Ths BBC video I feel is excellent at describing mainstream thinking on this issue: "The secret Life of Chaos" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6NnCOs20GQ care to discuss?
That order arises out of chaos and returns to chaos seems to be a logical path for a system in which energy is neither created or destroyed, merely transformed.
yet the video clearly demonstrated chaos arising out of order... which I realise is contra to the intent of the demonstration. The point I guess that I am currently exploring and have been doing so for some time [5 years now] is that chaos can not exist with out an inherent order underpinning it nor can order exist with out chaos. Essentially this means that Chaos logically [ human mind logic] is actually not chaos at all but has the appearance of such only. "He waves his lighted match in a video feedback loop" to demonstrate: infinite reductionism: the smaller you get in your observations the more information needed to make predictions...etc At what point does the reduction become ridiculously complicated? My answeris: always has been. But for the sake of human certitude we gloss over the variables and claim a finite solution when only an infinite (reduction) solution is possible. eh...anyways just chatting... Example: take 1 milion digits of pi and look at them and you see chaos of numbers, digits. Yet every one of those numbers is part of an order called Pi.
Perhaps 'order' is how our brain makes sense of 'chaos'? Underpinning everything we observe, all is comprised of this chaos, yet our brain is constantly seeking patterns and points of reference for the data that we receive by means of our senses. All order returns to chaos and vice versa. How do we determine which is the 'starting point'? :shrug: It's another chicken and egg riddle to me. I'm just an observer, dropping in a post until some of the more profound thinkers decide to swing by. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Yes in a sense I believe you are correct when you say that the human mind is "addicted" to seeking order out of chaos...most philosophers would agree I think. The issue of the chicken and the egg though is typical of what I call "time linea" thinking and the rejection of paradox which is also a part of human nature in support of finding "value and meaning" in it's existance. Neither the chicken nor the egg came first IMO as they occur simultaneously however the paradox requires time or "change" to resolve the impossibility so our time linea approach to things is well justified. Chaos and order existing simlutaneously yet as stated earlier my opinon is that it is always order [due to the contancy of the universal constant - Gravity]
I can't comment on the video, since i'm not in a position to watch videos at the moment. But addressing the subject line: Perhaps not everthing that happens is determined by some law of nature. And/or perhaps the laws that do govern a kind of event are simply probabilistic, as may or may not be the case with some aspects of quantum mechanics. And there's that whole chaos-theory thing. Simple functions can generate infinite complexity. Complexity that might well seem completely random to anyone who doesn't happen to be aware of the generating function. A lot of it is non-linear, where even infinitesimal differences in x might be associated with huge differences in f(x). Add in the possibility that many physical variables might not be precisly defined in some physical situations (qm's uncertainty principle), and a possible route to real physical chaos potentially opens up.
Order from Chaos is the 13th ball in Newtons kissing problem. The order is the fact that all of the balls are the same size. The chaos is the fact that they leave a gap for the 13th ball which can never be fitted. If you think of Space-Time as a same sized grain, then you have this 13th ball problem. The gap will move around. The gap will create an area of least resistance. You will get chaos from order. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kissing_number_problem
. . . it's a Yin vs Yang sort of thing . . . . duality of the universe . . . yes vs no . . . up vs down . . . . etc.
Assuming that you mean the video linked to in the first post, where and how did it demonstrate chaos arising out of order?
Chaos and order coexist when any substance is turning from liquid to solid or vice versa. Take water. The water as ice is more ordered than the water as water. But as the water becomes ice it releases heat, so the total amount of disorder in the universe is increased rather than decreased. (Please correct me if I have got this wrong) Question. Gravity also increases order. Because of it we are all on the surface of a solid sphere, rather than floating about randomly in space. An object acting under gravity releases heat as friction. But does it also release heat in the same way that water becoming ice does?
Seems things we don't understand are many times chaotic but things we tend to understand are in order.
Re post 10. As an item is drawn into earth's gravitational pull, there should be an output of heat to compensate for the decrease in entropy. There is probably a name for that heat. What is it? Added later. Thinking about it, that is why large bodies get hot enough to start fusion. When things get closer together, the pressure increases and they will release heat. It doesn't matter what the reason is. I've answered my own question. Thanks CK!
Perhaps our perception of chaos is due to information overload? Our brain seeks patterns and order and we are comforted when we can 'make sense of it all' or even just a temporary respite from having our senses assailed 24/7 every day of our life. We absolutely require a rest period to process the information of the day and to all our body to perform healing/growing functions. Order requires constant maintenance, a use of energy, and once that maintenance is withdrawn, order returns to chaos as it's energy is reabsorbed and eventually redeployed. The universe is on a scale beyond current ability to measure, and if it is expanding, even that task may be forever beyond our ability to perform. I would suggest that it is this scale that creates a sense of chaos where there is an underlying order. Because our brains seek patterns, we look for order and then extrapolate that anything we cannot perceive as a pattern is chaos. It may be the other way around, that chaos IS the pattern, yet on a scale too large for us to assimilate and so our brain has tricked us by mirroring the information. We see order as arising from chaos when perhaps 'order' is the anomaly and that chaos is just order on the ultimate scale.
there is just this annoying detail called senses and awareness. if only we didn't have that, then we wouldn't need to care about listening to them. evidently, it matters for some reason. the question is why it matters and something we can't answer. why is there constructs in nature that are constantly trying to retain a certain order and we feel it when it's not in contextual order? i mean, we're all gonna die anyways, so why is nature trying to keep us alive by causing us pain? seems it wants to keep a certain order even if it's temporary. but why?
True. It is we who choose to conceptualize and categorize the environment around us as 'order' or 'disorder' (chaos). Why? Is it important to our survival? Is this a genetic trait? I think it matters because of 'the domino effect'. Nature (the universe, what have you) appears to be a vast system of constant flux. Which organisms currently hold sway is dependent upon the underlying integration and to change even a small detail of that 'order' can begin one or more chain reactions of change, each cascading another chain of events. Change is entirely predictable, because that IS THE ORDER within chaos, but the precise nature of the change is impossible to predict because of the number of variables involved. (Thought image, the universe as a multidimensional blackboard, upon which every conceivable formula is presently being described and ascribed simultaneously.) The chance of a lifetime, in a lifetime of chance...... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Cool video, and you are correct. The distinction between chaos and order is more subjective than objective. We call something "chaotic" when it is not predictable to humans. We call something orderly when it is predictable to humans. So, if the distinguishing factor is human cognitive limitation then the words "chaos" and "order" probably don't point to a real objective phenomenon.
he went from what appeared to be orderly to what appeared to be chaotic yet to me he demonstartated how both are actually simultaneous and occur depending on what perspective you take. [ he necessarilly uses a sequential method of demonstrating something that is simultaneous IMO]
