Related papers: Chaos at Fifty
Reliable prediction of large chaotic sytems in the short to middle time range is of interest in a number of fields, including climate, ecology, seismology, and economics. In this paper, results from chaos theory, and statistical theory are…
In recent years there has been a considerable increase in the publishing of textbooks and monographs covering what was formerly known as random or irregular deterministic motion, now named by the more fashionable term of deterministic…
Is flipping a coin a deterministic process or a random one? We do not allow bounces. If we know the initial velocity and the spin given to the coin, mechanics should predict the face it lands on. However, the coin toss has been everyone's…
When identifying instruments that have had great influence on the history of physics, none comes to mind more quickly than the pendulum. Though 'birthed' by Galileo in the 16th century, and in some respects nearly 'dead' by the middle of…
The classical Lorenz system is considered. For many years, this system has been the subject of study by numerous authors. However, until now the structure of the Lorenz attractor is not clear completely yet, and the most important question…
Prediction of ``anyons'', often attributed exclusively to Wilczek, came first from Leinaas & Myrheim in 1977, and independently from Goldin, Menikoff, & Sharp in 1980-81. In 2020, experimentalists successfully created anyonic excitations.…
The Lov\'{a}sz Local Lemma (LLL) is a keystone principle in probability theory, guaranteeing the existence of configurations which avoid a collection $\mathcal B$ of "bad" events which are mostly independent and have low probability. In its…
According to quantum theory, randomness is a fundamental property of the universe yet classical physics is mostly deterministic. In this article I show that it is possible for deterministic systems to arise from random ones and discuss the…
The Lorenz attractor was introduced in 1963 by E. N. Lorenz as one of the first examples of \emph{strange attractors}. However Lorenz' research was mainly based on (non-rigourous) numerical simulations and, until recently, the proof of the…
The information-theoretic point of view proposed by Leibniz in 1686 and developed by algorithmic information theory (AIT) suggests that mathematics and physics are not that different. This will be a first-person account of some doubts and…
Non-deterministic chaos is a new dynamical paradigm where a non-deterministic system is influenced by random perturbations to produce the appearance of complexity. The non-determinism is envisioned to occur only at a single point in phase…
Discovering mathematical models that characterize the observed behavior of dynamical systems remains a major challenge, especially for systems in a chaotic regime. The challenge is even greater when the physics underlying such systems is…
Sir Arthur Eddington is considered one of the greatest astrophysicist of the twentieth century and yet he gained a stigma when, in the 1930s, he embarked on a quest to develop a unified theory of gravity and quantum mechanics. His attempts…
The predictability problem for systems with different characteristic time scales is investigated. It is shown that even in simple chaotic dynamical systems, the leading Lyapunov exponent is not sufficient to estimate the predictability…
The ergodic hypothesis outgrew from the ancient conception of motion as periodic or quasi periodic. It did cause a revision of our views of motion, particularly through Boltzmann and Poincar\'e: we discuss how Boltmann's conception of…
Deterministic many-body systems governed by simple interactions can self-organize into macroscopic patterns, and the determinants of long-time behavior are assumed to be encoded in the initial configuration. Here we show that predictability…
Incomputability as a mathematical notion arose from work of Alan Turing and Alonzo Church in the 1930s. Like Turing himself, it attracted less attention than it deserved beyond the confines of mathematics. Today our experiences in computer…
This paper is an introduction to the eleven works of the special issue on Quantum and Classical Frontiers of Noise. The weather, and its butterfly effect, is the typical example that explain why many natural phenomena are, in fact, not…
The notion of random sequence was introduced by Martin-Loef in 1966. At the same time he defined the so-called randomness deficiency function that shows how close are random sequences to non-random (in some natural sense). Other deficiency…
According to the standard model of cosmology, the arrangement of matter in the cosmos on scales much larger than galaxies is entirely specified by the initial conditions laid down during inflation. But zooming in by dozens of orders of…