complexity
chaoticutopia | September 7, 2007Life is complex. The last week has been particularly so for me, but I’d rather not go into details about it. So, I’m keeping this week’s fractal somewhat on the simple side. I suppose in fractals, just like life, simplicity and complexity are often found side by side. I’ve always liked to describe it in terms of waves; complexity rises and falls, almost rhythmically. It is always the edge between that seems most interesting. In a fractal, like today’s Mandelbrot set, simple circles bend into seemingly infinite forms, revealing complex edges. Is life any different? We never seem to notice our…
chaoticutopia | June 26, 2007It isn't hard to spot the aphids in this picture:
Aphids feasting on a maple leaf.
But, we aren't the only ones checking them out:
The aphids are spotted. So is the lady beetle.
(Two-spotted Lady Beetle, aka Adalia bipuncta).
In a matter of minutes, the lady beetle devours half of the aphids.
If the lady beetle is lucky, it will keep on eating aphids. There are plenty more on other leaves in the tree. Of course, it is not alone. There are other lady beetles around, as well. There are also eggs and larvae, promising new swarms to come. They aren't exactly free to take over the tree…
chaoticutopia | June 25, 2007I watched the translucent white balloon, perhaps escaped from some baby shower or wedding, float against the clear blue sky. If it had been a cloudy day, I might not even have noticed it up there. It was one of those clear Colorado days, with nothing to stop the incessant waves of heat, pouring from the sun. One of those days when it feels so hot that you think your skin might melt (instead of burning crisp and red.) There were no signs of rain or breeze, from horizon to horizon... except that balloon.
If you ask a young child to draw a picture of a balloon, they will draw a circle with a…
chaoticutopia | June 20, 2007There I was, after moping all Monday and trying to catch up on Tuesday,I found myself looking at Wednesday. Somewhere in there, I had planned to get a few posts up. I may suggest to everyone else that life thrives on the edge of chaos (and we ought to ride the waves) but I often forget to remind myself. Things come up, things get procrastinated, and stress begins to surface. But why stress? That is life... just enough chaos to keep us on our toes. We could cite that old adage, better late than never, but the bit from my banner works for me. So, say it with me... "Ride the Waves"
And here's a…
chaoticutopia | June 11, 2007
Nut or Grain Weevil (Probably Curculio, unknown species)
Weevils wobble but they don't fall off the lampshade.
I found this little guy wandering helplessly in circles around the top of my lamp. His long, skinny snout is a handy tool for boring into nuts and acorns. Typically, in a forest, that's fine, as there are plenty to go around. In the suburbs, on the other hand, there aren't many nuts lying about, so the weevils bore into other tasty treats, like bags of flour. So, even though they don't bite or carry deadly diseases, these little critters are considered pests. I wasn't too concerned…
chaoticutopia | June 7, 2007
Strong winds rustle the grass along the dam at Calkins Lake in Colorado.
Don't see the lake in this 360 degree panorama?
Well, that's because it isn't here anymore. In this small patch of open space, the prairie is being reclaimed. This land was once plowed by a farmer named Henry Calkins. In order to keep his fields as green as you see in the video, he had to store water in a small reservoir. Calkins dug a ditch from the nearby Farmer's Highline Canal (shown here on Monday) and built a dam from locally produced brick and concrete.
The lake may have once been calm and still, but it wouldn't…
chaoticutopia | June 4, 2007
Raindrops fall into the Farmer's Highline Canal in Westminster, Colorado.
Here, cottonwood trees, coyote willows, and town homes sprout along a canal, once primarily used for agricultural purposes, now supporting these suburban communities. Not too long ago, this was a dry ridge, and the only cottonwoods in the area were found along Big Dry Creek below.
All photos by the author, unless otherwise noted.
chaoticutopia | May 28, 2007It's been far too nice of a Memorial Day to come inside and blog. I can share this photo, at least. I took it while on a bike ride along Standley Lake, pausing to see the changes at my <bioblitz site there. The area where I caught a poacher stealing goose eggs was rather overgrown, so I couldn't spot the nest. I looked for the pair of geese, and found they'd made some friends:
A flock of Candaian Geese (Branta canadensis) at Standley Lake
All photos by the author, unless otherwise noted.
chaoticutopia | May 21, 2007
Contrail descending from a cumulonimbus cloud.
I suppose the most obvious signs of life in this picture are human in origin. With the storm rolling in, most animals had already sought shelter. Not us... we keep flying over the country, or running outside to take pictures. We operate under the assumption that we have the upper hand when it comes to the weather. (Of course, looking at last week's news, that might be a faulty assumption.) I think this picture says otherwise... we may have conquered flight, but our biggest jets are still dwarfed by ordinary thunderheads.
All photos by the…
chaoticutopia | May 14, 2007
Lady beetle eggs (Coccinellidae, unknown genus/species) on a cedar fence.
(Two animal species in one shot: There was a squirrel lurking in the trees behind, if you can make out the fuzzy gray shape in the background of the full-sized image.)
