Ysabella Nicole R.

Cruz
SCI 10-N

Human Ways: Chaos and Fractals

We are all selfish beings.

That is one of my theories of this worldcynical, yes, but it helps me pick out the
honest friends from the not so nice ones.
My misanthropic Hobbesian outlook aside, I always try to make sense of everything
around me. My mind relentlessly probes into deeper truths, and I find myself philosophizing
even in the shower.
All that there is in this world is chaos. And our little human mindsthat of scientists
and even of regular people like metry to come up with the best framework for the world so
we could understand everything absolutely, to see the world as it purely is. But what if thats
all there is? What if gazing at nature in all its chaos, is the omega of our understanding?
Poincar and Mandelbrot did not seem to think so. Through their genius works, they
have opened greater portals of comprehension and deeper wells of knowledge. Poincar laid
the foundation for chaos theory and proved that we cannot remain one-track minded
individuals, resting on Newtons laurels as if they were the be-all and end-all. The universe is
dynamic and so perplexingly designed that no linear equation or one-sentence theory can ever
capture its essence. Mandelbrot, on the other hand, set the stage for a geometric approach to
understanding the visuals around us through fractals. Through his contribution, we are now
able to see how details actually belong to one big picture.
But what do these things imply for us in these modern times? With so many riveting
phenomena (I mean, isnt social media just so stressful?), how can the works of Poincar and
Mandelbrot give us clarity in modernity?
First, I think that the concept of self-similarity can be applied to the modern mans
tendency to make himself relevant. Case in point, think of the millennial and his or her
attempts at curating a unified digital persona. Across all his/her social media accounts, you
will find a single voice and a signature aesthetic (especially when it comes to Instagram), and
its all kept up-to-date (references to the latest TV shows, perhaps?). Its as if everyone on the
digital sphere were a celebrity, whose persona one can find in the smallest nook of the
internet to a larger community such as Facebook. Aside from such individualistic culture,
entrepreneurs and even media have been on this self-similarity wave. Firms do so by tying
their brand to a larger picture of society so that they stay relevant. An example would be
campus tours done by magazines such as Scout and brands such as Nescafe. Their
individuality (or the details) are seen at a small scale, and even at a larger scale.
Next, both the sciences of chaos and fractals prove that at times, disorder is in fact,
order. A healthy EEG, the structure of a nerve cell, the branches of a tree, and even a
blossoming flower, are chaotic in its most natural state. Can we use the same theory to
question the present times? Put into the spotlight events such as the Duterte administration,
extrajudicial killings, and the death penalty bill, and this theory wont seem so attractive after
all. In these pressing times, can chaos stand as order? Well, I think that the chaos theory
cannot be applied to political and societal conflictbecause how can any type of conflict be
goodespecially when life is at hand? And so, I believe that such a paradigm can be used for
understanding human nature in general, the natural ebb and flow of things. Two people
meeting for the first time, a family getting together for lunch with the sun shining and the
clouds rolling by, the cry of a newborn baby, the sound of the traffic jam at EDSA, the ache
of a first heartbreak: these things make up our idea of life, and we can never deny the beauty
of such an order.
Surely, Poincar and Mandelbrot knew just how crazy this world is for them to conjure
up non-linear catchall theories. But with the unpredictability of this universe, why should we
still pursue stringing things into theories? Well, its in our culture. Were autonomous human
beings capable of thought, and sometimes, our relentless selves just need to get a grip on
reality. Scientists knew that we had an insatiable thirst for making sense of the world, and
their theories have truly captured that. Science is interwoven into the very fabric of our
understanding, and its not all about statistics and big words. The chaos theory and the
concept of fractals prove to even make our understanding of our world more simplified
because now, we have an avenue to translate our radical insights.
Through our attempts of putting order into chaoswhether its in our relationships,
work, or our inner selvesmaybe, just maybe, were a few steps closer to singling out what
this world really means for us.
Sodo I think that people are still selfish beings? Perhaps. But philosophys another
story.

Biblography
Nova. (1989). The Strange New Science of Chaos. [Online]. Available:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUsePzlOmxw
Nova. (2011). Fractals: Hunting the Hidden Dimension. [Online]. Available:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s65DSz78jW4
TED. (2010). Benoit Mandelbrot: Fractals and The Art of Roughness. [Online]. Available:
https://www.ted.com/talks/benoit_mandelbrot_fractals_the_art_of_roughness