Are Our Lives Controlled by Fate or Freewill? Ana Julia, Tyler Byrne, and Ashley Holms

Fate Definition Noun - the development of events beyond a person's control, regarded as determined by a supernatural power. Verb - to be destined to happen, turn out, or act in a particular way

Introduction - Fate What do you think is the difference between fate and luck? Do you believe fate is predetermined from the moment we are born, or is it subject to change? Do you believe certain events in life that appear to be “meant to be” are orchestrated by fate or simply coincidence? Is fate used as an excuse to justify your actions?

Fate by Ralph Waldo Emerson Deep in the man sits fast his fate To mould his fortunes, mean or great: Unknown to Cromwell as to me Was Cromwell's measure or degree; Unknown to him as to his horse, If he than his groom be better or worse. He works, plots, fights, in rude affairs, With squires, lords, kings, his craft compares, Till late he learned, through doubt and fear, Broad England harbored not his peer: Obeying time, the last to own The Genius from its cloudy throne. For the prevision is allied Unto the thing so signified; Or say, the foresight that awaits Is the same Genius that creates. Does this poem show how everyone has a fate or does it convince you that our future is dictated by our free will? How do we know if our choices in life is fate? Can you think back to an event in your life that seemed to happen because it was destine to?

Oedipus Rex

Oedipus Discussion Questions Does knowing our fate make it more likely to come true, or less likely to come true? Or does it not have an effect? If you could know how your life will end up, would you want to? Do you believe Oedipus is at fault for what happened? If not him, then who is to blame?

Freewill Definition The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion. Based on this definition, do you think free will is all-or-nothing or that we possess and exercise free will to varying degrees?  How much free will do we have?

Thomas Aquinas Situational Example You walk into a coffee shop, try to decide whether you want to have coffee or tea, decide you want coffee and order it.  From a common sense point of view, this seems like a clear case of a free action. But what do we mean by saying this is a free action?  Probably something like this: 'I didn't have to choose coffee.  It was perfectly within my power in the situation just described to choose tea.' However, is this really true?  Granted, if things had gone differently you might have ended up ordering tea.  So, for example, if someone in front of you in line had been raving about how great the tea was in this place (or maybe about how bad the coffee was) then you might have chosen differently.  But this isn't what we mean when talk about being free, is it? What then do we mean when we say that I made a free choice when I ordered the coffee, therefore 'Everything leading up to me deciding to order coffee could have gone the exactly the same way it did and I still could have chosen to order tea.'

Discussion Questions Is it really true that, if things had gone exactly the same way that they did, you could still have chosen to order tea? What are the necessary conditions for an action to be regarded as a free choice? How big of an influence does the environment/people around us have over our ‘freewill’? Do all our life choices come from chance or necessity?

The Benjamin Libet Experiment A participant would be asked to perform a simple task such as pressing a button or flexing their wrist. Sitting in front of a timer, they were asked to announce the moment at which they were consciously aware of the decision to move, while EEG electrodes attached to their head monitored their brain activity. Libet showed consistently that there was unconscious brain activity associated with the action in the motor cortex for an average of half a second before the participants were aware of the decision to move.

Discussion Questions Based on that experiment, do you think we are really aware of the decisions we make on a daily basis? Do we consciously make choices in life, or are we just a stream of thoughts and perceptions controlled by the chemistry of our brains? If we were just a stream of thoughts – is it possible for those thoughts and perceptions to still have freewill?

Moral Responsibility – Les Miserables Valjean was born into a poor peasant family during the French revolution. His parents died when he was very young, leaving him with his older sister to fend for him. His sister was widowed, having seven children to look after, the eldest being eight and the youngest being one year old. Valjean got a job as a tree pruner. The job only paid the paltry sum of 18 sous a day, and Valjean used his meager profits to provide what he could for his family. However, when winter came there was no further need for tree pruners. As a result, he was laid off and his family starved. In desperation, he broke the window of a baker in order to steal bread to feed his sister's children. He was sent to prison for five years for "burglary at night in an inhabited house".

Moral Responsibility Discussion Questions Do you think Jean Valjean had freewill to make the choice to steal the bread, or was it something predetermined that he could not have helped? If he had no other option, and did not make a free choice, then can he be held accountable for his action? Is free will necessary to deserve praise or blame for one’s actions?  If so, how much are people responsible for their actions and their situations? If we lack powers to act outside of the laws of nature or to make indeterministic choices, does that mean we lack free will?

CONCLUSION Freewill is necessary in order for us to be held accountable for our choices, however not everything in life is under our control and one cannot deny the hand of chance, or perhaps fate, in our lives.

Sources St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia, Q. 83, a. 1. https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/out-the- darkness/201709/benjamin-libet-and-the-denial-free-will Les miserable by Victor Hugo Oedipus Rex by Sophocles Fate by Ralph Waldo Emersons