Chaos Theory


It is exceptionally difficult for me to even attempt to try to introduce the Chaos theory and successfully have the reader automatically understand how it ties in. So, for starters, here is a little bit about what the Chaos theory has to offer:

 

"The name "chaos theory" comes from the fact that the systems that the theory describes are apparently disordered, but chaos theory is really about finding the underlying order in apparently random data.

The first true experimenter in chaos was a meteorologist, named Edward Lorenz. In 1960, he was working on the problem of weather prediction. He had a computer set up, with a set of twelve equations to model the weather. It didn't predict the weather itself. However this computer program did theoretically predict what the weather might be.

One day in 1961, he wanted to see a particular sequence again. To save time, he started in the middle of the sequence, instead of the beginning. He entered the number off his printout and left to let it run.

When he came back an hour later, the sequence had evolved differently. Instead of the same pattern as before, it diverged from the pattern, ending up wildly different from the original. (See figure 1.) Eventually he figured out what happened. The computer stored the numbers to six decimal places in its memory. To save paper, he only had it print out three decimal places. In the original sequence, the number was .506127, and he had only typed the first three digits, .506.

This phenomenon, common to chaos theory, is also known as sensitive dependence on initial conditions. Just a small change in the initial conditions can drastically change the long-term behavior of a system. Such a small amount of difference in a measurement might be considered experimental noise, background noise, or an inaccuracy of the equipment 

The flapping of a single butterfly's wing today produces a tiny change in the state of the atmosphere. Over a period of time, what the atmosphere actually does diverges from what it would have done. So, in a month's time, a tornado that would have devastated the Indonesian coast doesn't happen. Or maybe one that wasn't going to happen, does."

 

To sum it up, it is a theory that argues that everything that happens affects everything else that follows that event. Basically it states that everything anyone does is connected to everything else in life. So how exactly does this tie into the baby boom and how my generation and I came to be? Well it has EVERYTHING to do with ANTHING! For starters, had the baby boom not occured none of us would exist at all. Everyone from the age of, oh say, 40 and younger, today, would not exist. This idea can, and is taken so far back that it becomes a conecpt that most people cannot even grab. ALL of everything you and I know is a result of, not the baby boom, but world war II. So, unwillingly, we can thanks Germany. Or you may argue that we can thank Japan for bombing Pearl Harbor. Or perhaps the U.S. government at that time for deciding to go to war. Who knows who to blame/thank? According to this theory, we can thank an amish man in pennsylvania for coughing in his sleep on the night of July 17th, 1930. Because as stated, anything anyone does affects even matters that have nothing to do with that person. Its wild!!!

It was the choice of the fashion world of 1946 and on to create what they did and sell what they made to our parents. It was the choice of the soldiers and their significant others to create so many children. It was the choice of my parents to decide to start a family of their own. All of this leaves me in my own situation which is very similar to so many others my age, older then me, younger then me, deceased, unborn, foreign, local, male or female etc. This choice is, how are we going to create a generation of our own, and how will this generation be affected? Will our kids wear Converse, and skinny jeans, or will something new be created and out sense of style be considered outdated? Will they cherish alternative rock bands of the 20th and 21st century or will they move on to the bands of their own age? You may argue that the choice is ours. the chaos theory states otherwise!