Thursday 17 October 2013

Determinism, Fatalism and Predestination

Determinism- This is the concept that no matter what decisions you make in your life, or in a period of time, you will eventually reach a point or event that was planned out for you by God. So either way you will get there, but in your own way by making your own choices. For example if you are trying to reach a goal, only God knows if you will get there. No matter how many or how few times you try, which ever path you take, you will get there. 

Fatalism- Each and every choice that you make leads to where your fate lies with God. The idea of cause and effect is believed in fatalism, the fact that each decision you make leads to the consequence given by God. Furthermore, leading you to a certain point lead up to by each of the individual points in your journey. Whether that be reaching a goal or overcoming something for example an addiction, you will get there, each step will be planned out by God to get you there.

Predestination- This is a religious belief, unlike the other two, where God predetermines your past, present and future, before you have even lived in these moments. This is because God is not subject to time and space so he looks at ones life in a complete overview. So instantly he makes a decision in what their life will be, he predetermines their future. He does this by looking at the final steps leading up to decisions and makes them. Because of this lack of time and space, God doesn't see the past, because there is no past, he merely sees the future and determines it instantaneously. 

1 comment:

  1. Katherine, several things:

    Firstly, fatalism denies the causal nexus; in other words, it says that the choices you make have no effect on your future. This means that every step of your life has been decided before you were born.

    Secondly, if God is outside time, he sees all time at once, rather than experiencing past, present and future as we do. This means he can see our whole lives in one instant - and therefore all the choices we have made, make and will make in one instance.

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