Module #13 Discussion

11/23/2013

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There are many pieces of literature which revolve around the ideas of fate vs. free will. Does a person really have control over his or her life? Or is it a matter of destiny?

In the Final Destination movies, fate comes knocking on the doors of those who dare to defy it. However, the hero in the end is able to control fate by tricking it and therefore having free will.

What do you think? How is this topic relative to your reading thus far? What other connections to literature, film, etc. can you make?

Again, I am expecting that you are putting some thought into this discussion. It should be well-thought, organized, and clear.

You will respond to one (1) peer's post this week.

Steven

11/26/2013 12:05:46 am

Life is a chance that everybody takes through their decisions. Destiny is only in cases that people have no control over, such as winning the lottery or dying because they get hit by a projectile falling from the sky. In the "Final Destination" movies, we see the cast and crew portraying life as an act of destiny. Personally, I don't think that is the way that things really happen in life. In the reading thus far, we have seen Macbeth kill two people and with the second, start having hallucinations about the death. Whether or not Macbeth actually saw Banquo is unknown, but we can foreshadow that darker events are to come because of his internal fear. Other places where we see the act of destiny in film is in almost every horror movie of all time. Every way that a person dies is seen as "their time to go." Destiny doesn't have to be seen as such a bad thing. We often see stories of heroes who have a destiny of saving the world or solving a great mystery. At the end of the day, my opinion will always be that in real life, people go through the things that they do because of the decisions that they make.

Christine

11/27/2013 10:40:26 am

In reading your post, I realized that most of the main characters in Shakespearean plays do not have the happy ending destinies that we are used to seeing, hearing, and reading about in today's society. "Everyone loves a happy ending." says writer Lucas Scott in the hit TV show One Tree Hill. With that said, most writers of movies, novels, and plays write their plays to have happy endings. They also write it so that the protagonist fulfills their bountiful destinies. Shakespeare contradicts that because most of his plays end in the demise of his main characters. Macbeth is a great example of that statement.

Jess

11/29/2013 12:11:08 pm

I agree with you, if destiny was completely true then why would we even bother trying at anything knowing things were already set to happen for us? The idea of everyone's lives planned out ahead of time is not something that I can believe. Also, I thought the same thing when I responded with my blog post, that the things that people go through in life are because of their own decisions and how things affect them.

Logan

11/26/2013 09:42:08 am

The first thing that comes to my mind when this issue is discussed is Othello. In this play, a man was told that he would kill his father and then marry and have children with his mother. For this reason, he was exiled and believed it would never happen. In the end, he wound up king of his home town after unwittingly killing his father and marrying his mother. I do not believe that fate has a larger plan. I will use The Christmas Carol as an example; in this movie, scrooge is showed his past, present, and multiple variations of the future. The opposing futures are very different and decided by the choices he makes. In Macbeth, the choices he makes changes the outcome of the play substantially, and we are building up to that in our readings. In my past I made terrible decisions that, looking back, were extremely detrimental to my health and set me up for a terrible future. Through the help of my friends and my own sense of morals, I chose to change the way I lived. I determined my future based on the decisions I made for myself. If I would have stayed on the path I was on, it is a very real possibility that I wouldn't be alive right now, and I DEFINITELY would not have the relationships I have today. I, as well as everyone else, have the right to choose how I wanted to live and that determines my future.

Cristina

11/28/2013 10:31:27 am

I really love the fact that you brought up Scrooge and the Christmas carol. I feel tht choice has a huge effect on destiny. We are all subject to fate though. I feel that when a person is told what their future he's, they feel that they must stray from their natural course to achieve the prophecy. I have not read Othello so I am unsure if he does anything like Macbeth does to achieve his for told future.

Samantha

11/29/2013 10:45:27 am

First of all, I'm happy to see that you put a lot of effort into your post this week. I loved the example that you used with The Christmas Carol. It was very unique and appropriate for this time of year and something most people would not have immediately thought of. I also like how you related it to your past and how you came past it. We have all been through bad times, and it is important not to get hung up on something like that. You are a amazing, spontaneous, and lovable person and I'm glad that I got to be by your side as your grew and continue to grow.

Jess

11/26/2013 09:56:08 am

Although I have not seen any of the "Final Destination" movies, I can still give my viewpoint based on my analysis of other information I have learned from. For example, someone might have the perfect boy right in front of them who they are meant to be with but they are blindsided and end up not going for that boy. This was their own choice because they did not take what was right in front of them. This could happen with many other things such as work opportunities and constant life decisions we come across each and every day. I think that because we are not perfect and cannot be programmed to make the right decisions all of the time that our "destiny" can be determined by the choices we make throughout our lives, and is not planned from the start. In the end, I believe no matter how many bad choices are made things will work themselves out. I have felt many moments in my life where I made bad decisions and things happened leading me back onto the right path. Sometimes your path may have some rocks and holes that may get in your way but it will always lead to the place you are supposed to be. This is related to my reading of Macbeth so far because as much as Macbeth tries to be king, it is just not seeming to be meant to be. We often do see in movies, such as "A Cinderella Story" or even just the original Disney movie, "Cinderella" that through it all she still finds her king in the end. It truly seems destined to me.

