Free Will: Can You Control Your Destiny? -A Scientific Approach

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Are all of our actions destined to be?

Can destiny and free will exist simultaneously? If so, how?

Can you control your destiny?

Is there a ‘God’ who knows what our destiny is, or what are actions will be? And if there is, do we have any control?

“If all your actions you will take have already been taken, by you, then certainly an outside ‘God’ will be able to see all of your actions you will take at any moment in time, past or present.”

If you decide to eat an apple for breakfast or drink a cup of coffee, it is, in fact, your decision to do so, is it not?

And if it’s your decision, can’t you control your own destiny?

 

Free Will vs. Destiny

Inherent in the idea of free will lies the thought that human beings have control over all the decisions they make.

That is, everything that we do every day is based on a decision that we CONSCIOUSLY make.

However, some say that regardless of whatever decision you make, a predetermined result will occur sometime in the future.

A significant amount of people, in fact, believe that ‘God’ can see or knows what our actions will be today and in the future.

 

Our Future Actions Already Known?

If this is the case, perhaps our destiny can NOT be controlled.

But this raises some important questions:

  • How can ‘God’ know our future actions if we haven’t made them yet?
  • Doesn’t that mean that free will is an illusion and all our actions are predetermined?

However, those arguing both sides of this problem fail to ask a simple question.

Why can’t destiny and free will exist together?

Where are the rules that outline the law that only one is available, without the other?

Fortunately, philosophers have proposed some solutions.

 

The Time Picture

Think of time as an never ending horizontal line in both directions.
For every moment in time, you are at a single point on the line.

The future is to the right (positive X axis), while the past is to the left (negative x axis).

Now let’s say that there is a ‘God’ that lies somewhere OUTSIDE of that line, in such a way that every point of that line is visible to this ‘God’.

For the free will camp, this line makes perfect sense, since the contents of the following moment on the line may simply be the result of your own decisions that are consciously made.

But this doesn’t answer the question;

How can free will exist at the same time as ‘God’ knowing all of our future actions?

One answer lies in the understanding of TIME itself.

 

Time As An Arrow or Circle

While some understand time as an ‘arrow’ (that it has direction – can go forward or backward) others see time as a CIRCLE (time repeating itself over and over again).

Is there any evidence for time as a circle?

Astronomers have discovered that the Universe continues in any direction for an infinite amount of space, and Einstein taught as that time and space are one in the same.

Scientists say that they’ve mathematically come to the conclusion that there is no end in any direction we look from Earth.

Think of a magic gun that shoots bullets that never lose their energy and think of that gun shooting straight up into the sky. This bullet, according to scientists, will continue to go on in that direction… forever.

Does this prove that time is a circle? Certainly not, but it does make the concept plausible.

What about religion? Does religion say anything about time?

For the religious, God is an omnipotent, omnibenevolent creature who has and will exist forever.

How can something exist without a beginning? This again, does not prove the existence of circular time, but only adds to its plausibility.

 

Circular Time & Your Future Actions

So, certainly, time can exist in a circular way.

If this is the case, any actions that you make today, tomorrow, or in 50 years, may be an action that has already been taken before.

This is a radical idea.

If all your actions you will take have already been taken, by you, then certainly an outside ‘God’ will be able to see all of your actions you will take at any moment in time, past or present.

 

Bigger Idea / Science

This also makes the ideas of free will and destiny more interesting.

If you make a conscious decision that you’ve already made in some past cycle, was the original action based on free will or destiny?

Furthermore, scientists have discovered the possibility of parallel universes. That is, every single time you have a decision to make which can go one way or another, the Universe may split into a world where one action is taken and another where the other occurs.

As a result, scientists say we could have billions of Universes in parallel in which every action that can occur, will.

If this is true, the concepts of free will and destiny don’t make any sense. If everything that will happen does happen, how can we say that all actions are based on our own will? If destiny is a predetermined result, how can destiny exist if all results will occur?

Either way, destiny and free will are only words. Can we really believe in things that we don’t understand?

At the very least, it seems at least a possibility that destiny and free will can exist together.

What do you think? Do you believe in destiny? Do we have free will? 

There is NO Reason for Students to Vote Romney

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Unless you are for the idea of cutting your own funding.

Didn’t think you were.

If you’re a student in college or university, or if you plan on getting your education, I have absolutely the slightest clue why you would think voting for Romney is a good idea.

Now if you support Romney and that statement offended you, please continue reading, as you will encounter something that has rarely existed with the GOP this year; FACTS.

Have you heard of Romney’s plan? For education, the ‘severely conservative’ candidate is ON RECORD supporting his vice president’s budget; you know, the one that cuts billions of dollars from education?

Well, out of concern, he was asked how kids should pay for things if they didn’t have support. You know what he said?

“ASK YOUR PARENTS FOR MONEY”

Sorry Governor, we didn’t all come from gold.

Obama on the other hand has aggressively addressed education. Whether it was the extra billions of dollars he put into Pell grants or whether it was the income based student loan repayment option set to take effect next year, Obama is GOOD for students.

There is absolutely no logical argument to be made. Obama helps, and Romney hurts, regardless of what your opinion is.

