Chaos vs Order
- Thread starter Negative Zero
- Start date
I am of the feeling that chaos is the beinging of everything, order was birthed from it. Chaos is about change, constant change, order is about rules, too much of both lead to the same result, stagnation together they work in a balance. 
This means choas is creation but order is life, together their foe is 'nothing', the vast emptiness, the void.
This means choas is creation but order is life, together their foe is 'nothing', the vast emptiness, the void.
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Negative Zero asks
Well, there are two related questions here:
(a) what kind of world do you want to create?
(b) based on the mechanics of D&D regarding Law and Chaos, what must necessarily be true about the Law-Chaos dynamic in your world?
Of course, question (a) can be answered almost any way. However, there are a few obvious possibilities:
1. Order is the natural state in which the universe existed before time and chaos was somehow unleashed into the universe as a cancerous force eating away at it. (In this theory, chaos has a good analog with entropy -- time exists because we can measure the escalation of this thing: chaos/entropy which is unidirectional.)
2. Chaos is the natural state in which the universe existed before time and order was somehow imposed by a freak organization of matter within the chaos, creating some kind of order-bestowing entity/God. Gradually, order is overcoming chaos, beating it back even if it loses battles to chaos from time to time.
3. Nothingness is the natural state in which the universe existed before time but with the introduction of matter, two opposing forces came into existence: one which sought to order, consolidate and organize matter, the other seeking to disperse matter.
4. Chaos and Law are forces which have always existed since the beginning; the two are evenly matched and vie against eachother eternally.
I would argue that arguing that chaos is the mere absence of order is actually #2. Chaos, there, is not so much an active principle as it is the inherent state of things that have not been given purpose and form by law/order.
In response to (b), I would argue that option #2 in which chaos is not an active principle is problematic. As long as D&D recognizes "neutral" as a concept, neither evil nor chaos can simply be defined as an absence of good or law; the mere absence of such things, I would argue, is represented by neutrality. Thus, in my reading of the D&D game mechanics, chaos and evil must be active principles; so, throw away your Catholic theology (in which evil is the mere absence of good) -- as far as D&D is concerned, chaos and evil are active principles.
My theory of evil and chaos as active principles is also somewhat supported by the mechanics of detection spells. People can detect law, chaos, good and evil but they cannot detect neutrality. Furthermore, in the description of detect chaos, chaos is described as having a "strength" -- this cannot work for the absence of law/order concept.
If neutrality were a simple balance or synthesis of law and chaos, one would expect that neutral people would register in both a detect law and a detect chaos spell but instead, the neutral register with neither spell. This suggests to me that neutrality is the absence-defined thing, not chaos.
Well, there are two related questions here:
(a) what kind of world do you want to create?
(b) based on the mechanics of D&D regarding Law and Chaos, what must necessarily be true about the Law-Chaos dynamic in your world?
Of course, question (a) can be answered almost any way. However, there are a few obvious possibilities:
1. Order is the natural state in which the universe existed before time and chaos was somehow unleashed into the universe as a cancerous force eating away at it. (In this theory, chaos has a good analog with entropy -- time exists because we can measure the escalation of this thing: chaos/entropy which is unidirectional.)
2. Chaos is the natural state in which the universe existed before time and order was somehow imposed by a freak organization of matter within the chaos, creating some kind of order-bestowing entity/God. Gradually, order is overcoming chaos, beating it back even if it loses battles to chaos from time to time.
3. Nothingness is the natural state in which the universe existed before time but with the introduction of matter, two opposing forces came into existence: one which sought to order, consolidate and organize matter, the other seeking to disperse matter.
4. Chaos and Law are forces which have always existed since the beginning; the two are evenly matched and vie against eachother eternally.
I would argue that arguing that chaos is the mere absence of order is actually #2. Chaos, there, is not so much an active principle as it is the inherent state of things that have not been given purpose and form by law/order.
In response to (b), I would argue that option #2 in which chaos is not an active principle is problematic. As long as D&D recognizes "neutral" as a concept, neither evil nor chaos can simply be defined as an absence of good or law; the mere absence of such things, I would argue, is represented by neutrality. Thus, in my reading of the D&D game mechanics, chaos and evil must be active principles; so, throw away your Catholic theology (in which evil is the mere absence of good) -- as far as D&D is concerned, chaos and evil are active principles.
