Clipmarks | Complexity theory Clips

knots

Sun, 12 Oct 2008 03:18:20 GMT

clipped by: jcolier
clipper's remarks: Why your electronic wires get knotted by themselves.

It is well known that a jostled string tends to become knotted; yet the factors governing the “spontaneous” formation of various knots are unclear. We performed experiments in which a string was tumbled inside a box and found that complex knots often form within seconds. We used mathematical knot theory to analyze the knots. Above a critical string length, the probability P of knotting at first increased sharply with length but then saturated below 100%. This behavior differs from that of mathematical self-avoiding random walks, where P has been proven to approach 100%. Finite agitation time and jamming of the string due to its stiffness result in lower probability, but P approaches 100% with long, flexible strings.

The relative probability of forming a knot decreased exponentially with minimum crossing number and Möbius energy, mathematical measures of knot complexity.

Religious Hate Speech

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 18:21:31 GMT

clipped by: AtlLiberal
clipper's remarks: The view from one of the believers. If you care to wade through this drivel you will be entertained by a multitude of false assertions, straw men, and arguments from ignorance. The depth of illogic is stunning. It's sad that many people who read this sort of crap swallow it as readily as they do the dogma behind it.

Clip Source: www.dailyevergreen.com

Atheism has no morals

We are special, reducing our complexity is wrong

The Daily Evergreen

Published: 10/07/2008

The pure materialist atheism that is supported by such prominent atheists as Richard Dawkins, author of “The God Delusion” and developer of the theory of memes, lacks any morality and justifies the world’s worst atrocities. Often you may hear Dawkins and others telling people what they should and shouldn’t do, so let’s examine their moral credibility from their own principles.

Pure materialism rejects the existence of anything beyond matter and its interactions. When all events in the universe are reduced to the colliding of atoms, there’s no room for good or bad. These interactions are purposeless and irrational.

Because of this reductionism of everything, materialists argue that humans are the same as animals, thus taking away the dignity humans have.

I'll Get Right On It.

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 15:54:25 GMT

clipped by: powerof2
clipper's remarks: I haven't even heard of most of these.

Clip Source: www.networkworld.com

The world's 23 toughest math questions

Those wacky folks at he the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency have put out a research request it calls Mathematical Challenges, that has the mighty goal of "dramatically revolutionizing mathematics and thereby strengthening DoD's scientific and technological capabilities."

So if you're game, take your pick of the following questions and have at it.

The Mathematics of the Brain: Develop a mathematical theory to build a functional model of the brain that is mathematically consistent and predictive rather than merely biologically inspired.

Occam's Razor in Many Dimensions: As data collection increases can we "do more with less" by finding lower bounds for sensing complexity in systems? This is related to questions about entropy maximization algorithms.

Settle the Riemann Hypothesis: The Holy Grail of number theory.

documentar

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 20:36:47 GMT

clipped by: pankarta

Clip Source: www.illustramedia.com

Part 1
LIFE: THE BIG QUESTIONS
A new challenge to the theory of natural selection.

Part 2
WHAT DARWIN DIDN'T KNOW
Exploring the complexity of the living cell.

Part 3
MOLECULES & MOUSETRAPS
Molecular machines that defy Darwin’s theory.

Part 4
HOW DID LIFE BEGIN?
Why “chance” cannot explain the origin of life.

Part 5
THE LANGUAGE OF LIFE
DNA genetic information, and life on Earth.

Part 6
THE DESIGN INFERENCE
The scientific evidence for intelligent design.

For more than a century, Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection has defined biology. Yet, today a growing number of scientists question its ability to account for the origin and diversity of life. This six-part series examines Darwinian evolution and presents a powerful challenge to its validity—the theory of intelligent design.

Beyond Web 2.0: How Tech will Change the World (video)

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 12:05:52 GMT

clipped by: Djiezes
clipper's remarks: The video (1h40m) can't be clipped, but you can watch it online at the source.

Dr. Hiroshi Tasaka discusses Beyond Web 2.0: How the Next Tech Revolution will Change the World.

