Theists: How can predetermined fate and free will coexist?

[RoadRunner79]

I think that it is strange, because if everything is deterministic and you eliminate choice, then you can no longer trust logic (and therefore any scientific conclusions).  If you cannot choose, then you cannot make a determination that one thing is more reasonable than another.  Or at least, the determination, isn't based on logic or reason, but on the physical configuration of the brain.

Given two opposing ideas, you cannot evaluate them in any real sense, as your answer is predetermined based on physics, not on logic.  You cannot answer any differently.   And even though you think you may be correct, as well as thinking critically, this is also just an illusion (under this view).  Even posts and discussions here, are not an example of any creativity, thought, or rationality,  it is just the output that corresponds to the input.  Although the algorithm processing the inputs may be quite complicated; in the end you have no choice, determination of your own, or ability to evaluate whether a correct or incorrect output is the result. 

This argument appears to me, to be cutting off the branch that it is sitting on!

This is a false dichotomy.  That deterministic algorithms cannot also be rational.  What makes you think you cannot evaluate the alternatives in any real sense?  The outcome is determined, but that determination can include rational considerations.  It has been shown by genetic algorithms that task oriented organisms can evolve from basics.  Is rationality not simply another task?

I would agree, that a deterministic algorithm may appear rational, or come to results, that we would consider logical.  However; they also may not.  This argument is more about determining what is rational and what is not, which you cannot do under hard determinism.  The terms determine, evaluate, choose, or consider, don't have any meaning under a hard determinism governed by natural forces.  They are just going to do what they do.

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I think that it is strange, because if everything is deterministic and you eliminate choice, then you can no longer trust logic (and therefore any scientific conclusions).  If you cannot choose, then you cannot make a determination that one thing is more reasonable than another.  Or at least, the determination, isn't based on logic or reason, but on the physical configuration of the brain.

Given two opposing ideas, you cannot evaluate them in any real sense, as your answer is predetermined based on physics, not on logic.  You cannot answer any differently.   And even though you think you may be correct, as well as thinking critically, this is also just an illusion (under this view).  Even posts and discussions here, are not an example of any creativity, thought, or rationality,  it is just the output that corresponds to the input.  Although the algorithm processing the inputs may be quite complicated; in the end you have no choice, determination of your own, or ability to evaluate whether a correct or incorrect output is the result. 

This argument appears to me, to be cutting off the branch that it is sitting on!

Bold mine.

This is the problem I was talking about. If we assume no choices are being made, then there is no choice as to whether or not you trust something either. You can't get from determinism to any sort of imperative. So in any such discussions (involving imperatives), it's pragmatic to assume that there is more to choices than determinism. If that assumption is wrong, nothing has been lost since the discussion couldn't have gone any other way anyhow. Maybe this is what you were saying, I'm not sure. It is indeed a self-defeating argument.

I find a weird kind of irony with the idea of determinism dictating the flow of a discussion about determinism.

It looks like we are on the same page. 

And I agree completely with the last line (which I highlighted).  It's also interesting, when you consider our propensity to think and speak, as if we had a choice; is simply the result of deterministic forces (dominoes falling).  And then you get into this group of chemicals and forces becoming self aware, and self reflective (as in philosophical discussion such as this). It's so different from what we are accustomed to; as a way of operating, that it can be difficult to wrap you head around all the implications.  And even then; in the end you need to deny yourself any choice, in whether the results are correct or not.