Slaughterhouse Five and Fate

Billy Pilgrim has virtually no control in his life, and therefore very little free will. He cannot decide when or where he will go next, just as a traditional idea of fate suggests. This gives Billy a sense that, because everything is beyond his control, he should not try at it. What is to happen will happen regardless of what he does. His view of death is an interesting one, though. The Tralfamadorians believe that life is comprised of individual moments. Just because we are dead in one moment doesn't mean we are dead in all of the other moments. We are still very alive in the rest of the moments that make up our lives. But this view is very detached an unemotional. It makes it seem like we should hardly care what happens to us because it would happen regardless of what we think of it. That is where I think that Billy is wrong about people. People are passionate about what they do in their lives, so they must believe that their actions have at least some impact on what happens in their lives. But is that just an illusion? Should we all be more like Billy and not care when bad things happen because our reaction does not affect anything? I do not believe this is the case. Billy may take a hands off approach to his life, but that seems almost inhuman. It seems to be human nature to care about what happens to us. If we couldn't control a thing, people would probably stop trying or caring altogether by now. Because they have not stopped acting emotionally and otherwise in their lives, people at least think they have some control over their lives. Billy's view seems almost pessimistic; he makes most things in life feel inconsequential. However, sometimes the little things that we appear to have no control over seem to mean the most. If we didn't react and learn from mistakes and shortcomings, what stops everything from just happening over and over again?