Dr. Hiroshi Tasaka, Professor at Tama University in Tokyo, and President of Thinktank SophiaBank, has authored numerous books on the philosophy of working, management theory, business strategy, the Internet revolution and knowledge society, as well as paradigm shifts in human society.

A specialist in complexity systems, Dr. Tasaka will explore how next technology revolution will further empower the individual, blending the monetary and voluntary economies to create a new system of Capitalism. Dr. Tasaka will also discuss ways in which technology will help build bridges between the U.S. and Japan, as well as among countries in Asia in the emerging post-knowledge society - Imagining Global Asia

He talks about Dialectic Philosophy, Complexity Sciences & Collective Psychology among other th

Clip Source: fora.tv

Beyond Web 2.0: How Tech will Change the World

Audio (Mp3)	48 MB	12 min
Video (Mp4)	364 MB	1.5 hr

Tags: technology, society, future, web 2.0, internet, web, complexity, psychology, philosophy, innovation

David Deutsch: Quantum physicist

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 02:01:47 GMT

clipped by: zalisan

Clip Source: www.ted.com

David Deutsch's 1997 book The Fabric of Reality laid the groundwork for an all-encompassing Theory of Everything, and galvanized interest in the idea of a quantum computer, which could solve problems of hitherto unimaginable complexity.

Why you should listen to him:

More than any other thinker, David Deutsch will force you to reconsider your place in the world. This legendary Oxford physicist is the leading proponent of the multiverse (or "many worlds") interpretation of quantum theory -- the astounding idea that our universe is constantly spawning countless numbers of parallel worlds.

In his own words: "Everything in our universe -- including you and me, every atom and every galaxy -- has counterparts in these other universes." If that doesn't alter your consciousness, then the other implications he's derived from his study of subatomic physics -- including the possibility of time travel -- just might.

Tags: quantum theory, parallel worlds, subatomic physics, evolution

Crystal clear? think again

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 09:44:12 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: "of fast-moving and slow-moving regions in a solidifying glass were seen in experiments, and computer simulations predicted that this pattern, called dynamical heterogeneity, should exist."

interesting stuff..
what amazes me, is as one zooms in (and out new levels of complexity that were not seen before, are discovered.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

The Nature of Glass Remains Anything but Clear

Philip W. Anderson, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist at Princeton, wrote in 1995: “The deepest and most interesting unsolved problem in solid state theory is probably the theory of the nature of glass and the glass transition.”

Thirteen years later, scientists still disagree, with some vehemence, about the nature of glass.

For scientists, glass is not just the glass of windows and jars, made of silica, sodium carbonate and calcium oxide. Rather, a glass is any solid in which the molecules are jumbled randomly. Many plastics like polycarbonate are glasses, as are many ceramics.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Dr. Wolynes zeroed in on an observation

the viscosity of a glass was related to the amount of entropy

Further, if a glass could be formed by cooling at an infinitely slow rate, the entropy would vanish at a temperature well above absolute zero, violating the third law of thermodynamics

Around that time, the first hints of the dichotomy

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Tags: glass, chemistry

More Evidence for a Revolutionary Theory of Water

Sat, 05 Jul 2008 01:54:31 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver
clipper's remarks: The current study is the most recent addition to a growing body of evidence for a new theory about the structure of liquid water. In 2004, Nilsson and colleagues sparked controversy with a paper published in Science that suggested the tetrahedral model of water was incorrect. Nilsson agrees that the debate is far from settled and that much work remains before a clear picture of liquid water emerges.

"Over the last decade or so we have discovered that materials once considered homogeneous exhibit complex nanoscale order," said Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory director Jo Stöhr. "In my view, the work on water is yet another example of the actual complexity of matter, this time within a simple liquid. Modern X-ray work appears to be triggering a new understanding of liquids and we may have only seen the beginning of a paradigm shift in our understanding."

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

The traditional picture of how liquid water behaves on a molecular level is wrong, according to new experimental evidence

Water, by any measure, is strange stuff

It behaves unlike any other liquid

It has a tremendous capacity for carrying heat—which is why the Gulf Stream keeps Europe warm. Water's solid phase —ice— is less dense than the liquid, which is why ice floats; life on Earth could never have formed if oceans and lakes froze from the bottom up

But despite its prevalence and importance, liquid water is not well understood, and its molecular structure has been the subject of intense debate for decades

The prevailing model of liquid water holds that as ice melts, the molecules loosen their grip but remain generally arranged in the same tetrahedral groups

In the recent study

clear evidence also emerged for the dominance of a second, less defined structure in the mix.

It is amazing that the modern usage of X-rays demonstrates that Röntgen, more than 100 years ago, was on the right path

Tags: physics, water, molecular structure

Scientists Create a "Law of War" -But Does It Work?

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:14:50 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: ...we spent the money on this instead of body armor, would they punch me in the face?

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

An international team of scientists have bravely taken time away from fusion research, curing cancer and solar power to announce some truly staggering results: in war, sometimes some people get killed. But other times, more people get killed. It's amazing stuff.

In a complexity study more staggeringly misleading than a blind guide dog that's just been spun in a centrifuge, their discovery of a "Law of War" was announced at the European Consortium for Mathematics. The work doubtless contains valuable insights from the growing field of complexity theory, so it's unfortunate that such valid research is tarted up with buzzword headlines more mercilessly targeted on defence department dollars than a cash-seeking missile.

This statistical mish-mash is being pitched to the Pentagon, where it will doubtless find another home in the "pile of numbers we use to justify things." But if you really want check your contribution to a war effort, ask yourself this: if I told some troopers

Ten Major Flaws Of Evolution

Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:41:14 GMT

clipped by: jmjoness

Clip Source: creationismunleashed.blogspot.com

TEN MAJOR FLAWS OF EVOLUTION - REVISED

The complexity of living systems could never evolve by chance—they had to be designed and created. A system that is irreducibly complex has precise components working together to perform the basic function of the system.

The high information content of DNA could only have come from intelligence. Information science teaches that in all known cases, complex information requires an intelligent message sender

No mutation that increases genetic information has ever been discovered. Mutations which increase genetic information would be the raw material necessary for evolution. To get from "amoeba" to "man" would require a massive net increase in information.

There is a total lack of undisputed examples (fossilized or living) of the millions of transitional forms ("missing links") required for evolution to be true.

Pictures of ape-to-human "missing links" are extremely subjective and based on evolutionists' already-formed assumptions.

Tags: evolution, origins, creation, theory, science, biology

Evolution: Fact, theory, or law? Or none of the above?

Sun, 08 Jun 2008 08:04:12 GMT

clipped by: jmjoness
clipper's remarks: Read the whole article and see what you think. I thought he had some pretty good points to make.

Clip Source: emporium.turnpike.net

Is Evolution a Theory, a Fact, or a Law?

In conclusion, evolution is not observable, repeatable, or refutable and thus does not qualify as either a scientific fact or theory. Evolution must be accepted with faith by its believers, many of whom deny the existence, or at least the power, of the Creator. Similarly, the Biblical account of creation is not observable, repeatable or refutable by man. Special creation is accepted with faith by those who believe that the Bible is the revelation of an omnipotent and omniscient Creator whose Word is more reliable than the speculations of men. Both evolution and creation, however, can be compared for their compatibility with what we do observe of the facts of nature. In the months ahead, we will see that creation by intelligent design is a vastly more reasonable explanation for the origin of the complexity we see in living things than is evolution by mere chance and the intrinsic properties of nature.

Tags: theory, evolution, creationism, origin of life

Scientific responses to 15 points of Creationist NONSENSE

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 21:33:04 GMT

clipped by: lordthor541
clipper's remarks: Click on the links to see the responses and more questions posed by faithtards.

I mean creationists.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

1. Evolution is only a theory. It is not a fact or a scientific law.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

4. Increasingly, scientists doubt the truth of evolution.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

6. If humans descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?

7. Evolution cannot explain how life first appeared on earth.

8. Mathematically, it is inconceivable that anything as complex as a protein, let alone a living cell or a human, could spring up by chance.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

9. The Second Law of Thermodynamics says that systems must become more disordered over time. Living cells therefore could not have evolved from inanimate chemicals, and multicellular life could not have evolved from protozoa.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

12. Nobody has ever seen a new species evolve.

13. Evolutionists cannot point to any transitional fossils--creatures that are half reptile and half bird, for instance.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

15. Recent discoveries prove that even at the microscopic level, life has a quality of complexity that could not have come about through evolution.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

methodological naturalism can push back ignorance

Tags: jesus, god, creation, intelligent, design, religion, darwin, evolution, science, study

Are Individuals like Molecules in a Social Matrix?