My theory of evil and chaos as active principles is also somewhat supported by the mechanics of detection spells. People can detect law, chaos, good and evil but they cannot detect neutrality. Furthermore, in the description of detect chaos, chaos is described as having a "strength" -- this cannot work for the absence of law/order concept.
If neutrality were a simple balance or synthesis of law and chaos, one would expect that neutral people would register in both a detect law and a detect chaos spell but instead, the neutral register with neither spell. This suggests to me that neutrality is the absence-defined thing, not chaos.
I agree with fusangite - in D&D Chaos & Order are both defined as active properties, each with a value ranging from 0 to Infinity.
This differs from such real-world properties as darkness (absence of light) or cold (absence of heat). It also differs from the Christian view "He whose almighty Word, Chaos & Darkness heard, and took their flight..." in which Chaos & Darkness are the absence of Law & Light.
This differs from such real-world properties as darkness (absence of light) or cold (absence of heat). It also differs from the Christian view "He whose almighty Word, Chaos & Darkness heard, and took their flight..." in which Chaos & Darkness are the absence of Law & Light.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
You're right with your first idea, Neg Z....it depends on your worldview. If you view Chaos as superior and natural, of course order was imposed rigidly on a free world. If you vew Order as superior and natural, Chaos came along later and disrupted it. In the same vien, Good could be the natural state of things, defiled by Evil, or Evil could be the natural state of things with Good merely being a sweet-sounding lie for the foolish to believe.
Maybe one's right. Maybe another's. Maybe they're all. Maybe none. By default in D&D there's no absolute proclimation, so it can be whatever you want in your campaign, or (as I prefer) eternally sketchy and vague.
Maybe one's right. Maybe another's. Maybe they're all. Maybe none. By default in D&D there's no absolute proclimation, so it can be whatever you want in your campaign, or (as I prefer) eternally sketchy and vague.
Forgive me for hijacking this and dragging philosophy in, but I just can't resist...
Umbran wrote:
Even if a person does it "just to hurt others," s/he is still doing it for a perceived good, perhaps just the (twisted) pleasure or personal satisfaction/gratification received by doing so. I still argue that no one does anything evil just because it's evil. There's always some "good" being aimed at... but this is very fine semantic hair splitting...
Umbran wrote:
Even if a person does it "just to hurt others," s/he is still doing it for a perceived good, perhaps just the (twisted) pleasure or personal satisfaction/gratification received by doing so. I still argue that no one does anything evil just because it's evil. There's always some "good" being aimed at... but this is very fine semantic hair splitting...
geezerjoe
First Post
Order is the logical and eventual realization of Chaos, meaning that given enought time all Chaos will eventually form an Order so strong that it will oppose all chaos Thus chaos eventually destroys itself, resolving into order, but perfect order is unchanged and unchanging, therefore the end of everything. So as one should conclude, Chaos must exist first.
Phew
l8r
Joe2Old
Phew
l8r
Joe2Old
Particle_Man
Explorer
In the beginning was the goop,
and from the goop came the Slaads,
and from the Slaads came other things that were not Slaads, and some of them made a new realm (to be called "not the goop"), but their true Slaad ancestry comes out when they contact the Slaads.
Man, I thought *everyone* knew that!
and from the goop came the Slaads,
and from the Slaads came other things that were not Slaads, and some of them made a new realm (to be called "not the goop"), but their true Slaad ancestry comes out when they contact the Slaads.
Man, I thought *everyone* knew that!
Tom Cashel
First Post
Implication of order = expansion of chaos.
Expansion of chaos = implication of order.
They are inextricably linked and, in effect, the same thing.
More info there! Over there! Right THERE I tell you!
edit: added link
edit-edit: added second edit
Expansion of chaos = implication of order.
They are inextricably linked and, in effect, the same thing.
More info there! Over there! Right THERE I tell you!
edit: added link
edit-edit: added second edit
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