"The eight-year-old Hitler sang in the church choir, and entertained thoughts of becoming a priest." (Adolf Hitler - Wikipedia)1. What makes one person turn into Adolf Hitler, and another person turn into Mother Teresa?
People answering this question start off with certain 'premises' or assumptions, which may be wrong.
For example:
A. the atheist starts off with the premise that life is an accident and that no one has a spirit or soul.
But,"the first scientific study of 'near-death' experiences has found new evidence to suggest that consciousness or the 'soul' can continue to exist after the brain has ceased to function."
(Soul-searching doctors find life after death - Telegraph/FREE WILL?)
"The best that neuroscience can do is to show that behavior X is neurally correlated with activity in brain structure Y.
"This has precisely nothing to do with determinism because non-deterministic effects could be present at much more physically fundamental levels than those dealt with by neuroscience and never show up on the neuroscientist’s radar." (http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/free-will-roundtable.html)
B. The believer in God may start off with the premise that at some point in the past 'God' decided to create various spiritual creatures.
But some people believe that spiritual creatures have always existed.
The Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyah claimed that 'created things have always existed'. Mormons believe that we have always existed.
"The death of his younger brother, Edmund, from measles on 2 February 1900 deeply affected Hitler. He changed from being confident and outgoing and an excellent student, to a morose, detached, and sullen boy who constantly fought with his father and teachers.... After his father's sudden death on 3 January 1903, Hitler's behaviour at the technical school became even more disruptive, and he was asked to leave in 1904."C. Westerners tend to think of people as individuals.
But, according to the Taoists, everything in the universe is single, whole, but composed of opposites.
According to the scientists, "under certain circumstances subatomic particles are in some form of intimate connection with one another no matter how far apart they may be." (Quantum interconnectedness - Economic Times)
D. Some people do not believe in 'acts of God'.
Life magazine reported (The Mystery of Chance):
On 1 March 1950, all the fifteen members of a church choir in Beatrice, Nebraska, due at practice at 7:20, were late.
For example, one couldn't start her car; and one mother and daughter were late because the mother had to call the daughter twice to wake her from a nap.
At 7:25 the church building was destroyed in an explosion. The members of the choir, Life reported, wondered if their delay was "an act of God."
"The Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna rejected Hitler twice, in 1907 and 1908, because of his 'unfitness for painting'... After being rejected a second time by the Academy of Arts, Hitler ran out of money. In 1909 he lived in a homeless shelter, and by 1910, he had settled into a house for poor working men... He was a frequent dinner guest in a wealthy Jewish home; he interacted well with Jewish merchants and sold his paintings almost exclusively to Jewish dealers."2. One could argue that neither Hitler nor Mother Teresa had achieved full 'enlightenment' (Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith)
To Carl Jung, God may be an evolving being.
Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung (1875 - 1961) said in Memories, Dreams, Reflections:
"Natural history tells us of a haphazard and casual transformation of species over hundreds of millions of years of devouring and being devoured...
"But the history of the mind offers a different picture. Here the miracle of reflecting consciousness intervenes."
French theologian and scientist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) also sees God as an evolving thing. De Chardin argues that all things are evolving and the unity of the universe is grounded not in matter or energy but spirit.
"Hitler became fixated on warfare after finding a picture book about the Franco-Prussian War among his father's belongings."3. If we do have 'free will', it could be seen as a burden. (Existential Primer: Fyodor Dostoevsky)
Dostoevsky points to characters who do bad things, knowing that they are bad, in order to assert their uniquness and independence.
Some might say that God does not have this burden, as, presumably, he is incapable of choosing evil?
Dostoevsky, and others, seem to suggest that all creatures go through a long learning process, which can involve suffering, in order to achieve enlightenment.
Hitler was 'lucky' enough to survive a number of assassination plots.4. Eastern thinking often has less of a problem with the question of 'free will' and 'good and evil'.
"When you are aware of the Tao and feel it, you can flow with it, and the right action appears for itself, spontaneously."
Henry C K Liu wrote in the Asia Times about Taoism. Where does evil come from? There can be no ‘good’ without ‘evil’.
