"Chaos" has lately become a field of lively scientific study. As a result, some long-held beliefs are turning topsy-turvy.
For example, astronomers have studied the mysterious "great red spot" in the atmosphere of Jupiter for centuries and had always thought it to be the work of stable and orderly forces. Now computer models suggest it is expression of chaos masquerading as order, not order at all. In other research, scientists studying computer models of motions long thought to be a jumble of indecipherable disorder suddenly find, on their computer screens, endlessly branching patterns of simplicity and beauty interweaving with bursts of random turbulence. Chaos in stability, order in turbulence!
These new "chaos" theories, described for the layman in books such as James Gleick's Chaos: Making a New Science, may well prove useful in illuminating some scientific and engineering problems. In the final analysis, however, chaos theory shows mankind as entrenched as ever in the grasp of discordant material structures, uncontrollable material forces, and calamitous events. In fact, chaos theory suggests that matter is inherently subject to chaos. And if you and I are subject to matter, as is generally believed, you and I would be inherently subject to chaos. Not a comforting thought!
