DETERMINISM AND PREDETERMINISM.

Evening Star, Issue 22106, 13 August 1935, Page 6

DETERMINISM AND PREDETERMINISM.

TO THE EDITOE. Sir, —In my letter entitled, ‘ War— What For?’ published in the ‘ Star ’ to-night, I quoted Professor Einstein’s statement that “ everything is determined, the beginning as well as the end.” An absurd error has been introduced in the printing, changing the term “ determined ” into its opposite, “ predetermined.” The doctrine of predeterminism requires that every event in the universe, even the most trivial, throughout all eternity has been deliberately planned and foreseen by a Supreme Power existing outside and apart from the universe. It implies that every effort of man to solve his problems and to modify his environment is futile and foredoomed to failure, because the outcome of the matter has already been decided. Theologians and philosophers may play with such rubbish, hut in the actual practice of their daily lives they act in accoidance with the principle of determinism. They have taught this doctrine in the words of an old hymn; The rich man in his castle. The poor man at his gate; God made the high and lowly, And ordered their estate. In short, the doctiue of predeterminism has provided an excellent means of pacifying a turbulent and oppressed class. The doctrine of determinism, on the other hand, provides a correct theory of knowledge enabling man to understand and control his environment. It provides the only basis for rational thinking in the most fundamental of all generalisations. The only Absolute Is the universe itself, which has existed eternally. It is infinite in extent and is constantly changing in its parts. There is nothing constant but change apart from existence in general. Every cause is itself an effect, and every effect a cause. Our faculty of understanding takes us from the immediate cause to the less immediate, to the remote and fundamental. The war danger of to-day has its immediate causes in the megalomania of Mussolini, Hit-

ler, and the spokesmen of other imperialisms. Their power and scope result from the needs of the financiers and industrialists for markets to realise in money the commodities produced by the workers. As the markets of the world (which are constituted by the needs and the purchasing power of the masses) are saturated these needs produce rivalries and conflicts, which inevitably culminate in war. But if pro-, Auction and distribution were operated socially instead of privately there would bo no rivalry, and therefore no incentive for war. We should have harmony and co-operation between nations. Therefore, proceeding from immediate to remote and fundamental causes, our understanding teaches us that the continuance not only of war, but of economic crisis, unemployment, poverty, and all social evils of a general nature is determined by the private control of the land, ships, factories, banks, and other machinery of social production.—l am, etc., A. B. Powell. August 12.