Because this isn’t my opinion or my analysis. These are hard, empirical, unquestionable FACTS.

And since when do facts have two sides?

Obama 2012
-Mike

Romney SUPPORTED Obama’s 2009 Stimulus

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Remember the stimulus all the Republicans think was worse than any possible event in the history of the world? Yeah, the one in 2009 which the CBO said added 3.3 million new jobs?

Looks like Romney actually SUPPORTED it, before he flip flopped.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjeHXedOrwI?fs=1&feature=oembed]

Next time you hear the GOP telling us how America imploded after the stimulus, let them know Mitt would have done the same.

Mike

Obamacare Results in SLOWEST Rise in Health Spending in 50 Years

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Update: In 2011, health spending accounted for the SAME percentage as the previous two years. Obamacare is working.

Remember when Obama told us growth in health care was the slowest in 5 decades?

Turns out he was right. Check this out from the CMS.

GROWTH IN U.S. HEALTH SPENDING REMAINS SLOW IN 2010

HEALTH SPENDING GROWTH AT HISTORIC LOWS FOR SECOND CONSECUTIVE YEAR

U.S. health
care spending experienced historically low rates of growth in 2009 and
2010 according to the annual report of national health expenditures
(NHE) published in the January issue of the journal Health Affairs. 

Analysts at the Centers for Medicare
& Medicaid Services (CMS) report in the article that the increase in
spending for 2009 represents the lowest rate of increase in the entire
51 year history of the NHE.   The low rate of growth, the data show,
reflects lower utilization in health care than in previous years. The
report notes that U.S. health care spending grew only 3.9 percent in
2010, reaching $2.6 trillion or $8,402 per person, just 0.1 percentage
point faster than in 2009.

In 2010, as health spending growth
remained low, growth in U.S. economy as reflected in gross domestic
product (GDP) (4.2 percent) rebounded. As such in 2010, the health
spending share of the overall economy was unchanged at 17.9 percent.  In
the past, this share has increased, rising over time from 5.2 percent
in 1960.

“We have worked hard since the passage of
the Affordable Care Act in 2010 to lower health care cost growth,” said
Marilyn Tavenner, acting CMS administrator. “We believe that the tools
in health reform will help keep health care cost growth low while
improving the value of care for consumers.”

Key findings from the new report include:

 

  • Household health care spending
    equaled $725.5 billion in 2010 and represented 28 percent of total
    health spending, slightly lower than its 29 percent share in 2007.
    Growth in total private health insurance premiums slowed in 2010 to 2.4
    percent from 2.6 percent in 2009, continuing a slowdown that began in
    2003.  Despite this deceleration, for the first time in seven years, the
    growth in premiums exceeded the growth in insurer spending on health
    care benefits, with the net cost of insurance increasing by 8.4 percent
    or $11.3 billion in 2010. Out-of-pocket spending by consumers increased
    1.8 percent in 2010, accelerating from 0.2-percent growth in 2009.

 

  • Retail prescription drug spending
    (10 percent of total health care spending) grew only 1.2 percent to
    $259.1 billion in 2010, a substantial slowdown from 5.1-percent growth
    in 2009 and the slowest rate of growth for prescription drug spending
    recorded in the NHE.

 

  • The federal government financed 29
    percent of the nation’s health care spending in 2010, an increase of six
    percentage points from its share in 2007 of 23 percent, and reached
    $742.7 billion.  Part of that increase came from enhanced Federal
    matching funds for State Medicaid programs under the American Recovery
    & Reinvestment Act     which expired in 2011.  Medicare spending grew
    5.0 percent in 2010, a deceleration from growth of 7.0 percent in 2009.

 

  • Medicaid spending increased 7.2 percent in 2010, slowing from 8.9-percent growth in 2009.

 

  • The state and local
    government share of total health spending declined from 18 percent in
    2007 to 16 percent in 2010 and totaled $421.1 billion, in part due to
    the temporary assistance in the Recovery Act.

 

  • Hospital spending, which accounted
    for roughly 30 percent of total health care spending, grew 4.9 percent
    to $814.0 billion in 2010, compared to growth of 6.4 percent in 2009.

 

  • Growth in private health insurance
    spending for hospital services, which in 2010 accounted for 35 percent
    of all hospital care, slowed considerably in 2010.

 

  • Physician and clinical services
    spending, which accounted for 20 percent of total health care spending,
    grew 2.5 percent to reach $515.5 billion in 2010, slowing from
    3.3-percent growth in 2009.

 

  • Private businesses financed $534.5
    billion, or 21 percent of total health spending in 2010, down from a
    23-percent share in 2007.

 

The NHE report, prepared annually by the
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Office of the
Actuary, summarizes recent trends in health care spending based on the
most current data sources.  Available historically since 1960, the NHE
represents the official estimates of total health care spending in the
United States and measures annual health spending by the types of goods
and services delivered (hospital care, physician services, retail
prescription drugs, etc.), by the programs and payers that pay for that
care (private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, etc.), and by the
sponsors who are ultimately responsible for financing that care (private
business, households, and governments).

Information in this report can be accessed at the following web location:

http://www.cms.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/02_NationalHealthAccountsHistorical.asp#TopOfPage

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