The philosophy of Naturalism is about how nothing exists beyond the natural universe. The Laws of Nature are very important, and are over the behavior of the natural universe. The "spiritual" world doesn't exist, and if you can't see it, it isn't real. Naturalists believe that there is no purpose for the world being created, and no purpose for those living on Earth. The ideas originated in the Renaissance of the 12th century. The search for natural causes picked up when more people started believing that God was the operator of the world. There will always be opposition to a belief, and naturalism played that role. Naturalists believe that there is no higher truth than natural science itself, and the scientific method is the only way to answer questions about the world. In the modern world, different philosophers interpret naturalism differently. There are now divergences about understanding naturalism, and what it truly is. There are different kinds of naturalism, like Ontological Naturalism, and Methodological Naturalism. No matter the kind, Naturalism's platform is still that reality is nature, and intelligence is using only experience and science.
http://www.naturalisms.org/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/naturalism/
Naturalism was a literary movement that happened from the 1880's to the 1940's. This form of Naturalism used realism to explain that heredity and social conditions had a huge force in shaping a humans character. Instead of Romanticism or Surrealism, this literary movement seeked to replicate a believable, everyday reality. Romanticism literature had highly supernatural and symbolic content. Naturalistic writings often contain harsh realities, like disease, corruption, sexuality, poverty, and racism. Naturalistic writers were often criticized for writing on "taboo" subjects for that time. Many Naturalist writers were pessimistic, and often wrote about the hardships in life that they believed couldn't be changed. Naturalism is an extension of realism, meaning the writings didn't "sugar coat" stories and make them seem like fairy tales. Most writings weren't uplifting, and their authors weren't the happiest people.
http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/natural.htm
The below video is a great description of different forms of literature in this era!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcNxjXS5XVA
In Jack London's writings, his characters are forced to deal with the everyday hardships of life. Many of his stories are forced to be labeled under "Naturalism", because he spoke about the cold, hard truth. His Naturalist writings were not restricted to only Gold Rush tales. In his semi-autobiographical works, he exposed issues like poverty and abuses of power. His work influenced a generation of American Naturalists, who aspired to tell authentic stories about the realities of American society. All in all, I believe that I was able to answer my question, "What exactly IS Naturalism?", through my research.
