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Chaos Fractals and Self Organisation
184 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 10, 2019
Book's Title: Chaos, Fractals and Self Organisation
Author: Arvind Kumar
The author Arvind Kumar sums it so well "In some small corners of physical reality, we now know, perhaps a little better, what it is that we do not know." The new myths created or being continued in linear science (as non existence of linear science was the myth in classical science for 4 centuries almost!) seems to me to be regarding the "deterministic laws of evolution/ assisted bifurcations assisting morphogenesis". I mean, C'mon! The whole book is basically the author repeating how random and numerous the possibilities are. How totally irregular, how unpredictable and chancey the outcomes and results are at a local level in Physics and Chemistry itself let alone in a highly complex biological phenomena like morphogenesis!! Then to backtrack later that morphogenesis is so predictable because of perfect conditions-That seems very arrogant. More like wishful thinking of a cover up for insufficient, hollow or expired neo-Darwinistic theories in face of emerging Chaos science.
Linear sciences is definitely a younger science than the four century old classical Physics. My school Physics always focused on the Giants- Maxwell, Einstein, Newton and Schrodinger etc. But Benoit Mandlebrot, Mitchell Feigenbaum, Robert May, Edward Lorenz, Henri Poincare definitely deserved a mention and more.
Its a highly captivating book; any time I felt my attention slipping there was an extremely interesting insight into real life phenomena.
Now I stand corrected that chaos is not random noise. All one needs to verify a chaotic system is after constructing a suitable phase state look out for any steady states(strange attractors).lol. Chaos is the philosophy of nature found in simple and complex systems alike in their complex behavior. Chaos is locally unstable but globally stable. Unpredictability and different results from same initial conditions and deterministic laws is CHAOS. ex. precarious Butterfly effect, capricious weather forecasts, swaying unrestricted movement of pendula, erratic insect population, leaking of a tap and earth's random reversing of magnetic polarisation.
Fractals are objects or spatial irregular and kinky shapes which can only be seen from afar(never see the forest for the trees)/"in scale" scientifically put. Irregular coastlines, jagged mountains, bronchial network in respiratory systems, white noise in call transmissions, tectonic plates and weathering of rocks, earthquakes small or big, snowflakes, canyons and clouds, clusters in radiation in metals or in gossip are all FRACTALS.
A Good read!
Author: Arvind Kumar
The author Arvind Kumar sums it so well "In some small corners of physical reality, we now know, perhaps a little better, what it is that we do not know." The new myths created or being continued in linear science (as non existence of linear science was the myth in classical science for 4 centuries almost!) seems to me to be regarding the "deterministic laws of evolution/ assisted bifurcations assisting morphogenesis". I mean, C'mon! The whole book is basically the author repeating how random and numerous the possibilities are. How totally irregular, how unpredictable and chancey the outcomes and results are at a local level in Physics and Chemistry itself let alone in a highly complex biological phenomena like morphogenesis!! Then to backtrack later that morphogenesis is so predictable because of perfect conditions-That seems very arrogant. More like wishful thinking of a cover up for insufficient, hollow or expired neo-Darwinistic theories in face of emerging Chaos science.
Linear sciences is definitely a younger science than the four century old classical Physics. My school Physics always focused on the Giants- Maxwell, Einstein, Newton and Schrodinger etc. But Benoit Mandlebrot, Mitchell Feigenbaum, Robert May, Edward Lorenz, Henri Poincare definitely deserved a mention and more.
Its a highly captivating book; any time I felt my attention slipping there was an extremely interesting insight into real life phenomena.
Now I stand corrected that chaos is not random noise. All one needs to verify a chaotic system is after constructing a suitable phase state look out for any steady states(strange attractors).lol. Chaos is the philosophy of nature found in simple and complex systems alike in their complex behavior. Chaos is locally unstable but globally stable. Unpredictability and different results from same initial conditions and deterministic laws is CHAOS. ex. precarious Butterfly effect, capricious weather forecasts, swaying unrestricted movement of pendula, erratic insect population, leaking of a tap and earth's random reversing of magnetic polarisation.
Fractals are objects or spatial irregular and kinky shapes which can only be seen from afar(never see the forest for the trees)/"in scale" scientifically put. Irregular coastlines, jagged mountains, bronchial network in respiratory systems, white noise in call transmissions, tectonic plates and weathering of rocks, earthquakes small or big, snowflakes, canyons and clouds, clusters in radiation in metals or in gossip are all FRACTALS.
A Good read!
January 14, 2020
I had bought the book at the National Book Trust's stall at the New Delhi World Book Fair, 2020. The book is very cheap considering its contents. NBT also gives a 10% discount. The content of the book was new to me. I must say that the author has done an extremely good job in bringing an entirely esoteric subject before the common reader. Although the topic of Chaos and Fractals have been handled very well, the end topics which are concerned with Self Organisation and Complexity seem less organised and too complex. Topics such as the Logistic Function, the Prigogine principle have been very well explained with suitable examples. NBT should do more work to publicize such publications in the field of Popular Science.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews