From: Amara Graps (Amara.Graps@mpi-hd.mpg.de)
Date: Fri May 11 2001 - 08:01:14 MDT
From: Lee Corbin <lcorbin@ricochet.net>
> If you ask anyone
>who is reading this what a good mathematical model of the conscious
>development in real time of an organism should be, they'll sooner or
>later point you in the direction of non-linear dynamics (chaos theory),
>because of the way that our lives, as well as so many other physical
>phenomena, exhibit features not found in differential equations.
This makes no sense to me. Differential equations are one of the main
mathematical handles for linear and nonlinear physics, as well as for
every other physical approximation that I'm familiar with. Even if
your differential equations computes into a coupled system of a
million-by-million eigenvalue matrix, the mathematical formulation of
your differential equations is still valid.
Are you maybe mixing "continuous" and "discrete" ??
Amara
P.S. I've not read Greg Egan's "Theory of Dust".
--
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Amara Graps | Max-Planck-Institut fuer Kernphysik
Interplanetary Dust Group | Saupfercheckweg 1
+49-6221-516-543 | 69117 Heidelberg, GERMANY
Amara.Graps@mpi-hd.mpg.de * http://galileo.mpi-hd.mpg.de/~graps
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"Never fight an inanimate object." - P. J. O'Rourke
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