Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia; Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc.
Fatalism foiled by Freewill
Post 48.August 04, 2018 continued . . .
Rationalism versus Fatalism Optimistic Stoic Fatalism
Fate is such a significant force in human lives that it goes by many poetic names, such as : destiny, providence, the stars, chance, luck, serendipity, fortune, kismet, karma. But pragmatic scientists have their own technical name for that inexorable force of nature : Evolution, the progressive, but apparently aimless, direction of physical change. Like one-dimensional Time, natural development has an undeniable general direction, but its desultory destination is unknowable. Unlike the mercurial gods of superstitious cultures, Evolution is more like an abstract mathematical principle, steadily and relentlessly changing the future by subtracting all but a few of the randomly-produced alternative solutions to the problem of survival, allowing only the best qualified to pass into the next generation. Unfortunate-ly, snuffing-out of species used to be the province of Nature, but recently human Culture has become a primary cause of mass disappearance of plants & animals. So Cultural Evolution can indeed override natural mechanisms. Hence, humanity has the power to imagine the future, and to choose an unnatural path into the unknown. History is a record of many dead-ends, and a few open-ended trails leading toward the misty horizon.
Deism seems to be an improvement on ancient Fatalism, and on modern materialistic Evolution, in that it allows us to find meaning for our own lives, despite the random conditions of our personal point of beginning. Modern usage of the "F" word tends to indicate a pessimistic attitude of Defeatism. But the philosophical Greeks were hardly a depressed bunch of losers6. As Harari noted, “Later Stoics—such as Seneca and Epictetus—emphasized that, because "virtue is sufficient for happiness", a sage was immune to misfortune.” Moreover, early Buddhists actually found hope in their ability to defeat Fate — and the endless cycles of Karma — with self-control, leading to the tran-scendent state of Nirvana. We can't change the circum-stances of our birth, or the flow of destiny through time, but we can adjust our attitude toward the world, and our place in it. The motto of NeoDeism might be : "don't worry, be happy".
Nevertheless, I wouldn't advise Deists to openly refer to their religious philosophy as either Stoic or Fatalistic, because the significance of those antique worldviews would be lost on most moderns. Yet we can still learn some valuable life lessons from those early attempts to deal with the fact that the gods don't seem to respond to our fervent prayers for succor, except with regal indifference. Religious people tend to cope with divine silence by selectively interpreting the “ups” of life as answers to prayer, and the “downs” as punishment or harsh life lessons. But Deists don’t have to cherry-pick their pro & con evidence, or to deny the signs of design in the natural order, with its diverse beauty and sordid ugliness. Instead they can ensure that their minds are untroubled by Nature's vagaries, through self-control of their natural emotional responses with rational judgment. By taking the long view, they can accept that G*D is neither Good nor Evil, but BothAnd.
End of Post 48
6. Stoicism : See post 25a. “The path to happiness for humans is found in accept-ing this moment as it pre-sents itself, by not allowing ourselves to be controlled by our desire for pleasure or our fear of pain, by using our minds to understand the world around us and to do our part in nature's plan, and by working together and treating others fairly and justly.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism
“Determinism is a long chain of cause & effect, with no missing links. Freewill is when one of those links is smart enough to absorb a cause and modify it before passing it along. In other words, a self-conscious link is a causal agent---a transformer, not just a dumb transmitter. And each intentional causation changes the course of deterministic history to some small degree.” ___Yehya
Transcendent Meaning : Young children typically live idyllic lives, sheltered by their parents from the “thousand shocks the flesh is heir to”. But as they mature, they come to realize that this is an imperfect world, blighted by suffering, and destined for death. So, they begin to question the significance of our “brief candle”. Why are we born into the physical world, only to be borne out of it, just as we seem to have learned how it works? Why do we wither into decrepitude, just when our minds are beginning to gain wisdom and to grasp understanding? Why would God create such an unfair world, when humans can so easily imagine a more perfect existence? Such plaints too often lead to pessimism & depression. Some people feel like cursed Sisyphus, forever rolling his rock uphill, with no third act to resolve the absurdity of his situation, or to give some ultimate meaning to his un-merited suffering. Despite the repugnance of their reality though, resolute Romantics may hold out hope for a return of their long lost paradise on Earth. But, since mankind’s Utopian visions always fall short, most will redirect their hopes to a heavenly realm, where freedom and justice prevail. This new paradise is envisioned as a reward for patiently suffering indignities and injustices in the here & now. Yet it’s only attainable by bravely crossing the river of death into an imaginary promised land on the other side of a dark abyss of ignorance. Instead of re-directing their frustrations to a dubious afterlife though, more realistic & pragmatic folk will accept the “bird in hand”, and turn their efforts to making the best of their inheritance, by learning how to control Nature for their own purposes. Such knowledge can provide down-to-earth meaning to the time we have for sure : this moment, Now!.
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