Is our life foretold?

I have been pondering this question for awhile now. I guess this would be an interesting place to discuss about it.

Think of our universe and beyond, as it is made out of atoms, matters, energy etc... If these elements and energy are behaved in a predictable way (eg. add H + O2 = H2O + energy release). Since our body and everything else around us is made out of these elements and energy. Is that mean our life has been foretold? Whatever actions we take have infact being foretold and that we cannot alter our future?

we will all die one day.

In this Universe and at this level we have been given Free Will. So NO - everything is not on a SET course.

One may probably think the answer is yes, in that everything in the past has happened as it should have, everything thing at the present is happening as it should and everything in the future will happen as planned.

Some may subscribe to the notion that we may be living our lives over and over again (half the time in reverse) if you believe the big-bang, big-crunch (expanding and contracting universe) theory.

I, for one, believe that the concept of quantum tunneling throws a big wrench in the predictable universe paradigm. In essence, quantum tunneling allows events that are highly improbable, or even theoretically impossible to happen. Quantum tunneling occurs all the time at the subatomic level. At the classical physical level, it does not seem to happen. But hey, it only takes one domino to be out of place to change the course of the future.

But lets face it. Reality is a perception. If you can't predict the future, for all intents and purposes, you have free will.

WP

Maybe with some arbitrarily powerful supercomputer and a perfect knowledge of how matter works on the subatomic level you might be able to predict the sequence of events for the next 1000 years. Or maybe not since the act of measuring (i.e. establishing an initial state for your computer simulation) alters what is being measured. I revel in the fact that a lot of the universe remains a mystery. Life would be boring if we knew everything. And it would be utterly pointless if our fates were preordaned. Free will is what separates mankind as well as many higher animal species from those which live solely on instinct. By using this free will we can alter the course of our lives to a great extent.

Yep, that's right, so we all just might as well stop the endless contemplation and indecisiveness regarding the purchase of various flashlights and just buy them, because we're going to buy them anyway.

(actually, I don't know)

LA OZ said:

I have been pondering this question for awhile now. I guess this would be an interesting place to discuss about it.

Think of our universe and beyond, as it is made out of atoms, matters, energy etc... If these elements and energy are behaved in a predictable way (eg. add H + O2 = H2O + energy release). Since our body and everything else around us is made out of these elements and energy. Is that mean our life has been foretold? Whatever actions we take have infact being foretold and that we cannot alter our future?

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This idea had it's 15 minutes of fame when Newtonian physics took hold.
It's relegated to sophmoric philosophy these days.
If nothing else Chaos and the absolutely random rate of radation discharge falsifies the idea - on this or any other level.

Google "determinism", that's the idea being discussed here. It's a self-refuting fallacy based on a lot of other fallacies, among them a flawed concept of causality.

IMO, with conscious thought you get random acts committed outside the realm of nature.

In the world, there is such a huge element of chaos.

One time I took grayhound bus to an airport, and wasn't aware of their first come, first serve policy. I had reserved tickets but was the last person in line and was turned away because all seats were taken.

Next bus about 1 hour later.

I take it, and arrive late for the flight, with traffic problem contributing to the delay.

Next flight was a full 24 hours later.

I wait in the airport all that time. To make this more aggravating, the plane I was late for was also very late but they wouldn't let me board it because the gates were closed or something (I think they sold my seat to someone else)

It's very frustrating to seat in the terminal with a ticket in hand, watching the plane sitting outside and unable to get on it.

It's like fate was telling me - No, you are not gonna get on this flight. I called managers - complained - to no avail.

(This is not a "Final Destination" story BTW)

I hang out there for a day and get on the next flight, same time, next day. (Didn't want to pay $90 for a hotel) One day at a terminal is a very long day, eating crappy, expensive food and sleeping on the metal benches.

So, I safely get to my destination, breaking lots of plans, affecting lots of schedules, likely affecting the course of history with the ripple effect. All because of my judgment.

Now, this happens all the time. You seek outcome A but get outcome Y due to these elements of chaos. There is no predictability.

Tomorrow, you may get out of bed, and fall down the steps, breaking your neck, or your tire may blow out, causing you to pull over, change it, only have to a sleepy driver drive out of his lane onto the shoulder and hit you, with fatal consequences.

I don't have any plans anymore for anything longer than 1 day, and am not surprised when that doesn't work out. I have a plan B, and often, plan C and have a feeling even that's not enough.

I have this constant feeling that I am not in control of anything, only my behavior, and even that doesn't mean much.

Life is what happens when you have other plans How true that is.

Maybe it's all working to a greater design, and in fact, the outcome of what we see as chaos is a plan and predictability?

Fundamentally, I am unable to answer the original question here, wondering the same thing myself.

Trashman said:

Yep, so we all just might as well stop contemplating the purchase of various flashlights and just buy them, because we're going to buy them anyway.

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This may be a good excuse to use on our partner.

