[OT] Chaos Theory [was Re: Benefit and belief]

[Steven D'Aprano]

By the way, who removed the OT label from the subject line? Please don't
unless it actually comes back on topic.


DevPlayer wrote:

> I still assert that contradiction is caused by narrow perspective.

There's no doubt that some *apparent* contradictions are caused by lack of
correct information. But:

N is an even number;
N (the same N, for avoidance of doubt) is an odd number

is still a contradiction, no matter how you look at it.

[...]
> If I am correct; not sure here; but I think that is part of the new
> math Choas theory. (The notion that not all variables are known and
> the results of well defined functions may result in completely
> different actual outcomes) [Missing variables in such data sets and
> functions, to me is basically a narrow(er) perspective of the all the
> revelent factors for such computations.]

Chaos theory goes back to Henri Poincaré in the 1880s, and possibly even
older. 130 years is hardly "new".

The principle of Chaos Theory is not that there are some unknown variables,
but that even if you know all the variables, even the slightest error or
uncertainty in their values may lead to radically different results in the
future.

As so often is the case, something which seemed controversial when first
proposed is actually quite obvious. Sometimes errors cancel, and a small
uncertainty doesn't make any difference in the final result; sometimes
errors add, and a small uncertainty increases to a large uncertainty in the
final result; and sometimes errors multiply, and a small uncertainty can
add to a huge uncertainty. Opposition to this idea was not based on
mathematics, logic or common sense, but on the idea that God and/or Nature
would not be so cruel as to allow errors to multiply.

Or in other words, "if this were true, it would be unfortunate, therefore it
can't be true". The story of Mankind, really.



-- 
Steven