Butterfly - The Secret Life Of Chaos, The Laws of Nature and the Power of Evolution

This awesome documentary shows that evolution is not merely a theory for life: It's a universal law of nature that seems intrinsically linked not only to biology but to the very mathematical laws of reality and nature. They really cover everything you need to know about modern science in a very easy to understand way.

They end with a very interesting program, in which they program random chaotic events to evolve (failures die, successes live and flourish) which ends up with completely unique virtual creatures evolving, which evolve to carry out unique actions and contain unique traits that they could have had no way of predicting from the original source code.

Chaos in a nutshell: Very simple rules or equations with nothing random in them, in which they are completely determined can have outcomes that are entirely unpredictable, without any outside influence.

Watch the documentary here on put-locker

(The BBC has taken the rather unusual step of banning the upload of this particular documentary from you-tube, even though it's a BBC4 program and purely educational)

Centuries of scientific certainty dissolved in just a few short years.

The truth of the clockwork universe turned out to be just an illusion.

Something which had seemed a logical certainty revealed itself merely as an act of faith.

And worse, the truth had been staring us in the face all the time.

Because Chaos, is everywhere.

Nice thread OP. See my quote? ;-) Been my favorite quote for years.

reply to post by ZeuZZ


Chaos is inevitably followed by drive. -Americanist

reply to post by ZeuZZ


Half way through, just wanted to say that it's a real shame what the court did to Turing. He should have gone to prison and continued his work. :shk:

ETA: I don't mean he deserved to go to prison. I just mean it would have been the lesser of 2 evils...

reply to post by ZeuZZ


It is a very good documentary.

What is beautiful about life is that it is constantly in a flux of change and transmutation, and that, if only people would abandon the need to control and maintain order, through ritualised practices, they would find that this is what forms the basis of all spirituality. The living in the moment, because one cannot predict what is around the corner, because there are an infinite set of variables that contribute to create an equally infinite set of possible futures. That, of course, applies to the micro and the macro.

You might find the following link interesting...

www.chaordic.org...

It is a fascinating concept, that we, as humans, rather than attempt to construct order from the chaos, as a means of attempting to control nature, we instead allow chaos to find it's own order, and therefore retain the dynamism and survivalism, that is inherent in the natural world.

Originally posted by BiliverdinWhat is beautiful about life is that it is constantly in a flux of change and transmutation, and that, if only people would abandon the need to control and maintain order, through ritualised practices, they would find that this is what forms the basis of all spirituality. The living in the moment, because one cannot predict what is around the corner, because there are an infinite set of variables that contribute to create an equally infinite set of possible futures. That, of course, applies to the micro and the macro.

You might like my upload, or the thread I started on this topic:



We have a lot more control over these micro and macro phenomenon than we realize.

reply to post by ZeuZZ


Thank you for posting this Zeuz! I always enjoy finding new material relating to this topic.

I think you and anyone else interested in this thread enjoy a few threads a shared a few years ago on this very topic.

The Future is Coming: Part 1

When speaking of evolution, we cannot forget the very universe itself and matter. The universe is composed of opposing forces and systems which interact over to attempt to reach equilibrium.

The evolution of matter is also an important topic. Matter was formed over time different stages and increasing complexity. At first the universe was to hot to be anything but plasma. and then over time, orbital and atomic structures began to form. Initially there was only hydrogen and helium and maybe trace elements of lithium?. But most of the elements after the first two elements were fused in mass in stars.

And then you have to consider the chemical makeup of planets. Over time millions of chemical interactions are going on which change the chemical composition of a planet. This molecular evolution is controlled by variables such as the current stability of molecules, their ability to interact with other molecules (nothing evolves in isolation), and the most important factor would be a chemicals ability to replicate itself. Each of these factors (among others) help determine the environment.
Self replication + random "mutations" in chemical structures is key, and im sure you can all assume why.



Chemical Evolution
Nucleosynthesis
Abiogenesis

This topic get a whole lot more interesting in this second thread.

Why the Universe may be a Computer afterall: Genetic Algorithms, Cellular Automata, and Rule 110

While researching binary cellular automata, Prof. Wolfram discovered a very interesting rule, rule 110.


There are 4 classes of cellular automata.

class 1 - produces basic checkerboard patterns
class 2 - produces arbitrarily spaces streaks
class 3 - starts to become more interesting as recognizable features such as triangles appear in the pattern in random order

class 4 - the most famous example being Rule 110. This one however produced the "aha experience". and resulted in wolfram dedicating over a decade to this topic. Class 4 rules produce surprisingly complex patterns that do not repeat themselves. We see in them many different types of artifacts however the pattern is neither regular nor completely random; it appears to have some order but is never predictable.

Why is this important? Keep in mind we began with the simplest starting point: a single black cell. the process involves repetitive application of a very simple rule. From such a basic rule we see complex and interesting features that shows some order and apparent intelligence. Localized structures appear and interact in various complicated-looking ways

Wolfram makes the following point repeatedly: "whenever a phenomena is encountered that seems complex it is taken almost for granted that the phenomenon must be the result of of some underlying mechanism that is itself complex. By my discovery that simple programs can produce great complexity makes it clear that this is not in fact correct.

The universe is more mysterious than we understand!

Good thread OP and I hope my input spawns further discussion!