I wanted to salute mathematician and meteorologist Edward Lorenz (1917-2008) who died recently. Known as the father of "chaos theory" and a Professor Emeritus at MIT, this man contributed immensely to our understanding of complex nonlinear dynamic systems. Well-known for the fabled "Butterfly Effect", he aided us in our understanding about the predictability of the output of complex systems and showed that many systems are extremely sensitive to the initial conditions. In other words, the flapping wings of a butterfly in Brazil may result in a devastating tornado in Texas at some future time. The importance of his work cannot be overestimated and he has been compared to Isaac Newton with regard to how his work changed our understanding of reality. I have included my own rendition of the Lorenz Attractor.
Goodbye Professor Lorenz!
No comments:
Post a Comment