If all plants and animals are unconsciously following a 'program', could the same be true for us/humans?

Possibly, but if it were true, how would we know for sure, and how could it be proven?

If you’re preprogrammed to do what you’re doing (say, like posting this question), how do you know that your benevolent overlord didn’t have it in your program to ask it?

What you’re saying is – how do you know that you have free will?

That’s been a religious / theological question for thousands of years.

All I can say, is good job for making me seriously question everything.

I find that when you think about things like this, it always brings questions, and those questions provoke even more questions etc. but there are very few answers to satisfy these questions.
Maybe we were programmed to only get so far in our thought process and then stop, because of the sheer size of the questions.

It’s sort of like imagining the universe, to me, it has to be contained in something, but then it can’t, but it has to! and then that argument goes on and on inside my head, and I start to feel sick because of thinking about this.

I realise that I probably don’t make sense to any of the jellies except myself. But isn’t that how the universe is?
wow, I’m deep XD

I wasn’t suggesting that any ‘thing’ is or has written our programs. However, I’ve spent many hrs watching nature’s creatures and much like other conversations I find it seems like at least the so called lower life forms follow a program for lack of a better word. Spiders for instance seem to be very specifically programed. They do very little other than what all the other ones do. No observed idiosyncrasies or traits I can appreciate. Each species seems to act or respond the same to external forces. But if they are programed. Why not ‘higher’ life forms too? Like us? Because we think we have a choice that could at each turn affect our future? We spend our lives attempting to build a life we want to live. What if we just build the web we were supposed to build? Spiders n sharks n flies n bacteria n fire etc all feel to me like they have a purpose or ‘program’ so why would we b different on the same planet in the same universe?

Another thing. When I was in science classes learning about atoms , electrons , neutrons etc and their ‘behavior ’ my most common questions were why? Why do these things that make up all things do this ? Most common answer from college professor was…......Because they like too. Everything from our smallest understanding of things seems to be following a ‘program.’...

If all these things are programmed, who is the programmer? And who programmed the programmer? We can go on forever, or we can just say that things are as they are and leave it at that.

The varied forms of life have evolved from relatively simple genetic structures that have become increasingly complex allowing life to adapt to changing conditions. The ‘program’ that all life follows is written in their genes. Instinct and experience direct actions and reactions without the need for conscious intervention. However, the expression of genes is partly determined by the environment in which a life exists. We are here because evolution has created us. Sentient creatures have the ability to utilize their experiences and envision future possibilities allowing the assertion of their will by altering their unconscious.

Thanks Bill. But the root of my question is whether or not everything including yourself and me could be subject to the same forces as them. I feel like I / we feel above such a ‘program ’ as we view ourselves as higher beings than others. But if even the subatomic particles and most other life on this planet and even the heavens are a sort of clock set in motion , why not us too? It seems odd we would be the only animal or other in existence to not be ‘programmed. ’...

What? There is nature: birth, growth, death. How can this be a program that relates to human “choice?

I’m not sure. I certainly don’t have a preconceived answer to my question. But what if the decisions we make are at least following a framework of what we (like everything else does) were programed to do?

@MrGrimm888 A “program” insures that the results must follow. In other words, it must follow an “if, then” progression. the decisions you seem to choose are non-the-less preprogrammed. In a “fuzzy program”, the progression is not as pre-dertermined, but still follow the program instructions.

Free-will, in other words, not preprogrammed, will allow choices outside the program peramters

@MrGrimm888, without question all life is subject to the same forces. They depend upon physical and physiological conditions necessary for the survival of the individual and its specie. Although human beings may be the current epitome of genetic evolution, this does not make us superior to other forms of life.

The only constant in the universe is change. Everything from subatomic particles to galaxies has a beginning and an ending. Each cell within a living thing is governed by a life cycle. Matter is transformed into energy and energy to matter. This is the clock of creation.

“I find it seems like at least the so called lower life forms follow a program for lack of a better word. Spiders for instance seem to be very specifically programed. They do very little other than what all the other ones do. No observed idiosyncrasies or traits I can appreciate. Each species seems to act or respond the same to external forces.”

Different forms of life have evolved different kinds of nervous systems, different ways of taking in and responding to information from their environment. Those with very simple nervous systems may appear to us to be “programmed”. They are simply responding to their environment in a very direct, uncomplicated way. The brains of some animals, like humans, allow organisms to have complex interactions with their environments, such that they can make more complex choices based on multiple factors, including being able to consider the consequences of their actions.

“When I was in science classes learning about atoms , electrons , neutrons etc and their ‘behavior ’ my most common questions were why? Why do these things that make up all things do this ? Most common answer from college professor was…......Because they like too. Everything from our smallest understanding of things seems to be following a ‘program.’”

To be honest, these are not very good answers for a science teacher to give a student. Not all organisms have the ability to “like” to do things. Some are simply reacting to stimuli. Everything does not “seem to be following a program”. There is no evidence for such a statement, unless you attribute all animal behaviour to genetic inheritance, and that is extraordinarily unlikely.

“But the root of my question is whether or not everything including yourself and me could be subject to the same forces as them. I feel like I / we feel above such a ‘program ’ as we view ourselves as higher beings than others.”

It sounds like you don’t consider humans to be animals, but we absolutely are. We have more complex responses to stimuli in our environment than most animals do, because of the way our brain works. But we are responding to the same kinds of pressures that all other organisms do. Anyone who studies evolution will tell you that humans are not “higher” beings. We are well adapted to our environment, and we have developed the ability to shape the environment if it becomes a pressure on us. But consider that a species of bacterium that is thriving in a thermal vent in the ocean is a very simple creature, which may have changed very little in the millions of years that it has existed, and is perfectly adapted to the environment where it lives, although a human would die instantly if put in the same place. Which of us is then the “higher being”?

Adaptation is about how well one does in very specific circumstances. There is no objective scale of relative worth.

Dappledleaves , I chose the word higher because when I ask questions about these types of things people usually disassociate themselves (as himans) from all other life on our planet. I agree that we are simply animals. Albeit a upgraded, version. At least mentally.