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Deep Simplicity: Bringing Order to Chaos and Complexity
by
Over the past two decades, no field of scientific inquiry has had a more striking impact across a wide array of disciplines–from biology to physics, computing to meteorology–than that known as chaos and complexity, the study of complex systems. Now astrophysicist John Gribbin draws on his expertise to explore, in prose that communicates not only the wonder but the substanc
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Hardcover, 279 pages
Published
April 5th 2005
by Random House
(first published 2004)
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Start your review of Deep Simplicity: Bringing Order to Chaos and Complexity

This book is about chaos and complexity, how the interaction of simple rules can result in complex behavior.
The first quarter of the book is a remarkably readable history of math. Starting with Galileo and moving forward to modern times, Gribbin mentions most of the major discoveries that led to the modern understanding of chaos. I was very much looking forward to the rest of the book after finishing this second chapter.
Unfortunately the rest of the book was a minor disappointment. Without a his ...more
The first quarter of the book is a remarkably readable history of math. Starting with Galileo and moving forward to modern times, Gribbin mentions most of the major discoveries that led to the modern understanding of chaos. I was very much looking forward to the rest of the book after finishing this second chapter.
Unfortunately the rest of the book was a minor disappointment. Without a his ...more

Aug 17, 2018
Nyamka Ganni
is currently reading it
I don't really get why this book is not popular enough! This is amazing!!
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I have read a few John Gribbin books and loved them all. His book about quantum theory, 'In Search of Schrödinger's Cat', is a classic. I have had 'Deep Simplicity' with me for a long time. I thought it was time to take it out and read it for 'Science September'.
In 'Deep Simplicity', John Gribbin talks about Chaos theory. I remember during my student days one of my classmates was reading about it and he was planning to apply it in his research on business cycles. I don't know whether he was able ...more
In 'Deep Simplicity', John Gribbin talks about Chaos theory. I remember during my student days one of my classmates was reading about it and he was planning to apply it in his research on business cycles. I don't know whether he was able ...more

Noted science writer, John Gribbin, is on to a little known aspect of science related to chaos theory and self-organized complexity that is the basis of life and other complex systems. The book is organized as to be helpful for the initiate, and is a good attempt to bring this new concept into the public domain. Mathematics breaks down when the systems move from simple shapes or manipulations to complex objects and repetitive interactions begin on a large scale. Future states of such systems can
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This was my first Gribbin and the first few chapters made me regret not reading him before: a delightful historical summary of our theories for gravity and thermodynamics with patiently explained mathematics, accompanied by a careful discussion of determinism – a real page-turner.
The latter part of the book however didn't live up to my expectations – especially the way he handles the issue of life, endorsing a metabolism-first approach without explaining how RNA-DNA integrated into it, and not l ...more
The latter part of the book however didn't live up to my expectations – especially the way he handles the issue of life, endorsing a metabolism-first approach without explaining how RNA-DNA integrated into it, and not l ...more

Still reading the book. My opinion of the book is imperfect but I worry that James Gleick's Chaos was a better presentation. Gribbin does dig up a lot of historical facts to piece together a story, however, most is partisan to the old world. It's a useful book on complexity or chaos science... This is a more accessible book compared with others out there. As bonus, it's not pretentious.
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Bought many years ago and day on the shelf as I don't read many hardbacks. Finally got round to this though and glad I did. 4 stars as some parts are fairly dry and, even in their simple form, are helped out by a bit of a background in maths and other theory.
But there are some points in here which absolutely blew me away, and indeed changed my life. The emergence of order, of systems (planetary, life, intelligence etc) and its *inevitability* turned my world on its head.
So a must read if you're ...more
But there are some points in here which absolutely blew me away, and indeed changed my life. The emergence of order, of systems (planetary, life, intelligence etc) and its *inevitability* turned my world on its head.
So a must read if you're ...more

There are some rare texts that invite your thinking and even challenge it one step ahead of what you contemplate . Assorting complex dimensions round one self directed by the existence of physics in ones life the author has done great justice in thought provoking chapters well gardened for novice and advanced readers . As of now it has entered in my shelf of all time favourite and will analyse its content once I read few more books . Must for thinkers

Overall good book:
- Some parts are too long
- author jumps around a lot (though I guess that's expected given the topic)
- main point of the book is fascinating, I'm curious to see where this research goes in the future, especially regarding the origin of life ...more
- Some parts are too long
- author jumps around a lot (though I guess that's expected given the topic)
- main point of the book is fascinating, I'm curious to see where this research goes in the future, especially regarding the origin of life ...more

Interesting and mind-stretching though the material is, this book suffers from some British Academic Stuffiness that made my eyes glaze over time and again. Gribbin tries to make the underlying science accessible, but there's a bar there that even I couldn't quite hurdle over. This book could have used a more populist editor, I think, to trim the fat of biographical trivia, hair-splitting details that don't affect the larger ideas, and over-engineered sentences that run on and barely hold up und
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This book took me a lot of focus to be able to finish it. So much information from evolution, computer science (Turing machine), cosmology...etc.
It starts from the chaos, thanks to the chaos with patterns, everything follow the law of physics in a predictable way: power law. Earthquakes, economic..,etc. What caught my eyes in this book was about the connection of Alan Turing and evolution on animal fur/ skin color patterns.
"In fact, one overarching theory of how biological patterns form comes ...more
It starts from the chaos, thanks to the chaos with patterns, everything follow the law of physics in a predictable way: power law. Earthquakes, economic..,etc. What caught my eyes in this book was about the connection of Alan Turing and evolution on animal fur/ skin color patterns.
"In fact, one overarching theory of how biological patterns form comes ...more

