Choice of Destiny 009

Exploring Destiny Principle

G: You have been saying that the Principle of Destiny is what determines what happens. And, we cannot change our destiny. Can you explain this a little more?
S: There are three ways of explaining this Principle. First is the simple tautological proof. The destiny principle is stated in a manner that the statement can never be proved wrong. It Destiny determines what happens and nothing happens that is not destined, it automatically means that whatever happens is what is destined to happen. Of course, you might say that earlier you were weak and were beaten by others in competition but now you have changed your destiny by going through a course under a guru to make yourself strong after which you have started beating all others because of your enhanced power. Interestingly, this example of yours proves rather than disproves the principle of destiny. For, I would say that you were destined to start as weak, then destined to get strength with the help of a guru and finally destined to establish your supremacy over your competitors. Thus, the Destiny principle cannot be proved wrong.
G: Where have I gone wrong by giving the examples to prove that destiny can be changed?
S: The problem is that in each case you see a dramatic change in the course of a man’s life, you are assuming that the change was not destined. You are assuming that a man would remain weak was his destiny. But through his own efforts he has become strong and therefore changed his destiny. Your assumptions are wrong. The destiny included the dramatic change in one man’s life as compared to no change in another man’s life.
G: What are the other explanations of destiny principle?
S: The second approach to explaining the destiny principle is to construct a model of the functioning of the Universe on the basis of assumptions that cannot be proved wrong and then show that destiny cannot be changed. This method is also tautological in the sense that the assumptions are essentially the implications of the Destiny Principle. However, since the assumptions are explicitly stated, this method gives a logical insight of the mind of those propounding the Destiny Principle.
G: Would you now explain this Second approach?
S: I can only try to formulate the model. But I am not sure whether this model is the best representation of the Destiny model. This model makes the following three simple assumptions:
1.The Universe is under a predetermined continuous process of change.
2.This is reflected in a process of continuous actions by and interactions among the entities contained in the Universe.
3.The process of actions and reactions results in a process of continual change in the status and property (of change/ response/ reaction) of each entity.
From these follow the Destiny Principle.
G: How?
S: Because of assumption 3, any entity at any point of time does not remain the same entity the next point of time and thus undergoes continual change in its status and properties. So, the only destiny of an entity is the emergence and extinction of a status within an infinitesimal time interval. Now, due to the assumptions 1 and 2, each entity has to accept the change in its status and property at each successive point of time. The process of change of the Universe determines each action of each entity. The status of each entity at any point of time is what is destined for it, given the process of change of the Universe. No entity can alter the predetermined process of change of the Universe and therefore its own destiny.
G: I have a problem with the predetermined process of change of the Universe. Who has predetermined the process?
S: Maybe God. If you do not believe in God, you have to find out who determined. But so long as it is predetermined the destiny of each entity and the Universe is unalterable.
G: Why do you say that the process of change is predetermined?
S: Let us say it is not predetermined. But is the process a defined, definite process (it is yet not known to us)? If it is a defined, definite process, the status of each entity and therefore the destiny of the Universe and all entities are defined and determined by the process.
Thus the destiny of the Universe and all entities in it cannot be altered. Alternatively, let us say that the process is undefined and therefore arbitrary. In that event, the destiny of the Universe and the entities are totally indeterminate. Any thing can happen at any time in the Universe. In such a case, every thing that happens is not within the control of any entity in the Universe. Thus each entity faces a destiny irrespective of whatever it does. It is like the determination of prices and quantities bought and sold in a perfectly competitive market: Demand and Supply forces determine them but no individual or group of buyers can determine the market prices at any point of time or over time.
In either case, whether the process of change is defined or not defined, each entity in the Universe is dependent on destiny for its future and is unable to influence its future with certainty. However, all the best brains of the mankind have tried to discover the defined, definite process of change of the Universe.
G: Why are you getting into so complicated things?
S: There is no complication. It is simple. If we think that Man can or has built his destiny, then this would mean that Man is outside or independent of the Universe, which is continually changing. This is the fallacy or illusion that a human being is constantly suffering from because human beings are destined to do so. This illusion or Maya is a property of human beings that produces the destined actions from them (they do not do anything on their own). Is it not so very elementary and simple?
G: It seems so at the moment. Now tell me about the third approach.
S: Before I come to the third approach, I need to elaborate on the concepts used in the second approach so that one can understand the assumptions and appreciate how the conclusion about destiny principle is understood.
G: What concepts? You talked in plain English. There is no new concept!
S: Nothing is new but the concepts should be clarified. First, consider the term entity. There are broadly three types of entities. There are form-specific entities like cells of a living body, parts, components or constituent elements of a living or non-living body (hand, finger, fossil, root of a tree, electron, proton, atom, tiger, teeth, fish, water, atom, house, club, schools, kingdom, table, chair, oil, Sun, Moon, Mars, airplane, ship, missile, fruit, fertilizer, shirt, virus, etc). A collection of parts, elements or whole of living or non-living bodies can also be form-specific entities (like family, troops, administrators, rulers, judiciary, dinner-set, books, library, fleet, flock, etc). Then, there are form-free entities (including their parts, components or constituent elements) like electricity, heat, energy, air, pressure, force, sound, etc). Another group of entities may be called formed entities like idea, language, thought, feelings, symbols, logic, mathematics, sciences, technology, rules, laws, codes, customs, religion, sports, warfare, marriage, knowledge, beauty, love, hatred, anger, etc). Components or parts or collection of formed entities are also formed entities.
