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Forums - General Discussion - Fate vs. Free Will

shams on 03 July 2007
Timmah! said:

@Shams

That's a load of crap, and I have never heard of such rubbish before. Sounds like something conveniently invented by the Church to explain how the "stories" present in the Bible led to moden society. I am quite deeply worried that you actually (seriously) believe that. Gosh...

So do you like... BELIEVE in Adam & Eve?? And that all humanity came from them???

That the DNA from two people can turn into billions of DNA combinations? Or do you not believe in DNA either? Or is this something that God "conveniently" triggered?

Please explain this to me, or provide "links" - I'd love to have a read how this is possible ;)

You do realise that biology will show that its IMPOSSIBLE for a pair of humans to produce a very large, varied population of humans?

Ok, so it is impossible for a pair of humans to produce a very large, varied population of humans (same species), but you believe a single-celled organism that came from a puddle of goo is the 'father' of the vastly varied, incredibly large population of all creatures from every species? Did you think that one through? Your point actually works against your belief in evolution.

I think I like my Adam better.

And please stop insinuating that people who believe differently than you are idiots. That method of debate is incredibly childish. Let your arguments stand on their own merits and leave badgering insults out of it.

If you want to discuss this, lets do it in another thread. This has nothing to do with the free will/fate argument.

PS - you didn't provide any links... I am still waiting. I'm happy to explain how the single cell evolution theory not only works, but fits completely with the pattern of life on this planet (including evolution theories, DNA sharing, fossils, timelines for evolution and more).

 



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shams on 03 July 2007
That Guy said:
ok back to more crazy stuff.

So if the universe was strictly newtonian (i.e. we can describe everything in terms of forces, velocities, and positions), then could theoretically create a computer to model all the movements of all the bits of *stuff* ( i say stuff because things like photons and crap don't have *mass* and thus cannot be matter or something like that) out there. Also assuming that our thinking process is nothing more than simply a matter of *stuff* going back and forth in our brains, then we could mathematically prove that fate is what exists.

Let me rephrase, if we track every single thing out there in the universe, then we could also predict where everything would be in the future, taking into consideration all we know about physics.


Problem:

The universe is not strictly newtonian and we have stuff like quanta to worry about. Quantum mechanics deals with randomness and probabilities. With everything explained using quanta, then everything really is just random, disproving fate (oddly, though, not *proving* free will)

Even weirder:

Providing that string theory will lead us to a Grand Unified Theory, we can explain everything in strings and map out everything in the universe again, and thus we come back to fate.

Crazy, huh?

This is pretty much what I am saying.

Firstly, there is a certain amount of randomness present in everything. The quantum states thing doesn't really apply to macro situations - it just means you can never predict the exact value of an analog signal/value. This is why computers NEED to use digital signals/processing, and why they don't align with the way that our minds work very well.

Apart from the intrinsic "recursiveness" of the situation (i.e. how can you build a computer to model everything, when it would also need to model itself??), there are practical problems to overcome:

1/ Observation: How do we observe the state/value of everything, when everything we see is subjective?

2/ Enough data: When do we have enough data to build a model? How many inputs are enough? Potentially even missing one of them, would be enough to break the simulation.

...

Even though (IMO) there is no free will (i.e. all our decisions are determined by what is in our heads, plus inputs, etc..) - this doesn't ever mean that our decisions can be predicted (by any means possible).

So even though fate decides everything - no one can actually determine what this fate is before it occurs.

(you could argue that this IS free will anyway - but that is more a point of definition than anything else)

This discussion only holds from a philosophical point of view - rather than from a practical/engineering point of view. Its hard enough modelling (perrfectly) a simple device (such as the driving of a car on a road) on a computer - so we are a long, long way away from considering modelling the (real) behaviour of a person.

 



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vizunary on 03 July 2007
That Guy said:
ok back to more crazy stuff.

So if the universe was strictly newtonian (i.e. we can describe everything in terms of forces, velocities, and positions), then could theoretically create a computer to model all the movements of all the bits of *stuff* ( i say stuff because things like photons and crap don't have *mass* and thus cannot be matter or something like that) out there. Also assuming that our thinking process is nothing more than simply a matter of *stuff* going back and forth in our brains, then we could mathematically prove that fate is what exists.

Let me rephrase, if we track every single thing out there in the universe, then we could also predict where everything would be in the future, taking into consideration all we know about physics.


Problem:

The universe is not strictly newtonian and we have stuff like quanta to worry about. Quantum mechanics deals with randomness and probabilities. With everything explained using quanta, then everything really is just random, disproving fate (oddly, though, not *proving* free will)

Even weirder:

Providing that string theory will lead us to a Grand Unified Theory, we can explain everything in strings and map out everything in the universe again, and thus we come back to fate.

Crazy, huh?

I know some about Grand Unified Theory as well, but therein lies some problems with fate. Yes(in this theory), everything is in some manner connected and mapped out., BUT, this is a big BUT, it has already be done so an infinite number of times, with every possible decision already been made. So in this case there could still be free will and every decision you make sends you down a different "mapped out" path.

Now with Quantum mechanics we also get presented different challenges, like you said with randomness. Though it seems to be on a more primary level, like atoms, protons, electrons, etc. But I'm not so sure it could actually be used to disprove fate, simply because it is a purely mechanical/physics based theory(mostly), and does not use any human elements in it, which it seems that the discussion is talking about. What I would say that it DOES confirm in some ways is that because of known actions/reactions the "fate" of stars/planets/celestial bodies may be predetermined. Like our own Sun, ABSOLUTELY  WILL either implode/explode/die in some fashion, it's just what happens to stars. Just look at what happened to Britney ;) LOL



That Guy on 04 July 2007

Well the computer thing is a practical impossibility due to the reasons you mentioned. Though its something we can think about. You know those crazy mind experiments you can think out.

You also bring out a good point, Vizunary. Mathematically, people have come up with the possibility with like infinite alternate universes where every single possibility occurs. That or it was an episode of star trek but it was a pretty cool idea nonetheless.