Samantha

11/26/2013 10:09:44 am

I believe a person has control over their life to a certain extent. After said extent, I believe fate takes over. One chooses their own path in life, but fate can change the path slightly or drastically. In our reading thus far, Macbeth has decided other people’s fates and even his own. He has murdered or ordered people to murder; he is clearing a path to the throne. Macbeth took away Duncan’s, Banquo’s, and Banquo’s son’s destinies because he chose to control his own personal destiny. In the movie “Tangled”, Rapunzel’s assumed destiny is to remain in the tower for the rest of her life. But, when opportunity comes knocking on her door, or rather a very attractive animated guy, Rapunzel takes control of her life. She makes a deal with Flynn Rider and leaves the tower to see the “floating lights”. The leaving of her tower causes a whole mess of things that were caused by both fate and freewill.

Logan

11/29/2013 05:18:41 am

I like your post, but I feel that you contradicted yourself. In Tangled, you said how she chose to leave the castle even though her destiny was to live there forever, so she broke fate and made her own destiny. The fact that she left was an act of choice to break fate, and your argument is therefore invalid.

Sam

11/29/2013 09:51:06 am

I agree with you that people can control their lives to a certain extent, but for the most part, people control the outcome of their lives. What I don't agree with you on is that fate takes over. Fate would mean something was or is meant to happen, and that would imply a supernatural force at work. I don't believe in witches or magic, so that something I just can't get behind.

Christine

11/26/2013 10:38:52 am

A person has control over the events that life presents to them. I believe that fate is what gives people the opportunities to change their future; however, it is that person's actions that will determine the true outcome of what is to come. Obviously, some people are able to have better opportunities and better futures because of the family they are born into. I believe both fate and the a person's actions both have strong effects on a person's future. This relates to Macbeth because he was given his fate by the three witches. He fulfills the "prophecies" given to him by the witches because of his actions. He becomes are ruthless king who was hungry for power and killed anyone who got in his way. This led to his demise. In the movie, Sleeping Beauty, the villain Maleficent tells the king and queen that their only child, Aurora, will be put into a sleeping spell when she pricks her finger on a spinning wheel. The king and queen hide their daughter with three fairies to take care of her in order for her to escape this fate. Unfortunately, Maleficent lures Aurora to a spinning wheel and she is put into a sleeping curse. Although Maleficent was not expecting Aurora to ever wake as part of her evil plan, true love's kiss wakes her and her true love also kills Maleficent. So even though, Aurora's fate was to be put into a sleeping curse forever, she escapes it because of true love's kiss.

Sam

11/26/2013 11:30:14 am

A person has complete control over their life and their fate. Certain random variables could possibly throw this off, though. For example a person could be stricken with a disease such as cancer that would affect their fate. It's important to remember, though, that these random variables can be avoided, so this fate is a result of the person's free will. The movie Final Destination shows people become the victims of the fate they escaped, but in real life, people don't just die due to fate. People die when they decide to drive to the movies and get hit by a car or walk under a plate glass window being installed when it falls on top of them. They could've taken a different road to the movies or walk around the scaffolding. Instead, their free will took them in that direction, and they just so happened to be in the line of fire.
In relation to Macbeth, I think the story has fate as the ultimate decision-maker. The witches seem to be pulling the strings, and they often talk about the future. If they already know what will happen in the future, it must mean there is a defined, linear course of events that can't be changed. Therefore, fate is what drives the events of the story.

Steven

11/28/2013 10:13:53 am

After reading your comment, I am wondering whether or not you mean that fate is something that controls the outcome of the world or something that has no meaning at all. I like what you say about Macbeth, I never really thought of it as the witches pulling the strings to ultimately decide the ending to the story since they already know the future. In this case, do you think it was their plan all along to have Macbeth killed? All in all, I really liked what you said in this post.

Tori

11/29/2013 01:31:01 pm

I completely agree with you when you sad that certain things can throw off how a persons life is. I do agree with you that people can control their lives but I don't agree that they can all the time. For instance, what if someone else's mistake causes a problem in that persons life?

Cristina

11/26/2013 02:07:54 pm

Well again we look at our control over choice. I feel that we do not have total control over our destiny but we can make choices that will either hurt or help our cause. I feel like Macbeth makes the choice to kill Duncan and this damages his chances of having a horrible fate,but then again it could have been written that way from the beginning. Free will and fate correlate directly with each other. People have their free will but only so far till random event happen to ensure what fate has decided. I f a person does not reach their fate on their own accord,then some higher power must step in. I feel like in Huckleberry Finn he makes his own choices so far. He was always going to end up at Toms aunt's house.

Tori

11/29/2013 01:10:52 pm

I believe that people do have control over their own lives to a certain extent. People can make their own decisions, and do things that they want to in life. However, I do believe that destiny plays a huge roll in a persons life. People are able to make their own decisions but destiny is what comes after that. Like in the final destination movies all the people made the decision to escape "death" and therefore their destiny was for death to come back for them. In Macbeth, Macbeth makes the decision to kill king Duncan and Banquo but he will pay for his mistakes at the end of the play. That is his destiny, he made those mistakes so its almost his karma that comes back for him by the end.

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Module #13 Discussion

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