Knowra Fatalism Fatalism Fatalism is the belief that outcomes are fixed and cannot be changed by human action. It treats events as unavoidable rather than open to intervention.
Determinism : The thesis that events, including human actions, are necessitated by prior conditions and laws of nature. Unlike fatalism, determinism does not by itself say that action cannot affect outcomes.
Logical fatalism : The argument that propositions about future events must already be true or false, making those events unavoidable. It derives fatalism from the truth status of future-tense statements rather than causal forces.
Aristotle : An ancient Greek philosopher whose works shaped logic, metaphysics, ethics, and natural science. His discussion of future contingents became a central source for logical fatalism.
Moral responsibility : The status of an agent as properly subject to moral praise, blame, or obligation for conduct. If actions cannot alter outcomes, the grounds for praise and blame become difficult to explain.
Compatibilism : The view that free will can coexist with causal determinism. It rejects fatalism’s implication that determined outcomes make meaningful action impossible.
Causal fatalism : The view that causal conditions make future outcomes unavoidable, regardless of human choices. It locates inevitability in the causal structure of events.
Megarian school : An ancient Greek philosophical school associated with dialectic, modal logic, and debates about possibility. Its thinkers developed arguments about necessity that fed later fatalist controversies.
Practical reason : Reasoning about what to do, including how actions can serve ends and respond to circumstances. Fatalism challenges whether deliberation can make a difference to what happens.
Free will : The capacity of agents to choose or act with some degree of control over their conduct. Fatalism denies that choices can change outcomes, challenging common accounts of free will.
Argument from idle necessity : An ancient argument claiming that if an outcome is necessary, actions aimed at changing it are pointless. It turns fixed outcomes into a practical claim that deliberation and effort are idle.
Show all 21