Re: Is Fatalism Worse or Equal to Religion?
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Well, wait a sec... Can you explain this to a kindergartner?:
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No, and we shouldn't have to.
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If it doesn't go all the way back to the big bang, then how can it be true?
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It doesn't matter.
All that matters is this: everything is caused by something else, in a fundamentally lawful way. If it didn't, all science would have fallen apart. As for choice, one of two things is possible:
A) The ego/personality is the sum of its experiences and environment. Because it is sentient, and can consciously "choose" things. Because it is fundamentally unaware of its choosing processes (are you aware of the neurons that fire when you choose to go to the bathroom?), its decisions appear, to itself, isolated, and thus there is an illusion of free will.
B) There is free will. Accordingly, there must exist an agent/force/whatever that functions outside of the known laws of science. There is no empirical evidence for said agent. Modern psychology repeatedly shows that behavior is lawful, suggesting that there is no need for such an agent (the vast majority of psychiatrists are determinists)
Occam's razor shreds the latter to pieces.
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