Letters from Tomis

Twentieth in a series of reflections on my thoughts after reading What is Marxism: An Introduction into Marxist Theory by Rob Sewell and Alan Woods. The thoughts, opinions, and any errors are mine alone.

To speak of determinism and fatalism in the same breath is to betray either a misunderstanding of one, the other, or both. While these concepts often seem to blur into one another in the minds of the less careful, a proper interrogation reveals them as fundamentally distinct—indeed, often at odds in their implications for human action and thought. Determinism, properly understood, is the assertion that all events, including human choices, are caused by preceding conditions according to natural laws. Fatalism, by contrast, is the notion that outcomes are preordained, irrespective of our actions or intentions. To confuse the two is to confuse a sober description of causality with a fatalistic shrug toward the cosmos.

Let us begin with determinism. The deterministic worldview rests on a rigorous foundation of causality. Every effect has its antecedent cause, and every cause its chain of predecessors, extending backward into the infinite regress of the universe’s beginning—or, if you like, its eternal process of being. Determinism tells us, persuasively, that the movements of the stars, the tumbling of an avalanche, and even the seemingly chaotic machinations of human thought arise from a matrix of interconnected conditions. To be a determinist is not to deny freedom altogether but to understand freedom as a product of constraints. A chess player, for instance, may move freely within the rules of the game but cannot simply declare the rook a queen because it suits their fancy. Human freedom, in this view, is neither illusory nor transcendent; it is constrained but meaningful.

Fatalism, on the other hand, comes dressed in the robes of resignation. The fatalist sees the world not as a great chain of cause and effect but as a pre-scripted drama, indifferent to the choices of its actors. In the fatalist’s cosmos, it matters not whether one struggles or acquiesces; the outcome is as fixed as a sentence carved into stone. The fatalist, unlike the determinist, denies the meaningfulness of human agency altogether, reducing all effort and aspiration to mere shadows dancing on a predestined wall. If determinism has its echoes in Newton’s laws and Einstein’s equations, fatalism owes its lineage to the mournful fatalism of the ancients, who saw the will of the gods as unassailable and the fates as unyielding.

This distinction, once understood, reveals the intellectual hollowness of fatalism compared to the rigor of determinism. The fatalist, who declares that human striving is meaningless, commits a philosophical betrayal of the first order. Such a worldview is not only anti-scientific; it is anti-human, a direct affront to the potential for curiosity, innovation, and resistance that defines our species. To accept determinism is to accept complexity; to resign oneself to fatalism is to accept despair.

Now, it must be said that determinism, like any intellectual tool, carries its risks. There are those who would interpret its insights as a form of subtle fatalism, arguing that if every action is caused, no one can be held accountable for their deeds. Such a conclusion is as lazy as it is false. Determinism does not absolve us of responsibility; it enriches our understanding of it. The murderer’s actions are, indeed, determined, but so too is our collective capacity to build a society that minimizes the conditions under which such actions occur. To embrace determinism is to embrace responsibility—not to deny it.

Fatalism, by contrast, encourages passivity. It whispers that nothing we do matters, that the injustices of the world are eternal and unchangeable. This is a dangerous lie, one that has been used to justify tyranny and oppression throughout history. The fatalist would have us believe that human progress is an illusion, that the abolition of slavery, the enfranchisement of women, and the triumphs of science were but the inevitable unfolding of fate. Determinism, properly understood, tells a different story. These triumphs were caused—by human action, by choices made under constraints, by the application of reason to the brute facts of existence.

In the final analysis, the difference between determinism and fatalism is the difference between a call to understand and a call to surrender. The determinist seeks to know the causes of things, to act within the bounds of necessity, and to expand the realm of possibility. The fatalist, by contrast, declares all effort futile and all change illusory. It is the difference, one might say, between the fire of Prometheus and the resignation of Job. Choose your allegiance carefully.

Note: This concludes my series on dialectical materialism as found in Sewell and Woods What is Marxism. They conveniently have divided their content into three sections: dialectical materialism, historical materialism, and economics. I’ll be tackling the historical materialism topic next. By the way, I highly recommend the book for those that are interested in these topics.

Sewell, Rob, and Alan Woods. What is Marxism? Wellred Books, 2004.