Today's Run
I just wanted to point out the serious gain in elevation at the 14k mark ...
Fatalism: Why do some people conclude that the future is predetermined? It goes against all instinct, and experience too. Certainly, fate has a role. But so does free will, so do choices and decisions, so do directed thoughts and plans. Determinism and fatalism are delusionary!
There should be less belief in fatalism in this post-modern era than there was in the scientific era. The rationale for a belief in determinism from those holding to a scientific world-view was the idea that cause and effect prevailed. Everything could be explained in terms of cause and effect. Every effect had a cause. The logical deduction then was to say that thoughts, ideas, will, emotion etc were phenomena which themselves have solely physical causes. We realise now of course that these arguments were circular; what was being proved was contained within the assumptions of the proof. To put it another way, science proved that everything was subject to science, but only defined everything as those things science could study; the tangible, the measurable.
As an analogy, it would be like saying the only force in the universe was gravity, because gravity is universal and everything was subject to it. And then, what an embarrassment it would be to discover magnetism!
Perhaps it is because the past is immutable, that some philosophers have been fooled into concluding the future is as well. Don't fall for that trap!
Nor does life depend on the spin of the dice. It's not pure chance. Chance does have a role; so does fate, so does cause and effect. But more importantly, your thoughts, decisions, and actions, can set in motion a train of events which will change everything. (a) from what the future might otherwise have been, (b) from what has usually been the case in the past! Your intervention can cause significant changes, to you personally, to your spheres of influence, to society itself.
Transformation is a genuine possibility.
But we are easily fooled. Stare closely and intently at the + in the centre. What do you see? What do you see next?
Keys to transformation - work in progress -
Key 1. Full of hope, anticipation and awe, ..knowing the future is malleable and that we can intervene to achieve worthwhile goals, …
Key 2. …we employ directed self-talk to get ourselves onto the desired track and to keep us there.
Key 3. tba!
Fatalism: Why do some people conclude that the future is predetermined? It goes against all instinct, and experience too. Certainly, fate has a role. But so does free will, so do choices and decisions, so do directed thoughts and plans. Determinism and fatalism are delusionary!
There should be less belief in fatalism in this post-modern era than there was in the scientific era. The rationale for a belief in determinism from those holding to a scientific world-view was the idea that cause and effect prevailed. Everything could be explained in terms of cause and effect. Every effect had a cause. The logical deduction then was to say that thoughts, ideas, will, emotion etc were phenomena which themselves have solely physical causes. We realise now of course that these arguments were circular; what was being proved was contained within the assumptions of the proof. To put it another way, science proved that everything was subject to science, but only defined everything as those things science could study; the tangible, the measurable.
As an analogy, it would be like saying the only force in the universe was gravity, because gravity is universal and everything was subject to it. And then, what an embarrassment it would be to discover magnetism!
Perhaps it is because the past is immutable, that some philosophers have been fooled into concluding the future is as well. Don't fall for that trap!
Nor does life depend on the spin of the dice. It's not pure chance. Chance does have a role; so does fate, so does cause and effect. But more importantly, your thoughts, decisions, and actions, can set in motion a train of events which will change everything. (a) from what the future might otherwise have been, (b) from what has usually been the case in the past! Your intervention can cause significant changes, to you personally, to your spheres of influence, to society itself.
Transformation is a genuine possibility.
But we are easily fooled. Stare closely and intently at the + in the centre. What do you see? What do you see next?
Keys to transformation - work in progress -
Key 1. Full of hope, anticipation and awe, ..knowing the future is malleable and that we can intervene to achieve worthwhile goals, …
Key 2. …we employ directed self-talk to get ourselves onto the desired track and to keep us there.
Key 3. tba!
