"Nonlinear Narratives: Order out of Chaos"

Although it may seem counter-intuitive to say that order arises spontaneously from chaos, this is what scientists studying nonlinear dynamics tell us. I argue that throughout history these ordering tendencies of chance have been attributed to final causes because they have the appearance of intentional/purposeful behavior, directed but free. In particular, the phenomena of emergent self-organization and adaptive evolution have seemed telic, that is, inherently progressive or creatively organized toward goals. A reconceived secular form of teleological explanation becomes necessary to account for what scientists now recognize as "emergence," that is, the existence of complex states that cannot be reduced to the sum of the states that precede them and therefore require additional descriptions of dynamical internal constraints (previously known as telic forces) that limit/guide random interactions. I will argue that the two types of telic phenomena, self-organization and adaptation through accidental functionality, may be associated with narratives of Kantian telos and Christian divine Providence, respectively.

Victoria N. Alexander is co-founder and director of the Dactyl Foundation for the Arts & Humanities, 64 Grand Street, New York, NY 10013, www.dactyl.org, tel: 212.219.2344, fax: 212 226.7320, alexander@dactyl.org. As part of her doctoral research in English (with specializations in Narrative Theory and Philosophy of Science) at the Graduate Center, CUNY, she studied at the Santa Fe Institute (www.santafe.edu) with Jim Crutchfield, one of the original investigators of deterministic chaos. She has published a number of articles on evolution, complexity, and literature and her most recent novel, Naked Singularity, explores these themes in literary form. Her various honors and awards include a Rockefeller Foundation Residency (Bellagio, Italy), Jewish Foundation for the Education of Women Fellowship, Art & Science Lab Residency (Santa Fe), Alfred Kazin Award for Best Dissertation (CUNY), and the Washington Prize for Fiction.