Deus Ex Natura: July 2008

Welcome friends. The name of this blog is a variation of Deus Ex Machina which courtesy of Wikipedia is:

"a Latin phrase that is used to describe an unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot. The phrase has been extended to refer to any resolution to a story which does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and is so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, allowing the author to conclude the story with an unlikely, though more palatable, ending.

Thus, Deus Ex Natura can be extrapolated linguistically and conceptually to whatever your subsequent understanding of it would be. An interpretation of my own is that whilst Deus Ex Machina described an unexpected or artificial event aiding resolution etc in a work of fiction or contrived human construct as above, Deus Ex Natura implies an inherent order to things, that the god or deity is in the natural order of life and nature, which is at once based on chance and probability like the universe largely probably is, but simultaneously on the peaceful notion that in nature the most elegant and simplist solution has proven to invariably be the best and that that underlying order is predominantly a product of life's organic complexity resolving itself. Our own irrationalities and self constructed dilemmas are ultimately resolved by the natural order of things in time. That's just a whole lot of crap that I just made up, but it sounds good, and I like the idea.

It's not the "relativity of Melville's duality of evil in 'Moby Dick' as it relates to 20th century colonialism"...it's just my blog! Actually, as discussed in the show 'Northern Exposure' - where this quote is from - was Ahab a hero hunting a killer whale or a murderer of an innocent creature? Like the colonel who burnt down the village in Vietnam to save the people. Or the president who bombed Iraqi children to death to spread freedom (sic). What's with that? And more importantly, what the hell am I doing on this particular planet in the dark ages? I guess I shouldn't have pissed off that 7th dimensional appointment officer. Cheers.