Fractals: The Math Behind Nature's Patterns

Through researching Thomasina's method of iterating mathematical functions and graphing the result, I have discovered that she was correct in assuming that there are ways of mathematically determining even the most complex patterns in nature. The method that she used is much easier today with new computers which can iterate functions in mere seconds, while it took here much longer doing it by hand in the margins of her math book. When a function is iterated over and over again (that is, each output is put back into the function as a new input) an IFS (Iterative Function Series) fractal is created, which is a self similar, never ending image. Thomasina remarked to Septimus that the equations he had her graph were too industrial, too plain, that for her theory of a formula for nature to be true, there must be something more complicated, and fractals are just that. Patterns in nature that seem too complex to have a mathematical explanation can be explained through fractals, rivers and fjords, canyons, leaves, lightning, and many more seemingly random patterns in nature all fall under the category of fractals.

Here are just a couple:

This website shows many natural fractals with their explanations:
17 Captivating Fractals Found in Nature
Here is a website that explains what a fractal is better than I can:
What are Fractals?

ITW Blog

Assess McCandless' life and death for yourself. Identify and rank the most compelling explanations Krakauer offers, and then explain what you think the story suggests about your/our relationship to nature.

I think that Krakauer puts it best when he admits to seeing some of his younger self in Chris. The whole story about the Stikine ice cap and climbing the devils thumb showed that Krakauer really did share some personality traits with McCandless in that he wanted to prove to himself that he could endure hardship alone in the wilderness, as a means of finding himself. Krakauer wanted to escape from his tedious life in Boulder, CO working as a builder. His trip to Alaska was meant for him to escape into nature, to embrace the challenge of survival on his own, on a walkabout of sorts.  Krakauer talks about how when we are young we have a resistance to settling down into “boring lives,” that we want to do more, and as a way to cope with our indecision, we go off and do things like climb mountains or go on spiritual odysseys like McCandless where we hope to find ourselves.  Krakauer, however, arranged for a food drop and brought equipment that would somewhat ensure his safety, which Chris did not. I think that Chris simply had too much of a flare for the dramatic in him. He was all about speaking his mind through meaningful actions, by completely disappearing from his family and by deciding to go into the wild with little gear and food. Some people think that his fatal flaw was his hubris. That he just didn’t have any mental grasp on his own mortality, but I disagree. I think that he knew exactly what he was getting into, and he liked the fact that there was going to be risk. McCandless loved the drama in symbolic actions, such as burning all the cash in his wallet, or intentionally disobeying laws. This is evident in the postcard he sent to Wayne Westerberg in which he says “If this adventure proves to be fatal and you don’t ever hear from me again I want you to know that you are a great man.”

McCandless' final picure, one of his many actions that come across to me as intentionally dramatic

Chris wouldn’t have it any other way than for there to be a symbolic risk in his adventure, and to acknowledge it in a dramatic one liner in the post card. For Chris, he wanted his relationship to nature to be an authentic one, where he would live off the land with as little gear as possible because that fit into his personality. For Krakauer, although he did almost die several times, he did at least value safety and a little bit of comfort over risk. I agree with McCandless up to a point, and that point is that there is an allure to the wilderness that attracts me, but I don’t agree with taking unnecessary risks in order to have a more “authentic experience.” 

Vine Triptych

I chose to show the irony of my relationship with nature. I do a lot of camping and enjoy spending time in nature, but I still contribute the the destruction of it just like everyone else does. My relationship conflicts with itself in that I appreciate nature as something separate from civilization, but my actions through everyday pollution would seem like I don't appreciate nature. The first two vines show how I take parts of the natural world and bring them into my life, and the last one shows how this appreciation is somewhat false, because my enjoyment of nature is something separate from my everyday polluting life.

Overpopulation

                According to Ishmael, one of the biggest offenses humans have made against the world is our boundless population expansion, and subsequent increase in resource production, which fuels even more population expansion. One of the more stunning moments I had while reading the book was when Ishmael predicted how human population would grow in the near future. Ishmael claimed that:

“At present there are five and a half billion of you here, and, though millions of you are starving, you’re producing enough food to feed six billion. And because you’re producing enough food for six billion, it’s a biological certainty that in three or four years there will be six billion of you. By that time, however (even though millions of you will be starving), you’ll be producing enough food for six and a half billion - which means that in three or four years there will be six and a half billion” (Quinn, 139).

