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anthrosub -> RE: The Concept of Fate? (8/8/2005 6:06:46 PM)
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My first encounter with fate came through watching a movie of all things as a teenager. I had heard the term but really didn't understand what it was all about. I know it seems trivial to think a movie could give someone a perspective but in retrospect, I'm glad it happened that way. The movie was made in 1964 and starred Glenn Ford, Susanne Pleshette, Rod Taylor, and Wally Cox (with a few cameo appearances thrown in). The movie was titled, "Fate is the Hunter" based on the book by Ernest K. Gann, which I found years later and still have on my bookshelf.
The story is about a plane crash and the investigation that ensues. Everyone dies but the flight attendant (Pleshette). Rod Taylor was the pilot and is accused of being seen leaving a bar shortly before the plane took off. Glenn Ford is the investigator and a friend of the pilot, who he wants to clear of the drinking charge. The whole movie takes place in flashbacks documenting some of the most interesting series of events and their outcome in the pilot's life through interviews with his friends. The crash is recreated and almost happens again because they copy everything so accurately.
Here's what happened...the pilot asks for a cup of coffee, which is brought to him and he places it on a console next to his seat. A few minutes later, some turbulance from taking off spills the coffee and causes a short to make one of the engine warning lights start flashing. The crew doesn't realize it's only a short circuit and shuts down the engine. Next, a bird gets sucked into the number two engine and causes a fire so they shut down this engine, too. With only two engines left, they start losing altitude and decide to make a belly landing on a nearby beach that's clear (it's late at night). The landing goes OK but they end up running into a condemned fishing pier and the plane blows up on impact.
The end of the movie takes place in a courtroom where Glenn Ford gives a great speech about how he believes it was fate that brought the plane down. There were a string of coincidences that together, caused the crash. The first engine was actually OK. The bird was usually gone from the area as it's a migratory species but the summer weather lasted longer than usual so it was still around. The pier was scheduled to be torn down a week earlier but the contractor was on vacation and decided to take an extra week off at the last minute.
Earnest Gann was a an airline pilot before WW2, a military cargo pilot during the war, and again returned to civil aviation until he was retired when jets took over the industry. His book is about his own experiences with fate and the movie has nothing to do with its contents, just the nature of fate as a concept. I highly recommend the book and the movie.
As far as my own view today, I think fate is yet another structure we superimpose on events to understand what's going on. I think it originates in the structure of how we think as human beings. Some people subscribe to the billiard ball theory of cause and effect in linear events. Others subscribe to a web-based perception (including myself) where everything affects everything else.
I had a great debate once with the vice-president of a company I used to work for. She insisted that all accidents can be avoided if one pays close enough attention. She was a big believer in cause and effect. I told her this was impossible because accidents, by their very nature, will slip past your diligence and the more diligent you are, the smaller or less noticeable will be the things that get by (I later learned that she lost her only daughter to a car accident where she lost control in a snowstorm and hit a tree).
I also told her people learn from making mistakes. If nothing is amiss, nobody pays it any attention and accidents happen when that's how things look (nothing amiss). Only when you see something out of place does it stand out. This is also the basis for the old saying, "Show me someone who's never made a mistake and I'll show you someone who hasn't learned much."
Edit to add:
I wanted to elaborate on the previous paragraph a bit. When someone makes a mistake, they learn what they did wrong because something didn't work, they noticed this fact and had to do something different to correct it. Think about this. If you went through life without anything going wrong you wouldn't give it a second thought and move on. In other words, there would be no contrast or comparison. This is why mistakes are valuable lessons.
This is how we learn just about everything. We notice the differences between objects, events, people, and so on. Not everything has to be a mistake to learn from it but the most important lessons always seem to be made up of some level of trial and error.
quote:
In buddism, they believe not in the past or the future, but in the now. And being open to what is happening at this precise moment. It is focusing on all what is happening around you and being able to hear. If you can hear, you will be able to centre yourself on what is happening in the now. So, unlike fate, its just about being open to the realisty that surrounds you.
Dark~angel...I had to laugh when I read this. These words of yours are synonymous with my description of intelligence...exactly the same definition using different words.
anthrosub
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