CHAOS: Complex Habitats Around Our Suburbs isn't just a geeky acronym; it is a gallery of often-unnoticed life. Each week, I'll add a new photo of a complex habitat found near my home. We often think of nature as something that exists outside of our neighborhoods, away from the cities. It is easy to forget that cities and neighborhoods are, indeed,…
chaoticutopia | March 30, 2007Which is a stranger place to find an interesting shape: on the north pole of Saturn or in 248 dimensions? In either case, without 21st century technology, we wouldn't be seeing anything at all.
In the first case, astronomers knew about this strange sight since the 1980s, but didn't get a clear view until Cassini hit the right angle:
A hexagonal form surrounding the north pole of Saturn.
This image reveals atmospheric activity on Saturn at a wavelength typically invisible to the human eye. Here's NASA's description:
In this image, the blue color shows high-altitude emissions from atmospheric…
chaoticutopia | March 20, 2007Looking at the rhythmic repetition of forms in nature, it is easy to imagine the influence of some creator, a poet who fixes each line with exact meter and measure. Yet, upon closer examination, we can see how these forms are self-creating, born from simplicity. Nature writes its own poetry.
Take, for instance, the tendency of water to form branching veins.
We begin with an aspen leaf, which landed on a bed of new fallen snow. Weeks of gentle sun warmed the dark leaf and melted the surrounding snow. In that tiny pool of water, the softer parts of the leaf began to decay, revealing an…
chaoticutopia | February 12, 2007Happy Birthday 198th Birthday
Thank you, Mr. Darwin, for showing us the bewitchingly simple way life can change and become more complex over time.
The Alliance for Science is holding a Darwin Day essay contest for high school students, with an intriguing question and cash prizes. If you're interested in participating, or would like to donate prizes to the cause, be sure to check Neurotopia for more information.
chaoticutopia | January 10, 2007Here's a collection of odd things I've run across in the last week or so. A fireball from space here, maps of the future there, general chaos everywhere, and someone riding the waves... just go with the flow.
First, last week, the skies over our head were glowing in the darkest hour, just before dawn. A chunk of Russian spacecraft, an SL-4 rocket body plummeted to earth, flaring into a giant fireball before crashing into the middle of Wyoming. Fun stuff. My husband happened to be outside at the time, taking a break from his assembly of the daily news clips. Although our view to the north is…
chaoticutopia | January 9, 2007As a writer, I love to use metaphors to explain what I see. Sometimes, it is much easier to describe how something is like another thing than it is to describe the thing itself. The metaphor adds a subjective layer of context to a thing, making the unfamiliar familiar. Language is, in some part, all subjective layers of context: a thing is a thing; we label and describe it for our convenience. We come to agreements about our language, about our use of labels, to the point where a thing and its label are indistinguishable.
The word "water" is indistinguishable from water itself, as it is…
chaoticutopia | December 19, 2006I get strange searches from google or yahoo all the time, from queries about facial hair to blowing things up. It isn't too unusual for a search engine to come up with sites unrelated to the original query, so I usually give these searches little more than a cursory glance. One search from yahoo last week, however, caught my eye:
disorder to describe ability to find meaning in random information wikipedia
For once, I thought, "kid, you've come to the right place." Not that they stayed... the link (#6 in the search list) led to my story, "Illusions in Lavender", which describes the world as…
chaoticutopia | December 13, 2006Thanks to everyone who responded to the spirituality survey!
After seeing the all the responses to the spirituality survey, this week, I've come to one definite conclusion: While folks are eager to define categories, they don't like being fit into them. I think this is because categories tend to be exclusive; if you belong in one group, you don't belong in another. Even overlapping categories seem to supersede one another; in the case of the spirituality quiz, the all-inclusive philosophical categories, such as Unitarian Universalism or Secular Humanism seemed less important than more…
chaoticutopia | November 23, 2006Here are a handful of photographs which not only fit the Thanksgiving theme, but also show fractal or spiral patterns, emerging in art and nature.
What better pattern to begin with than the turkey? The feathers of a turkey can display elegant fractal-like patterns:
This Tom seems to know his classy spirals will catch the ladies' eyes:
Other spiraling forms look similar, such as this fungus:
But you don't really need to go traipsing through the woods to look for spirals. You might find one, right on the dinner table, like inside this wine glass:
Finally, in Dallas, Texas, in a square,…
chaoticutopia | November 22, 2006I had so many creative guesses for the complexity puzzle posted the other day, that I decided to pull them altogether into one mosaic:
So... who was right?
I tried to include every answer, adding a few of my own "guesses" as well, to show more similar forms. Thanks to everyone who added their input. Both Chris and kimball had the correct answer, kimball being slightly more specific. The pattern (shown second from the upper left in the mosaic) was taken from a baculite fossil, showing the suture lines, and a fraction of shell. The baculites were a straight-shelled cousin to the ammonites,…
chaoticutopia | November 21, 2006Another spiral; this time, one that can be found inside the human body:
An isolated and dissected cochlea.
The cochlea is the organ inside your inner ear that ultimately transforms the vibrations of sound into nerve signals, which are sent to the brain and thus "heard". Essentially, it is a spiral-shaped, hollow bone, filled with fluid and lined with hairs. The coiled shape of your cochlea allows you to hear a wider range of frequencies than animals with a straight cochlea.
Different frequency waves peak at different positions along the tube. Hair cells sitting on the basilar membrane sense…