Sep 04, 2017
Sagar Acharya
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Science admirers and investors
Recommended to Sagar by:
Charlie Munger
In an excellent non-mathematical language, John goes on to explain the prerequisites required to understand life generating systems.
He explains power law on how positive feedback loops give exponential function equivalents in real life, fractals, some very important entities to understand complexity generating out of simplicity, evolution to show how today's life forms have been created by simple changing factors and shows the real life examples to understand complexity with simplicity. He also ...more
He explains power law on how positive feedback loops give exponential function equivalents in real life, fractals, some very important entities to understand complexity generating out of simplicity, evolution to show how today's life forms have been created by simple changing factors and shows the real life examples to understand complexity with simplicity. He also ...more

It took me a long time to read this book, mainly reading small sections and intermittently. Not necessarily an easy read, but full of fascinating ideas and covering in effect the broadest possible spectrum of life, the universe and everything. For me it’s another book which I know I’m likely to read again. What’s more I’m sure I’ll get even more from it the next time I read it. The principle theme is initially difficult to grasp, but once the penny drops I think you have a ‘aha’ moment (or proba
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I was familiar with the history of chaos theory from Gleick's "Chaos", and Stewart's "Does God Play Dice". I think that Gribbin did a good brisk summary of that subject while adding some interesting details. I much preferred the second half, on complex systems, self-organisation and life. There was some really interesting material about toy network models of global ecology. However, as a non-chemist, I would have like to have had a more detailed explanation of thermodynamic disequilibria and the
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This reading is delightful and eye opening.
From Newton’s gravity to Darwin’s natural selection, the book breaks down the three layers of any problem: the apparent simplicity in the surface, the complexity going deeper and then the simple rules which built the complexity.
The variety of fields studied make this book about something more than science. The planetary system, gas thermodynamics, fractals everywhere in nature and society and on the emergency of life itself. The book also discuss a bit ...more
From Newton’s gravity to Darwin’s natural selection, the book breaks down the three layers of any problem: the apparent simplicity in the surface, the complexity going deeper and then the simple rules which built the complexity.
The variety of fields studied make this book about something more than science. The planetary system, gas thermodynamics, fractals everywhere in nature and society and on the emergency of life itself. The book also discuss a bit ...more

I read this book on a dare from Charlie Munger.
I understood about 3/4 of it and what I understood was pretty fantastic. There are some amazing ideas about how life and the universe work.
I especially liked the explanation of how the sun is much larger now than it was a billion years ago and yet the Earth's temperature remains the same.
And the bit about how life on another planet can be identified simply by the presence of significant amounts of Oxygen and Nitrogen in the atmosphere.
This is no ...more
I understood about 3/4 of it and what I understood was pretty fantastic. There are some amazing ideas about how life and the universe work.
I especially liked the explanation of how the sun is much larger now than it was a billion years ago and yet the Earth's temperature remains the same.
And the bit about how life on another planet can be identified simply by the presence of significant amounts of Oxygen and Nitrogen in the atmosphere.
This is no ...more

Good overview of Chaos Theory as it applies to our world, though perhaps a little preoccupied with the question of the origins of life. It's a wide, deep topic and at 253 pages some parts feel a little short-changed, so perhaps it could be considered a good starting point to explore outward in areas of interest. Accessible to the interested amateur with, say, Algebra and a smattering of Calculus.
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Gribbin goes from describing the spectroscopic analysis required to provide evidence of life on a planet to summarizing his whole book in the swoop of one paragraph. If you desire to think briefly about many intricately scientific and mathematical topics, this book is for you. If you want that summary after each topic, choose something less grand in scope.

This was a bit of a slog, but with a lot of interesting stuff in there. It made some sense of the whole story from Newton to modern chaos and complexity in a coherent and interesting manner, which is a huge achievement. It was just a little hard to make progress at times, though that may be more a reflection on me and my sleep deprived toddler addled brain.

I am not sure if anyone who read that book was able to grasp it all. It's pretty insightful but I fail to summarize the content and connect all the theories mentioned together. It's challenging to say a book had it all.
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An accessible and relatively recent (Compared to Gliek's Chaos, 1988) book on Chaos and Complexity theory discussing the edge of chaos and the emergence if life.
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Started the book last year ad couldn't get through it. Demanding book, but made it through it the second time.
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John R. Gribbin is a British science writer, an astrophysicist, and a visiting fellow in astronomy at the University of Sussex. The topical range of his prolific writings includes quantum physics, biographies of famous scientists, human evolution, the origins of the universe, climate change and global warming. His also writes science fiction.
John Gribbin graduated with his bachelor's degree in phy ...more
John Gribbin graduated with his bachelor's degree in phy ...more
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“As I understood it, what really mattered was simply that some systems (‘system’ is just a jargon word for anything, like a swinging pendulum, or the Solar System, or water dripping from a tap) are very sensitive to their starting conditions, so that a tiny difference in the initial ‘push’ you give them causes a big difference in where they end up, and there is feedback, so that what a system does affects its own behaviour.”
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“Earth as our home in space, a single blue-white oasis of life surrounded by a black desert.”
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