Is there such a thing as chance?

There are already a number of threads on this topic, mostly framed in terms of determinism and indeterminism, be warned however, Syamsu is a major contributor to these threads, so how much you will get from reading through them is debatable. I think the most recent one is Syamsu's thread about probability terminology.TTFN,WKP.S. I mean the topic of the OP, not radiactive decay specifically.This message has been edited by Wounded King, 01-11-2005 05:27 AM

That doesn't actually argue that christians aren't at the forefront of the environmental movement, simply that a particular group of christians are actively participating in anti-environmental pursuits.TTFN,WK

Eh? Not only creationism but Lamarckism now?TTFN,WK

OK, so you're not a creationist. That doesn't make your rubbish about paternal alchoholism any less non-sensical. Certainly a child growing up in a household with an alcoholic father might be more likely to develop alcoholism, and certainly there are genetic factors which may predispose people to alcoholism thereby making it a familial trait, but do you have a single shred of evidence supporting the contention that if a father without a genetic predisposition to alcoholism became an alcoholic and fathered a child, that that child would be any more predisposed to alcoholism than any other due to "sin", leaving aside the environmental issue of being raised in a home with an alcoholic parent?TTFN,WK

Dear riVeRrat,As an answer to my question this leaves a lot to be desired. As you reveal so eloquently by suggesting that I 'ask a psychologist', you aren't really talking about 'sin' at all. Or rather what you choose to call 'sin' is something others would identify as a perfectly natural set of social and pychological phenomena, presumably because they are blinded by the Devil's deceptions.TTFN,WKP.S. I think you mean Tarot card reader

Indeed, in fact the religious factors such as 'sin' seem entirely redundant concepts here.No matter what the moral state of your father his health, poverty, class and other factors may well have an effect on your upbringing. How much the simple exercise of free-will is able to alleviate these effects is debatable.TTFN,WK