"Controlled quantities of the bad can be good. Excessive amounts of the good can be bad. Poison kills. But when handled properly, it can cure diseases. Without poison, there can be no medicine. To employ poison to attack poison is a Taoist principle, which is validated in modern medical the practice of vaccination, the use of antibiotics and chemotherapy treatments." - (Consider the lilies)
5. Is there a bit of God within Hitler?
According to The Upanishads, the Hindu New Testament (Life And Death Explained?):
God is within all the created world (immanent) and outside all the created world (transcendent).
God becomes immanent (within all) until the end of evolution when the immanent has all again become transcendent (outside the created world). The created world evolves into the transcendent God.
Why? For the joy of creation.
Why is there evil? For the joy of good arising from it.
Why darkness? That the light may shine more.
Why suffering? For the instruction of the soul and the joy of sacrifice.
Why the infinite play of creation and evolution? For pure joy.
The more the lower self is forgotten in good works, and in the realisation of the beautiful and the true, the quicker becomes the process of evolution.
6. Timothy Conway has written of (3 Levels of Reality) "the old, largely forgotten Christian idea of ... universal salvation taught by Origen and Clement of Alexandria and Gregory of Nyssa: God's love is so powerful that no creature can exile itself from this Love forever."
"Chhotu is an intelligent boy who belongs to a poor family in Rajasthan. Born into poverty, he is forced to find work at a roadside food stall."7. If we do not have 'free will', and everything is determined by such things as our genes, is that going to lead to the elite 'choosing' fascism?
According to Professor Philip Adey of King’s College London, a child's IQ can be raised by the right stimulation
"If general intelligence was indeed largely in the gift of the genes .... then we would be driven towards the deterministic and racist scenario of eugenics.
"Fortunately, all of the recent evidence points to the plasticity of general intelligence, the fact that a child’s IQ can be raised by the right kind of stimulation."
"The best that neuroscience can do is to show that behavior X is neurally correlated with activity in brain structure Y. This has precisely nothing to do with determinism because non-deterministic effects could be present at much more physically fundamental levels than those dealt with by neuroscience and never show up on the neuroscientist’s radar." (http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/free-will-roundtable.html)8. The following makes use of an article entitled 'Free Will' at the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy]
Most of us think that we have free will.
But, what is free will?
According to philosopher David Hume, the 'nature of free will' is the big question.
1. We can talk about 'Free Action', 'Free Will' and 'Moral Responsibility'.
If Hitler had been kept in jail, he would not have been free to invade Poland.
While in jail, Hitler may have felt that he still had 'free will'.
Hitler, once in power, was free to invade Poland.
If, as some scientists and philosophers suggest, there is no such thing as 'free will', then Hitler may not be 'morally responsible' for invading Poland.
2. Plato and Aristotle believed that if we have an intellect or brain, then we have free will.
Hitler used his intelect and decided that invading Poland was 'good'.
He had the 'free will' to invade Poland?
We use our 'free will' to do what we consider is 'good'?
3. 'Determinism' is the opposite of 'free will'.
A determinist would say that Hitler's actions were the result of such things as 'being beaten by his father', 'having inherited a disturbed character', 'having, met certain people'...
Website for this image4. Discoveries in 'Quantum Physics' suggest that 'determinism' may be wrong.
The movement of 'particles' cannot always be predicted.
And every particle, every thing, may be connected.
We may all be part of God or linked to God?
And the concreteness of reality may be an illusion.
Consciousness may create the brain, the body and everything we interpret as physical. (Life And Death Explained?)
5. Some people, called 'compatibilists', believe that people can have free will, even if determinism is true.
Hitler may have been affected by his past and by his nature, but, over the question of Poland, he still had a range of options and it was not innevitable that he would choose to invade when he did?
6. When we use words such as 'gratitude', 'resentment', 'forgiveness' and 'love', we tend to assume that people are responsible for their actions.
7. Some religious people claim that God is ultimately responsible for everything that happens.
But, this suggests that people have no free will and are not responsible for their actions.
If 'theological determinism' is true, then whether or not people repent is ultimately up to God, not to the people themselves.
Why does God not will that everyone is saved?
We might conclude that 'God' may not necessarily be as described by certain fundamentalists.
So, what about free willy?9. "Do you believe that you have control over your destiny?
"If you do not, then you are more prone to bad behavior."
This is according to findings from studies by experimental philosophers and psychologists, reported by John Tierney in the Times." (If You Don't Believe In Free Will, You Are Likely to Be a Cheater ... / Changing belief in free will can cause students to cheat.)
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