Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
The victors write the history books regardless of the reality at the time.
Birth of Jesus - Christmas
- Thread starter Cypress
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Daylight63
Verified User
Are you suggesting that God shifted winter in order to mess up Hitler's invasion of Russia but God didn't stop the Holocaust?
Interesting.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Fate is usually a deterministic idea. Preordained or otherwise an unseen hand that is beyond the individual's control.
Consider a daredevil like Alex Harvill. Was it preordained he'd die? Was it his destiny to die? Not IMO. He played the odds and the odds caught up to him. It's no different than playing Blackjack in that respect; respect the odds and stay in the game. Take a lot of risks and go bust. That's not fate or determinism, it's simply the choices people face and odds of certain events happening based upon their choices.
fate
1. what happens to a particular person or thing, especially something final or…
dictionary.cambridge.org
Daredevil Alex Harvill dies while practicing for a world record motorcycle jump
Margot
Verified User
Unconditional was the only safe option! Negotiate with Hitler? No way! Especially after the Holocaust became public
Margot
Verified User
Exactly! But no way to justify slavery or treason!
Margot
Verified User
Two different things! Yes on the winter, the Holocaust ,I don't understand ,I know in scripture it is the "birth pains before the rebirth of Israel" ! But that's something that's a mystery to me.
Daylight63
Verified User
That’s a justification. Either God did one and CHOSE not to do the other or he did NEITHER.
Why is God not allowed to be understood rationally? And why would one worship a being like that?
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
The Founders justified slavery in 1789. Agreed on treason. That's why I dislike Trump and his MAGAt supports.
Where you and I disagree is that the secession wasn't treason. It was Lincoln who attacked invaded Virginia, not the other way around.
Daylight63
Verified User
The Bible accepts slavery and even gives rules for slaves to be better slaves.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
God allows mankind the choice and doesn't make those choices for us.
You're probably right in a strict dictionary sense.Fate is usually a deterministic idea. Preordained or otherwise an unseen hand that is beyond the individual's control.
Consider a daredevil like Alex Harvill. Was it preordained he'd die? Was it his destiny to die? Not IMO. He played the odds and the odds caught up to him. It's no different than playing Blackjack in that respect; respect the odds and stay in the game. Take a lot of risks and go bust. That's not fate or determinism, it's simply the choices people face and odds of certain events happening based upon their choices.
fate
1. what happens to a particular person or thing, especially something final or…
Daredevil Alex Harvill dies while practicing for a world record motorcycle jump
I'm not using fate and destiny in that way. I think world literature is peppered with stories of people who did not want to tempt fate, or tried to change their destiny.
I've never found strict physical materialism very convincing. I don't think the destiny of Churchill, Ghandi, Alexander the Great can be explained by matter and energy, and the known physical laws of science
Supposedly Churchill considered an option to reach out to Mussolini after the fall of France to have IL Duce ask Hitler for some negotiated settlement, because his cabinet wanted to save Britain from what they thought was a losing cause.
Churchill obviously could have made that choice, but something in him drove him to envision the moral neccessity of a total victory over Hitler. I don't think we would be living in the world we are without Churchill.
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Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Much of that literature was based upon previous cultural notions far older than Christianity. Modern Christianity believes in a personal God, mostly based upon Matthew 10:29-31 and sparrows falling. I disagree with that interpretation, but it's the common Protestant interpretation to believe those who pray hard enough get what they want. Prosperity Christianity is an extension of that concept.
Destiny implies preordained. Usually by supernatural forces. Again, the Butler, PA assassination attempt on Trump is an example. Note how many MAGAts declared divine intervention. Fate. Destiny. It didn't work out so good for Corey Comperatore, Thomas Crooks or the two other human beings who were critically wounded. Did God hate them? Did they not light enough candles for God?
IMO, none of the above. People made choices, good or bad, and the rest was just the odds. The "luck of the draw". I do not believe the cards are stacked by any forces other than the natural laws of the Universe.
Fair enough. We'll have to agree to disagree that all of life is just random chance and it jusy comes down to the motion and mechanics of subatomic particles.
I think my wife was my destiny and fate. And I do think it's plausible to believe western civilization is endowed by the fate and destiny of people like Alexander the Great, Jesus, Charlemagne.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Quantum physics isn't even close to my area of expertise. Being able to spell it is about my limit.
How do you reconcile free will vs. destiny/fate?
Daylight63
Verified User
Fate has a tendency to help us draw pretty pictures by ignoring the blood that was mixed in with the paint. Charlemagne certain did a great deal for western civilization. His reign was pretty much non-stop war. And it only took like 30 years and at least one mass slaughter at Verden to get the Saxons to become Christians and worship a more peaceful religion.
We have lots and lots of heroes in western civilization who helped knit together the various warring tribes all over Europe and who Christianized the pagans, usually at the point of a sword (same thing was done by St. Olav in Norway...and now he's a SAINT).
It is always hard to say "was this a blessing?" when it had to be done through 30 years of violence and war.
I think we all agree that the end product: western civilization is a pretty good thing and I know I certainly enjoy it to no end. But was it "fate"? Or was it just that we, the inheritors of that which was forged from the blood and death and horror in the past, are just prone to call what WE have "good" and point to all things which manifest it as "fate"?
The secular 20th century was the most violent and war mongering era of human history, hands down.
If pacifism is our standard, we would spend a long time looking in vain for examples of civilizations based on Pacifism. In one sense, Napoleon was a war monger, but in the long view he was responsible for exporting the ideas of the French revolution and liberal republicanism across the continent.
A good college level European history class gives good insight into why Alexander the great, Churchill, and Charlemagne are so pivotal to the history of western civilization.
We fundamentally do not understand the mind and human consciousness, so we can't really say what drove the motivations and psychologies of Alexander the Great and Churchill, nor what gave them the leadership skills and gravitas which were lacking in their peers. Some people seem destined for greatness. What we do know is we can't point to the laws of physics, evolution, or chemistry to provide explanations.
You sure don't. The knowledge is available.
Understanding that electrical signals pass through synapses, or having a vague sense of where memory, auditory, and visual information is processed in the brain is not remotely close to being an adequate explanation for subjective conscious experience.
Yet you have no interest in finding out the information.
There are no legitimate scientists who say we understand and can explain consciousness and subjective mental experience.