Nova Television aired a program tonight called
Hunting the Hidden Dimension
Tuesday, August 18 at 8 pm
Mysteriously beautiful fractals are shaking up the world of mathematics and deepening our understanding of nature
I watched this and it was pretty cool, all about math, geometry, fractals and fractal art. The geometry scientist named Mandelbrot discovered ways of using repeating and developing patterns in math equations to create images. The images reflect the equation and also become surprisingly beautiful works of art.
In a previous post about the a 1960’s to ’70’s photo collection I had mentioned the beautiful art used throughout the book. It turns out much of it was based on fractal images. These were big in the 1970’s and have become part of our shared image culture. That was cool, but we’re just getting started.
You know that one of my favorite authors is Terry Pratchett and the show reminded me of one of his books, Interesting Times. The main character is a failed wizard named Rhincewind who gets into all kinds of misadventures and has perfected the solution to dealing bad situations; run. Run fast, run hard, and never look back. Interesting Times isn’t the first book that Rhincewind occupies but in this one he’s in the Discworld equivalent of China, running from Imperial guards and trying to keep his intestines coiled inside his own abdomen. Pratchett uses lots of ideas from fractal math, including the Mandelbrot butterfly. The what? The Mandelbrot butter…it’s like this.
If it’s true that a coastline cannot be measured accurately because of the fractal length of the actual shore, dividing into ever smaller units until infinity, then the same could be true of a butterfly’s wings. Now, if a butterfly has wings that are of an infinite size, due to fractal measurements and the theories of Professor Mandelbrot, what would be the effect of the weather when the butterfly flutters its wings? Could said butterfly create a hurricane-force wind by this fluttering action?
Yes, it could, if it lives in Discworld and is anywhere near Rhincewind. Find out how Rincewind manages to save the day, the people of the Counterweight Continent, and far more importantly – (at least according to Rhincewind) -himself.
Look for Interesting Times by Terry Pratchett, published by Harper, and available online and at any Borders. If you haven’t read anything by Sir Pratchett yet, run, drive, or skate to the nearest bookseller and treat yourself to one of the funniest and smartest writers alive today. Really, go now.
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