Does everything happen for a reason?

[Exodon Man]

I feel that the answer to this question varies greatly depending on whether or not you're a philisophical or riligious person. Many peopele prefer not to trouble themselves with such questions, and just go where life takes them.

However, personally (and me being a very religiously inclined person) I believe everything does happen for a reason, but not one that we as humans can always understand. Even if you're not a religious person, it seems very silly to believe that everything in our universe is wrapped around our own meger intellegence; and that there we will always understand everything around us.
In the words of Socrates "the wisest man knows that he knows nothing", or in other words: true wisdom is realizing that we don't, and never will, understand everything in the orld around us.
My point here is that (in my opinion) everything that happens and will ever happen (even the terrible things), happens for reasons that we as humans will never be (and should never be) able to fully understand until God Himself reveals them to us in his eternal kingdon.

This being said; this is MY OPINION!!! So PLEASE DON't FLAME ME FOR MY RELIGION, and please don't assume I'm igorant of the tragic things happening in the world. I have had more experience with personal hardship than any of you know.

my 2 cents worth.

 

[hamato_yoshii]

Maybe because of the questions we've already asked about negative things. Let's just say somethin negative happens to someone's parents, would you tell their kid "it's ok bud, everything happens for a reason?" Turn on the news. Listen to the horrific ways people die when there's so many ways for them to go out. I sure hope that didn't happen for a specific reason.

Someone above mentioned that the tiniest decicions affect the directions and outcome of your life. Now that i agree with. Every decision you make changes your path.

No, thats not what I would tell a kid at all, but that doesn't necesarily mean that it's untrue.

Just because bad things happen, doesn't mean that there must be no reason for them to be happening.

Also, and this adds in to the other reply from my post, we get caught in the trap that if I don't see the purpose or reason for something happening, it therefore must mean that there isn't one, and I don't think that is logical.

It's hard to have a discussion like this, on a board that bans any religious talk because it's kind of like having a thread like, "Let's have a real honest discussion on what kind of pets are the best and most popular, but nobody can bring up dogs."

 

[manlyfish]

nothing really happens for a reason unless someone intended it to if it was just a random thing we might think it would have a reason because of the way it affected us latter on

 

[frasertheking]

I feel that the answer to this question varies greatly depending on whether or not you're a philisophical or riligious person. Many peopele prefer not to trouble themselves with such questions, and just go where life takes them.

However, personally (and me being a very religiously inclined person) I believe everything does happen for a reason, but not one that we as humans can always understand. Even if you're not a religious person, it seems very silly to believe that everything in our universe is wrapped around our own meger intellegence; and that there we will always understand everything around us.
In the words of Socrates "the wisest man knows that he knows nothing", or in other words: true wisdom is realizing that we don't, and never will, understand everything in the orld around us.
My point here is that (in my opinion) everything that happens and will ever happen (even the terrible things), happens for reasons that we as humans will never be (and should never be) able to fully understand until God Himself reveals them to us in his eternal kingdon.

This being said; this is MY OPINION!!! So PLEASE DON't FLAME ME FOR MY RELIGION, and please don't assume I'm igorant of the tragic things happening in the world. I have had more experience with personal hardship than any of you know.

my 2 cents worth.

i never understand how people who say everythings pre determined or guided by god or believe in karma.

what exactly did africas do to be born in a third world country ?
to have half there kids die before they are 5.

i just think we get what we take from the world.

ive seen far to many kids lifes destroyed by drug addicts and seen what happens to these kids to think anyone is guiding it
why is it murders are allowed to destroy families for no good reason
if someone is up there he must be a real bastard and has a lot to answer for.
its hard to take that there is nothing looking after us but then that means you can do anything if you really want to in life

 

[gomezladdams]

Its all random.I believe in free will and that I have the power to make choices but the world around me is random.My choices affect the course of my life but the obstacles in my path are random.The idea that everything has a reason and has been predetermined is horrifying to me.That I'm just rolling down a rollercoaster track controlled by the predetermined structure and nothing I think or do makes any difference to the outcome?disgusting.I guess thats comforting to most folks but not me.If I started believing that I wouldn't bother getting out of bed.

 

[ballinouttacntrol]

i agree that this conversation is impossible to have without bringing religion into it but none the less, it was interesting to see people's opinions. Lucky we live in a world were we're all free to have our own opinions and thought process


The africa question....i guess i was just one of the lucky ones that it was written that my ancestors would be taken into slavery and eventually freed up so that i'd have a chance here instead of fighting for my life in poverty over there. Thank goodness that was pre determined

 

[chloe]

iv had things happen to me that i believe happened for a reason, i spose fate is the right word to use.
im a strong believer in it BUT there r certain things which arnt let off with that excuse.
x

 

[scalesandfins]

i think some things happen for a reason. the way i met my fiance was no sort of coincident. and the most recent thing that happend was my suriname boa got out and was gone for a few days i figured he was gone for good. i was laying on my futon the other night and heard somethin fall behind it. it was a stupid cricket. but then i saw a boa turd at the base of my wall so that made me start looking again. i walk into my kitchen and there he was peaking out from under my stove. i would have totally given up if that cricket didnt jump behind my futon. things like this happen to me all the time. im not religiuos but i do believe alot of things happen for a reason.

 

[knifegill]

That boulder has a bigger impact on the life around it then you realize. It can be sheltering small insects/animals Denying sunlight to plant life or giving a surface for them to grow on. Effecting erosion in the landscape nearby. All things that can effect human life at some point in infinite numbers of scenarios.

Nope. I'm talking about the boulder that doesn't.

Its all random.I believe in free will and that I have the power to make choices but the world around me is random.My choices affect the course of my life but the obstacles in my path are random.The idea that everything has a reason and has been predetermined is horrifying to me.That I'm just rolling down a rollercoaster track controlled by the predetermined structure and nothing I think or do makes any difference to the outcome?disgusting.I guess thats comforting to most folks but not me.If I started believing that I wouldn't bother getting out of bed.

This is how I ended up living in my car with a head full of dreadlocks contributing to minors and living on alcohol and those toxic little cheese cracker six-packs. I now have to believe in purposeless, random activity or else I'm just a dot on a fixed timeline scrolling pointlessly through my pre-written story. Predestination almost killed me.

 

[mqktandy]

Like I've said before. Believing in everything happens for a reason is just the minds way to comfort the subconscious from the fear everyone has of the unknown. The human mind is designed to find links, and ties events together to make sense of things. Take korsakoff syndrome for instance. When the brain can't remember exactly what happened in the recent pass (up to a couple days) it fills in our memories with visual clues from the present. They have nothing to do with the truth, but your brain grafts them into the memory to make sense of things. There are a lot of scientific studies done on this phenomenon and all have said that the brain makes false links to make sense of randomness.
Example 1. There was a guy who added up a lot of random dates in a book and predicted someones return to earth on October 22, 1844 in upstate new York. Didn't happen. But more and more people went back every year because it made sense. It eliminated the random factor, therefor made them comfortable.

Example 2. Goldbach's conjecture. This theory states that every number is the sum of two primes. Which works but the process for each number is different. Which supports the argument of trying to make sense of randomness by proving links are there that aren't. Btw there are about 100 theories of ways to link every number. In the end stating that everything is random has scientific evidence supporting it the opposite doesn't. In all it comes down to if u believe science or religion.