Brother James has prepared an essay on the TOW from two weeks ago - the one about free will vs. predestination. I'm sending it out as a supplemental thought (so you get TWO thoughts this week instead of one!)
I'd love to hear back from andy of you on this topic, and will include your ideas in upcoming thoughts of the week!
And now, on to what James said:
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I would like to address the ideas you passed on to me. If you feel
like forwarding any of this, be my guest.
First lets talk about your take on this. You looked at
the logic, 1+1+1+1=4, and you said that wasn’t true.
You gave an example of two triangles becoming more
than the normally accepted sum. What did you base your
conclusion on? Information that you had and I didn’t.
From my perspective 1+1=2, from your perspective 1+1=
however many triangles you could form from the
original 2. Neither answer is more correct than the
other is. They are based on different information. You
based your decision on the information that you have.
Was that free will or did you do just as I said we all
do and base your “choice” on the information you had
at the time of your choice? The reason I believe
people don’t like the idea of destiny over free will
is they want to believe they are in control. Control
is (in my opinion) an aspect of our over active ego.
My perspective on this is hardly a new one (I also
believe that there is no such thing as original
thought). Several philosophers that shared this point
of view were Descartes, Plato, Hobbes, Parmenides,
Spinoza, and Leibniz just to name a few of the west.
Spinoza is my favorite by far. His philosophy in much
in line with that of Thoreau.
Next, I would like to address Brother Don. I can’t
remember if Holly reprinted my definition of
information so I will restate it here. Information is
anything we gather by any means. This includes
emotions and intuition. Our emotions based on the
stimulation of that moment. Emotions are just one way
of expressing our reaction to information we receive
from our senses. To me intuition is just our brain
processing similar information from the past and
applying it in a logical way to the current situation.
Don states that there are other things we use to make
our choices. He said we use “choice” itself. To argue
that we use choice to make our choices is using a word
to define itself. How are you defining the word
choice?
Sister Catherine had a very interesting response. She
looks at the discussion from both points of view; most
people can’t do that. Where she stood was quite clear
but she brought up the aspect of illusion. I would not
only say that the illusion of free will is necessary
for most people, also, the illusion (if that’s what it
is) of things moving in a predestine way is necessary
for me. What we are talking about here is perspective.
How we interpret the information we receive. This one
makes more sense to me, that does not make it right or
wrong, just different.
I would love to discuss this further with anyone who
is interested.