still be working on their goals anyway, moving no matter belief in fate or not.

A few points:

1/ I agree that the term "Fate" isn't ideal here. A better argument I think would be "Does free will exist?". Fate is not exactly the same as 'No free will', and this only acts to complicate the argument. It tends to have a more mystical angle to it (destiny?), so it may be possible to argue to neither Free Will nor Fate exist.

2/ I can see this rapidly turning into another "Existance of God" arguments:

 - Free Will arguments tend to work against evolution, especially when people here say things like humans have free will, and animals don't. 

3/ Saying that we don't have free will, does NOT imply that we have no control over our lives. Quite the opposite. It recognises that the decisions we make are governed by reason (which is based on history, fact, knowledge, etc..) rather than some arbitrary decision potentially based on nothing.