One morning, I was startled by a wind that had suddenly turned biting. After seeing a forecast that daytime temperatures would not even reach 20 degrees Celsius, I dug out a fairly heavy jacket from the far end of my closet and put it on before heading outside.
In ancient Greece, cold weather like this was said to mean that Boreas, the god of the north wind, had arrived. Boreas, whose violent temperament matched the chill winds of midwinter, abducted the Athenian princess Oreithyia and made her his wife. Louis de Cahusac added a new story to this myth, and Jean-Philippe Rameau set it to music, creating the 1763 lyric tragedy "Les Boréades" (The Descendants of Boreas).
Alphise, a descendant of the house of Boreas and queen of Bactria, is obliged to marry into the Boreas family, but she declares her abdication in order to marry Abaris, a priest of unknown origin. The enraged Boreas abducts Alphise, and Abaris, carrying a magical golden arrow he received from her, challenges the sons of Boreas who had been her suitors. At the decisive moment, Apollo descends from the heavens and reveals that Abaris is his own son, born of a nymph of the house of Boreas. Alphise is thus free to marry Abaris.
In one sense, the ending feels hollow. Just as the conflict reaches its peak, the drama is brought to a close by a god rather than by any process of resolution. On stage, this was staged with the god descending by mechanical device, which is why it was called "deus ex machina." The deus ex machina suited the social values of that era of monarchy and came to be used almost as a cliché. Still, there are times when one wishes such a thing existed in real life as well. Wouldn't it be convenient if, whenever you were troubled, someone appeared and solved it for you? And lately it seems this wish has come true — in the form of artificial intelligence.