Do I believe in fate or destiny?

My answer to that starts at the word believe and is motivated by eliminative materialism. Perhaps a philisophicaly bumming but interesting theory that is eliminative materialism--proponed by the Churchland as the one that rejects any beliefs, desires etc. leads me to say neither.
I would instead say that it depends on a series of cause and effect relationships. However, my metaphysical view is one that thinks that in any possbile "eye of God", like that suggested by Spinoza and in a different way through the notion of temporality by Heidegger is such that there is a certain determinate fate/destiny in our lives. Through this view time is as one, it may also very well be the same kind of time over and over again in the same way as per Nietzsche's eternal recurrence.

I guess thats my answer, in a summarized form.

Bill:

Good question. Now as Paul Churchland has outlined, folk psychology i.e use of concepts such as beliefs desires etc. are here to stay. In fact, he himself (as well as other proponents of EM) uses wording such as "I believe" in his own work!

Yet the rejection of such statements is in their use, descriptive and epistemological use. That philosophers have for the longest time justified their beliefs in deductive reasoning that end at the concept of "belief" itself is what Churchland is trying to get at here. Again, this is a refutation of folk psychology (so in this case, maybe I was being too eager in displaying my philosophical knowledge when answering the question "do you believe in fate or destiny"). Thus, more developed philisophical systems go further than just "I believe" such and such and base it on their understanding of reality as they have systematicaly studied it.

However, what Churchland is ultimately getting at is that there are no solid "beliefs" as custom has them appropriated. That is, if someone believes in God, for example, it is not a spiritual, transcendental, immaterial belief as such...instead, it is simply the way our brains store information. Therefore, it gives the truly rational, descriptive and legitimate answers to why person X believes in God to neuroscience. So, we may imagine, that a person believes in God not because he has a spiritual connection with him and "feels" God or even "loves" (love as in something immaterial and thus transcendental) God, but because of the organization of his material brain and its respective processes.

So what it comes down to is the common (folk) use of these terms and how they relate to ones psyche (thus, folk psychology).

I hope this answers your question.

The difference is a matter of categorization of ideas.

Mind/body identity theory or type physicalism is a theory in the philosophy of mind. While eliminative materialism is a materialist position.

So in this sense your right that we only need, for theoretical purposes, the former. But for more political and i suppose revolutionary purposes the latter is in place.

An eliminative materialist also is more stringent on their "facts" since they wouldn't claim to be backed by a theory but a system of scientific truths that needs to be implemented in society, with a simultaneous revamping of the way people think.

Consider that when the Galileo wanted to refute the Geocentric model it wasn't just a theoretical proposition, it meant a change in the way people thought about the universe on a grand scale. It had huge political implications, it meant the complete, worldwide elimination of the way people thought about themselves. This political stand or position is what EM is trying to achieve.

Well see thats EM's problem with universal thought exactly, that EM's find that the majority of people in our world don't think of beliefs the way you and I do (as the same as--brain states). And when you do the research, I suppose, the majority of this world's people don't affirm mind/body indentity theory. They are instead stuck in the past and lagging behind empirical scientific knowledge and the proof that lags with it.

Keep in mind however, that EM was introduced in the 60s-70s.