complexity: Quick Facts

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Photos

A three-dimensional Lorenz attractor graph with swirling blue lines forming a butterfly-shaped pattern, representing chaotic motion in a mathematical weather model, with labeled x, y, and z axes.

Computer interface for an artificial stock marketNotice that when “Offers” (to sell) exceed “Bids” (to buy) in the “Volume” window a market crash occurs, as indicated in the “Market” window by the “Price” line dropping below the “Dividend“ value (indicated in gray).

Thursday night attendance at the El Farol Bar in Santa Fe, New MexicoEconomist W. Brian Arthur plotted the attendance of 100 possible Irish-music lovers over 100 weeks. No music lover would attend if he or she predicted that the crowd would exceed 60 (the “threshold”). Over time, the number of attendees, which appears to be a random (or chaotic) sequence, fluctuates around the threshold.

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Topics

system equipartition of energy

Key People

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John Henry Holland

American mathematician

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Edward Lorenz

American meteorologist and mathematician