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https://theconversation.com/mandelbrots-fractals-are-not-only-gorgeous-they-taught-mathematicians-how-to-model-the-real-world-244302>
"At the beginning of my third year at university studying mathematics, I
spotted an announcement. A visiting professor from Canada would be giving a
mini-course of ten lectures on a subject called complex dynamics.
It happened to be a difficult time for me. On paper, I was a very good student
with an average of over 90%, but in reality I was feeling very uncertain. It
was time for us to choose a branch of mathematics in which to specialise, but I
hadn’t connected to any of the subjects so far; they all felt too technical and
dry.
So I decided to take a chance on the mini-course. As soon as it started, I was
captured by the startling beauty of the patterns that emerged from the
mathematics. These were a relatively recent discovery, we learned; nothing like
them had existed before the 1980s.
They were thanks to the maverick French-American mathematician Benoit
Mandelbrot, who came up with them in an attempt to visualise this field – with
help from some powerful computers at the IBM TJ Watson Research Center in
upstate New York.
A fractal – the term he derived from the Latin word
fractus, meaning “broken”
or “fragmented” – is a geometric shape that can be divided into smaller parts
which are each a scaled copy of the whole. They are a visual representation of
the fact that even a process with the simplest mathematical model can
demonstrate complex and intricate behaviour at all scales."
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