G: You are giving too many illustrations.
S: It is just the opposite. Considering the infinite number of different types of entities, I am giving too few examples. But beside entities, I have to elaborate on Process. Processes are cause and effect sequences expressed without or with time lag. Processes may be defined mathematically. The processes may have properties like stability, stationarity, etc. The movement of the earth is a process. So is the flow of water from river to ocean to clouds producing rain a process. Similarly, the conception of a child, its birth and growth into adult and till aging towards death and the growth of a tree from a seed are processes. The making of a decision to consume and save are processes. The conversion of fossils into fuels, wheat into loaves, molasses into alcohol and mineral oil into kerosene are all processes. The teaching of mathematics in school is a process as much as the training of a manager into a better manager or the development of love / hate relationship between two human beings.
G: What about the concept of properties?
S: These are physical, chemical, biological, psychological, thermal, genetic, cosmological, astronomical, astrological, sexual, social, political, ethnic, and economic properties. Properties may also be processes. Entities exhibit or acquire these properties and are subject to undergoing these processes as are applicable to different entities. The processes and properties define the actions and reactions of entities at different points of time.
G: What is meant by Status?
S: Status is the snapshot at a point of time giving the condition of the entity in terms of properties, processes, actions and interactions. The status tells us what the entity is doing, what it is capable of doing and the forces operating on it at that point of time. It also tells us the specific sequence/phases in various processes through which it is passing, its composition, its combination or relation with other entities, its location, its feelings, etc.
G: Why are you talking about these various things? What does all this have to do with Destiny?
S: These help define the concept of destiny. If we take the snapshots over successive points of time in the future, we get the destiny of an entity. For example, the destiny of the Sun is what it is going through. If it has been burning for long, today’s Sun is not the same Sun that was burning 20,000 years back. The Earth has been orbiting the Sun for long. It has gone through changes in its composition and weather conditions. Man was not there from the very beginning. Many species have gone under extinction. The landmass has changed in shape. Is it the same Earth? The human society has changed. Each person is changing by the second. A Man of 25 is not what he was at the age of 5. Is it the same Man? This is one form of visualizing the destiny. The other form is to visualize the process that is responsible for the change. If there are processes that are generating changes in the entities’ status and imparting them with properties to act and react, how can the entities independently determine their destiny? The processes that affect the entities define all their actions and the results of their actions. So, the process or processes that describe the Universe define destiny of each entity in the Universe. The entities and their status at different points of time are only a series of transient outcomes of the various change processes at work in the Universe. This is the essence of the Destiny Principle as explained by the Second Approach.
G: What about the third approach to explaining the Destiny Principle?
S: The third approach is one of finding counter examples to disprove any theory that says that Human being as a group or an Individual can determine or influence its destiny in some way or the other. All the three approaches complement each other in our understanding the Destiny Principle. And, all these arguments for and against the destiny Principle are also entities that are again nothing but transient outcomes of the processes of change and the property of human beings.
G: Will you not explain the third approach further?
S: No. It does not require explanation. It has to be demonstrated. In the beginning, you had given examples to disprove destiny, which in fact only proved destiny. That is the way the third approach works. You must remember that to argue for and against the Destiny principle is a property of human beings. Some people argue for because of the experience they have undergone through various processes. Some others argue against because of the same reason. Only their experiences under the change processes differ and the processes have imparted to them opposite properties of action/ reaction. All this again is as per the Principle of Destiny.
G: At this point, I need some clarification. From what you said it seems no one and nothing in the universe has any control over what happens to it or anything in the Universe. There is no real choice. It so happens that there can be a few human beings who are destined by the process to reach peace of mind and happiness independent of their destined environment. But whether a particular person will know that this is not something over which the person has any control. Entire thing is as per destiny, but many who get liberated are destined to go through a path that is based on the concept of God - though in reality God may or may not exist. One who gets liberated (reaching peace of mind and happiness irrespective of whatever happens) gets into the State of Godhood or becomes God. So, one will come to know that he is on the path of liberation only by the process itself. That I believe in this is not my choice. I am destined to believe all these.
G: I think the destiny process can be expressed in the form of mathematical equations with parameters belonging to the domain of real numbers, allotted by our Almighty to each individual. In other words, everything whatever is happening in our life, whatever we are thinking and whatever qualities we are exhibiting, are time dependent variables, showing the results at every point of life following those equations. These sets of equations are our Life-path equations. We are just displaying the equations at every point of our lives from the birth unto death. The people with a very good mathematical background and interest in acquiring knowledge of human features/ behaviours can undertake this kind of research and develop the equations.
S: Maybe you are right. If some mathematicians are destined to find out the equations, one day they will. The Hindu Astrology is an effort towards that end. But nobody knows how their models and their calculations work. They are not precise. More fundamentally, I do not believe in deterministic destiny. I believe in stochastic destiny.
G: What is this stochastic destiny in contrast to deterministic destiny?
S: May we discuss this later.