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:23:40 GMT

clipped by: abailart
clipper's remarks: http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/complexity/models/antcolonies/page2.html

takes you to a fun interactive model with an ant coloby; you control variables. Clear accompanying text for explanation and discussion.

Clip Source: www.sciencedirect.com

striking structures (e.g. nest architecture, trail networks) of insect societies may seem familiar to many of us, the understanding of pattern formation still constitutes a challenging problem. Over the last two decades, self-organization has dramatically changed our view on how collective decision-making and structures may emerge out of a population of ant workers having each their own individuality as well as a limited access to information. A variety of collective behaviour spontaneously outcome from multiple interactions between nestmates, even when there is no directing influence imposed by an external template, a pacemaker or a leader. By focussing this review on foraging structures, we show that ant societies display some properties which are usually considered in physico-chemical systems, as typical signatures of self-organization

parsimony and simplicity of behavioural rules at the individual level

efficient processing of information, energy and matter within the whole colony.

Tags: complexity theory, emergence, insect behaviour

Evolution Beyond Darwin — Way Beyond

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 11:06:53 GMT

clipped by: wildcat

Clip Source: www.wired.com

Highly complex honeybee communities are one example of phenomena that some scientists think can't be explained by the mainstream theory of evolution alone, but instead by a theory of self-organization.
Courtesy AlainB/Flickr

Nearly 150 years after Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species, evolution has been widely accepted by scientists -- and, except for a few religious dogmatic types, the public -- as the blueprint for the engine of life.

But not every scientist thinks that evolution as it's now understood and applied is complete. They want to scale it up to the level of populations, even whole ecosystems. Moreover, they say evolution is intertwined with other dynamics that science is just starting to understand.

"The process of evolution is fundamental to the universe. Biology is the most obvious manifestation of it," said Carl Woese, a legendary microbiologist and one of the first proponents of this newly revised evolutionary framework.

Tags: complexity, evolution, darwin

Hypothosis gains validity from objections.

Sat, 19 Apr 2008 17:04:02 GMT

clipped by: graphictruth
clipper's remarks: Do extremism and an unconditional adherence to religious dogma result from a failure of a portion of the frontal lobe to fully develop or, if fully developed, to activate? Studies suggest that faithful adherence to a single reasoning strategy on tests such as the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test means that parts of the frontal lobes are inactive, have failed to fully develop, or have even been damaged. Thus, unqualified disdain for divergent beliefs,for personal interpretation, and for creative theories like Darwin’s theory of evolution, may indeed have, at least a partial, biological explanation: a reduced utilization of that section of the brain which has played such a vital role in humanity’s creative advances—the frontal lobes. By unconditionally obeying religious tenets—or any dogma—some people may be relying on the phylo-genetically older, more posterior portions of the brain that store knowledge and enable consistent or stable behaviors and, unknowingly, circumventing the portion whi

Clip Source: www.tikkun.org

The evolving and growing complexity of the human brain allowed our ancestors the ability to question, wonder, and consider new possibilities—to be creative. Life altering advances were the result. Is unconditional adherence to dogma (whether religious or secular) at odds with this evolved capability and our full potential as creative beings?

Adherence begets consistency or stability; questioning, searching, and discovering innovative alternatives, which is creativity, leads to change.

The implication that adherence behavior could involve a more primitive or phylogenetically older portion of the brain should not be an altogether startling notion. After all, given the most basic understanding, we would expect that early humans eventually became unstuck from various conditions because of an increasingly evolved reasoning power. Our capacity for creativity expanded and so we conceived of new and often better ways to do things.

Tags: bizarre, mental health, fundimentalism, religion, conservatives