Fatalism is a philosophical doctrine that
stresses the subjugation of all events or
actions to destiny.
Fatalism generally refers to any of the following
ideas:
The view that we are powerless to do anything
other than what we actually do.
Included in this is that humans have no power
to influence the future, or indeed, their
own actions.
This belief is very similar to predeterminism.
An attitude of resignation in the face of
some future event or events which are thought
to be inevitable.
Friedrich Nietzsche named this idea "Turkish
fatalism" in his book The Wanderer and His
Shadow.
That acceptance is appropriate, rather than
resistance, against inevitability.
This belief is very similar to defeatism.
Some take it to mean determinism.
== Determinism and predeterminism ==
While the terms are often used interchangeably,
fatalism, determinism, and predeterminism
are discrete in stressing different aspects
of the futility of human will or the foreordination
of destiny.
However, all these doctrines share common
ground.
Determinists generally agree that human actions
affect the future but that human action is
itself determined by a causal chain of prior
events.
Their view does not accentuate a "submission"
to fate or destiny, whereas fatalists stress
an acceptance of future events as inevitable.
Determinists believe the future is fixed specifically
due to causality; fatalists and predeterminists
believe that some or all aspects of the future
are inescapable, but, for fatalists, not necessarily
due to causality.
Fatalism is a looser term than determinism.
The presence of historical "indeterminisms"
or chances, i.e. events that could not be
predicted by sole knowledge of other events,
is an idea still compatible with fatalism.
Necessity (such as a law of nature) will happen
just as inevitably as a chance—both can
be imagined as sovereign.
Likewise, determinism is a broader term than
predeterminism.
Predeterminists, as a specific type of determinists,
believe that every single event or effect
is caused by an uninterrupted chain of events
that goes back to the origin of the universe.
Determinists, holding a more generic view,
meanwhile, believe that each event is at least
caused by recent prior events, if not also
by such far-extending and unbroken events
as those going back in time to the universe's
very origins.
Fatalism, by referring to the personal "fate"
or to "predestined events" strongly imply
the existence of a someone or something that
has set the "predestination."
This is usually interpreted to mean a conscious,
omniscient being or force who has personally
planned—and therefore knows at all times—the
exact succession of every event in the past,
present, and future, none of which can be
altered.
== Idle argument ==
One famous ancient argument regarding fatalism
was the so-called Idle Argument.
It argues that if something is fated, then
it would be pointless or futile to make any
effort to bring it about.
The Idle Argument was described by Origen
and Cicero and it went like this:
If it is fated for you to recover from this
illness, then you will recover whether you
call a doctor or not.
Likewise, if you are fated not to recover,
you will not do so whether you call a doctor
or not.
But either it is fated that you will recover
from this illness, or it is fated that you
will not recover.
Therefore, it is futile to consult a doctor.The
Idle Argument was anticipated by Aristotle
in his De Interpretatione chapter 9.
The Stoics considered it to be a sophism and
the Stoic Chrysippus attempted to refute it
by pointing out that consulting the doctor
would be as much fated as recovering.
He seems to have introduced the idea that
in cases like that at issue two events can
be co-fated, so that one cannot occur without
the other.
It is, however, a false argument because it
fails to consider that those fated to recover
may be those fated to consult a doctor.
== Logical fatalism and the argument from
bivalence ==
Another famous argument for fatalism that
goes back to antiquity is one that depends
not on causation or physical circumstances
but rather is based on presumed logical truths.
There are numerous versions of this argument,
including those by Aristotle and Richard Taylor.
These have been objected to and elaborated
on but do not enjoy mainstream support.The
key idea of logical fatalism is that there
is a body of true propositions (statements)
about what is going to happen, and these are
true regardless of when they are made.
So, for example, if it is true today that
tomorrow there will be a sea battle, then
there cannot fail to be a sea battle tomorrow,
since otherwise it would not be true today
that such a battle will take place tomorrow.
The argument relies heavily on the principle
of bivalence: the idea that any proposition
is either true or false.
As a result of this principle, if it is not
false that there will be a sea battle, then
it is true; there is no in-between.
However, rejecting the principle of bivalence—perhaps
by saying that the truth of a proposition
regarding the future is indeterminate—is
a controversial view since the principle is
an accepted part of classical logic.
== Criticism ==
=== 
Semantic equivocation ===
The basic logical structure of logical fatalism
is criticized as false.
The structure of its argument is "Either a
certain event happens or it doesn't happen.
If it happens, there is nothing to be done
to prevent it.
If it doesn't happen, there is nothing to
be done to enable it."
The problem in the argument arises with the
semantics of "if".
The argument fails because it uses "if" to
imply that the event will happen with absolute
certainty, when there is only certainty that
the event either happens or doesn't, when
both options are considered.
Neither option by itself is certain, even
though both options together are certain.
The use of the word "if" in this way frames
the sentence as "if the event is certain to
happen, then there is nothing to be done to
prevent it", but there is no certainty that
the event will happen.
Thus this type of fatalism relies on circular
reasoning.Another criticism comes from the
novelist David Foster Wallace, who in a 1985
paper "Richard Taylor's Fatalism and the Semantics
of Physical Modality" suggests that Taylor
reached his conclusion of fatalism only because
his argument involved two different and inconsistent
notions of impossibility.
Wallace did not reject fatalism per se, as
he wrote in his closing passage, "if Taylor
and the fatalists want to force upon us a
metaphysical conclusion, they must do metaphysics,
not semantics.
And this seems entirely appropriate."
Willem deVries and Jay Garfield, both of whom
were advisers on Wallace’s thesis, expressed
regret that Wallace never published his argument.
In 2010, the thesis was, however, published
posthumously as Time, Fate, and Language:
An Essay on Free Will.
== See also