Graph of expanding population (International...)

This was the first time that I was brought back to reality in a text that had been mostly theoretical, this was the first time that I looked down from the “taker thunderbolt” and realized that we may be about to crash into the ground. This prediction of population growth was spot on, seeing as how today we have passed seven billion and have already begun moving towards eight billion. This is the ultimate infraction of the peace keeping law, the ultimate blunder with the belief that we have the knowledge of good and evil. As Ishmael explains, we believe that being limited as a population is evil, so we grow without limit, which must be good. We ignore the fact that by expanding we are wiping out other animals, because we believe it is our destiny to conquer the world. Ishmael outlines an important problem in society, but doesn't say much about how to fix it, other than that it involves following the peace keeping law.

            

        A well known real world example of attempted population control is China’s controversial one problem of overpopulation and continue to “conquer” the world.  The fact that in our culture population child policy. This policy limits most couples to having only one child in an attempt to lower birth rates and slow population growth, with penalties for breaking this law. Even though China has the highest population of any country in the world, they recently formally relaxed the policy, allowing new exceptions for couples to have multiple children (China...). Many people view the policy as immoral, believing that couples should be free to have as many children as they want, and this is a perfect example of how our culture encourages us to ignore the control seems outrageous doesn't make the problem go away, it still exists, and we are taking away any forms of limitation such as China’s policy.

              Humans are still expanding, and yet we are still opposed to any population control such as China’s policy.  We continue to do nothing about this problem while our civilization continues to grow to the point where we crash and burn. The reason the topic of population rung true for me was because this is where I can hear mother culture whispering in my ear that limiting ourselves is immoral. Ishmael has opened my eyes to the problems that face humanity, and yet I still can’t shake the thought that it is inherently wrong to stop expanding our population. I know that population control seems immoral, but overproduction, over consumption and overpopulation are huge problems, and they will run our “Taker thunderbolt” into the ground. The question is, can we as a species overcome mother culture, or will we just continue to overpopulate and overproduce until we destroy the world?

Works Consulted:

"China officially eases controversial one-child policy." NBC News. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014.              <http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/12/28/22080954-china-officially-eases-   controversial-one-child-policy?lite>.

"International Programs." census.gov. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2014.                     <https://www.census.gov/population/international/data/idb/worldpopgraph.php>.

How We Set Goals for Ourselves

       One of the most human qualities is the ability to set a goal, and work to achieve it. Part of being a creative human being is discovering the boundaries of what we are able to do, and then pushing those boundaries to their limits. This is what people have done throughout the history of the human race, and we still do so today, only now, technology has a huge impact on this process. When watching the short film "Sight" I couldn't help but notice how much the male character allowed technology to control his everydaylife, and how technology could make someone lose their human qualities.

            

           The computer system inside of the man's contact lenses dictated his every action, his every goal. From small things such as slicing a cucumber in the kitchen, to larger parts of his day, such as going on a date, his "sight" told him what to do. The man in the film only cares about his accomplishments in his virtual world, with an entire wall of his home devoted to displaying his achievements in certain apps in his "sight." By allowing technology to play such a huge role in his everyday process of setting and achieving goals for himself, he effectively destroys his creativity, and becomes less human. His date (who isn't quite so absorbed in technology) seems bothered by the fact that he uses his sight to do everything in his life, and reacts with disgust to his use of the "wingman" app.  

   

The "Wingman" app 

         

          Although this film was clearly set in the future, I noticed how such negative effects of technology still apply to the here and now. In modern society, people have become more and more immersed in the virtual world, living their lives through social media, pictures, games, and apps. Our society hasn't yet gone to such extremes as the society portrayed in the film, but our growing fixation on choosing the virtual world over reality foreshadows what could be to come. People stare at their phones instead of having conversations, or will focus on documenting a moment through pictures and video rather than fully experiencing it. Technology has begun to take over the way we set goals for ourselves, and takes away part of our creativity, and part of our humanity with it. Instead of setting the goal of going skydiving,  we set the goal of taking a video of going skydiving to post to the internet. Instead of meeting a new person and getting to know them through conversation, we look them up on social media. Technology is a slippery slope, and we are beginning to slide towards dependence on technology and away from humanity. So maybe the next time you set a goal for yourself and go out and try to accomplish it, maybe you should leave your phones and cameras behind for a change, and really experience the thrill of accomplishment.