It becomes part of the body, but it does not become natural to the body. What is "natural to" something is a different thing than what is "part of" it. Again, a theological view of "natural" might fit Gloranthan chaos better.
For example, pulling from Orthodox Christian theology (because that is the theology that I understand best, so I'm least likely to screw it up), even though death is common, indeed, apparently universal to the human condition, for all who have been born have died (save two--Elija and Enoch), death is nevertheless viewed as an *unnatural* phenomenon, one that is a result of the Fallen state of the world. The fact that it is universal in our current experience does not make it "natural" in this theological sense.
Before people start accusing me of Humptydumptyism, I will state that this use of "natural" is at least 3,000 years old, since Orthodox Christianity inherited it from older (pre-Rabbinic) Judaic philosophy. I'm not pulling it out of my own hat, but out of somebody else's.
> That's a scientific viewpoint. From a philosophical metaphysical
> viewpoint, I think you would also find many who would agree that AIDS is
> "part" of that person. To pick a really extreme example, was Hitler's
But that does not make it "natural to" that person, not in the vernacular or even a rigorous medical sense. I work on vaccine development in transgenic plants. My work includes cloning out antigens and cloning them into plants. These antigens become part of the plant's protein profile. Their genes become part of the plant's genome. Nevertheless, they are still exogenous genes--they are not natural to those plants.
> "But the Gods War weakened that order, and admitted chaos into the world"
>
> The word used is NOT "intrude", but "admitted". In my mind, a huge
> difference, though this may be reading too much into it.
If I have a steel door, and there is a monster behind it, trying to get in, and if I do something stupid that weakens that steel door, has not my stupidity "admitted" this monster in? That is, my acts permitted the "intrusion". The fact that the intrusion would have been impossible without my weakening the door makes it no less an intrusion.
> Strip away the fluff, and essentially the tale is the same - "a god did
> something, the world changed, and a new entity, X, appeared". And BTW, the
> Unholy Trio are clearly described as *gods* who were taught by Rashoran.
Very naughty of you to bring this up. I like, but it's still naughty. My Lunars LOVE to harp on points like this. My Orlanthi HATE it when they bring things like this up.
> My question remains - why is chaos "unnatural" and "middle air" natural?
GODLEARNER! HACK! SLAY! FOR THE GLORY OF ORLANTH! That's why. As I said before, my Lunars LOVE to harp on points like this. My Orlanthi HATE it when they bring things like this up. "It's just different!"
> Anyway, I suspect that this discussion is nearing futility, as you guys
> repeatedly semi-flame that I am some argumentative idiot who isn't even
> trying to understand. Maybe I'm taking too much of a holistic, Taoist
> approach to the metaphysics, but, to me, your approach has plenty of holes.
Actually, the problem is that you're unwilling to leave the matter unresolved, thus, you are actually taking a fairly particularistic, non-Tao approach. It doesn't MATTER what Chaos actually is in Glorantha. All that matters is how the characters' cultures tell them to react to it. Chaos is, ultimately, chaotic. Thus, no theory will be able to embrace it.
"The Chaos that can be spoken is not true Chaos."
> I'd say extra-cosmic is one explanation _why_ they
> show up as gut-wrenching corruption. Saying that chaos
> _is_ extra-cosmic gives precedence to the Orlanthi/
> Praxian view.
Since that's most of what has been published, it is no surprise that this is what most people would say. In my own campaign, as GM, I say that "Chaos is a chaotic thingie, whatever a chaotic thingie is. It is what I use when I want a different type of play effect than what I would use were I to bring in Dragonewts."
Oops, I'm admitting that it's a fiction, ain't I? That's okay, I've got my patented anti-Giftbringer Spray. It's somewhere around here, I just have to open it fast enou
Powered by hypermail