No.

I like to think I am in control of the journey I am on, and try to enjoy life for what it has to offer.

etc said:

I have this constant feeling that I am not in control of anything, only my behavior, and even that doesn't mean much.
Life is what happens when you have other plans How true that is.
Maybe it's all working to a greater design, and in fact, the outcome of what we see as chaos is a plan and predictability?

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Yes, there's plenty of randomness outside of our own lives, but also a great deal under our control. I'm also one to have multiple plans in case the first one fails. Usually eventually one of them works more or less as intended. It's rare I have absolutely no control over anything in my life. In fact, as a rule I prefer to avoid situations where I have little control which is why I don't travel by plane at all. I don't want my life ended prematurely because some air traffic controller maybe didn't get enough sleep one night, or some programmer for the ATC system made a mistake in one of the lines of code. This isn't to say it can't end suddenly other ways, but at least if I'm cycling or walking I can look out for danger, and take preemptive steps to avoid catastrophe. I have some modicum of control, even if not 100%.

I do know exactly what you mean about one little thing screwing up everything else. For example, I was recently retiling the basement ceiling. While the old ceiling was down I took advantage of the situation to run electrical outlets to many places that needed them. Anyway, there was one place where I had just a little less clearance than I needed to snake a cable from the ceiling down into the wall. By a little less I mean probably 1/16". I tried everything to widen the space but nothing worked. Eventually I had to bite the bullet and remove a few sections of wood paneling. What should have been a 15 minute job turned into a 6 hour fiasco, all on account of a lousy 1/16". BTW, this happens all the time when I do things in the house. Something will always be too large or too small by some fraction of an inch, requiring all sorts of modifications.

In another case there was a crossbeam in the wall in the way of a cable. I didn't know it until I partially cut an opening for the new outlet. After discovering this I had to cut another opening about 6" higher. By mistake the saw slipped and I practically cut my finger to the bone. If the crossbeam hadn't been there I wouldn't have needed to cut the second opening and wouldn't have cut myself. Another 6 hours wasted waiting for the bleeding to completely stop and to clean up blood everywhere, along with me repeating ad nauseum "I don't have the f*cking time to bleed now".

I often think about randomness before I go cycling. By leaving 5 seconds earlier or later I might very well avoid a collision with a drunk driver just by virtue of being in a slightly different place when they come barreling down the road. Then again, I might hear them coming and take preemptive action regardless. While hardly a scientific observation, I've noticed that the majority of people who attribute their misfortunes to chaos or some divine plan are the very same people who don't plan anything and/or live dangerously. In either case sooner or later things will start to go massively wrong. More likely sooner rather than later. I'm not saying things always go well 100% of the time if you plan, but I think of advance planning as a way of gaming the randomness of unforeseen events more in your favor.

Determinism has not been refuted. Chaos theory fits nicely with determinism. There is no such thing as a random event. Random is a description of the observer, not the observed. It just means the oberver doesn't know why something happened, not that something happened without cause.

At this point, we have no known way for our lives not to be foretold (although the correct word is pre-determined). The problem is that so far there is no practical value to the theory, no way to put it to use. There are too many moving pieces and too many unknowns to ever predict someone's life with any scientific device now known or theoretically possible.

But on the small scale -- say going to the moon -- determinism has a lot of value. It's called science.

yes and no ? depends on the info you have. if you are aware of your genetics, in certain circumstances for instance, you can pretty much tell some things that are going to go on in your body/mind..

but as for the 5,000 acre brush fire burning in the 60 mph wind and 15% humidity 35 mile from where I sit at this moment; who knows which way the wind will blow the embers?

There is no such thing as a random event.

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Please give peer reviewed literature to support this or just explain how the physics behind atomic decay has been falsified.
Science, not philosophy.

Not sure I believe it, however here is some evidence of "Destiny":

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15759622/

Mike Painter said:

Please give peer reviewed literature to support this or just explain how the physics behind atomic decay has been falsified.
Science, not philosophy.

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There have been a few physicists who have speculated that there are random events at the sub-atomic scale, but they know hardly anything about the preconditions leading to the events they observe, and their findings are in conflict with almost all other science (from string theory to relativity). So their speculation is just that: speculation with no support.

Science cannot prove that there are no random events because our knowledge of the universe (or multiple universes) is so limited. (Science cannot prove that there are not 36 gods watching us from lawn chairs, either.) However, the more we learn, the more we see order in the universe. Chaos theory added to that body of knowledge. Stephan Wolfram (New Kind of Science) showed how the simplest equations can lead to nearly infinite complexity. Landing a person on the moon required a massive amount of assumptions in multiple disciplines that events are not random. Science works on the assumption that events are not random.

At any rate, guys....this is impossible to know. Even in a simple universe such as a small room with only one electron moving about, we cannot determine its destiny with absolute certainty. Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle forbids that. So why should be believe we can do that with our Universe?

WP