In the Wake of Chaos: Unpredictable Order in Dynamical Systems

by Stephen H. Kellert

Chaos theory has captured scientific and popular attention. What began as the discovery of randomness in simple physical systems has become a widespread fascination with "chaotic" models of everything from business cycles to brainwaves to heart attacks. But what exactly does this explosion of new research into chaotic phenomena mean for our understanding of the world? In this timely book, Stephen Kellert takes the first sustained look at the broad intellectual and philosophical questions raised by recent advances in chaos theory—its implications for science as a source of knowledge and for the very meaning of that knowledge itself.

Genres: Science, Philosophy, Mathematics, Nonfiction, Empiricism

190 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 1993

Reviews

[Todd Decker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kellert examines the challenges that a deterministic view of the world faces in light of chaos and quantum theory. After a brief overview of chaos theory, he starts to describe its impact upon our ability to predict systems. This leads into the challenges presented to the traditional scientific view of the world as being deterministic--like a movie where if one knows the current state of a system and all the applicable laws of nature than one can know the state of the system at any time in the future or past just by working through the differential equations. He then explores how this lack of determinism leads to a new view of how we identify if we "understand" something. Finally, he examines the biases in science that led us to systematically ignore research into chaotic systems.

Despite being a small book, Kellert's writing style is dense and verbose. He approaches the dialog from a vary formal thesis statements approach where he introduces each chapter, outlines each section, re-introduces the segment, summarizes the segment, than summarizes the chapter. Not that this is a 'bad' approach, but it can be tedious. Kellert often takes three or four sentences to say what could be put more elegantly into a single one.

Overall, I would still recommend this book to anyone who reads about chaos theory and then questions the overall implications. Also, it is perfect ammunition for anyone working with traditional scientists who want everything to be put into a neatly wrapped box with a nice tidy bow.

[Konrad Joseph · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boooooooooring