This is a theory that has been bouncing around in my head for a while, and this is my first attempt at putting it into words. Recently, I spent a few months excavating a chaos theory rabbit hole, and what I found changed my view of the universe and everything within it. For those unfamiliar with the concept, chaos theory is a recent development in science that posits within any seemingly chaotic system lies a series of discernible patterns. These patterns vary wildly from instance to instance because they are highly dependent on their initial conditions (i.e., speed, location, weight, etc.). To put it another way, there is order within chaos. A simplified version of this theory was popularized as "the butterfly effect."
Pictured below is the Lorenz system. It is a graphical representation of a chaotic system that, when viewed as a whole, reveals a pattern. From a certain perspective, it also happens to look like the wings of a butterfly.
Let's start with the earth itself--more specifically the "Goldilocks" conditions. Earth is able to support life due to its atmosphere, its distance to the sun, its vast supply of water, etc., and that exact combination of those exact conditions make it an astronomical anomaly. The Earth itself was formed over billions of years of converging processes in the vastness of space, star formations and then explosions, filling empty space with vast galaxies. Each process feeding into another process like a Rube Goldberg machine of incomprehensible scale, ending with space debris colliding and forming planets in the sun's orbit. From all this intergalactic chaos came a unique sense of order: our solar system.
Much like the life it supports, Earth is constantly evolving. Millions of years of geologic and atmospheric processes have resulted in earth's current climate. The atmosphere thickened and thinned, water covered the planet, and landmasses rose from the sea floor. The exact beginnings of life on earth are still not understood, but the scientifically accepted theory is abiogenesis, the process of inanimate matter becoming animate. In its infancy, Earth was a hot, bubbling cauldron, conditions which were perfect for instigating life. Another interesting theory is panspermia, that life comes from interspace debris that crash landed on earth (are we aliens :O ??). Either way, the implications for chaos in these events should be obvious.
However life made it to earth, it became uniquely adapted to earth's conditions through evolution. Generally, life competes with other life for resources, while also attempting to survive the chaos of existing. Some organisms are eaten, some are crushed by rocks, some contract illnesses, but others manage to prosper and pass on their genetic codes. But any lifeform, prosperous or otherwise, is subject to the whims of its planet, and mass extinction event after mass extinction event rocked the developing biology on earth. Organisms that once sat at the top of the food chain were knocked down multiple pegs (R.I.P. dinosaurs). An evolutionary change is only advantageous relative to the environment, and when the earth is so prone to change, that advantage is likely short-lived (on a geologic timescale). To put it another way, evolution is the order within the chaotic process of natural selection. Mammals currently rule the earth, though we may be witnessing the end of our reign.
In a system as limitless and complicated as space, the exact conditions required to create life were guaranteed to happen at least once. We are the order in a chaotic system.
Stay tuned for part II: my enhanced theory of evolution.
Pictured below is the Lorenz system. It is a graphical representation of a chaotic system that, when viewed as a whole, reveals a pattern. From a certain perspective, it also happens to look like the wings of a butterfly.
Let's start with the earth itself--more specifically the "Goldilocks" conditions. Earth is able to support life due to its atmosphere, its distance to the sun, its vast supply of water, etc., and that exact combination of those exact conditions make it an astronomical anomaly. The Earth itself was formed over billions of years of converging processes in the vastness of space, star formations and then explosions, filling empty space with vast galaxies. Each process feeding into another process like a Rube Goldberg machine of incomprehensible scale, ending with space debris colliding and forming planets in the sun's orbit. From all this intergalactic chaos came a unique sense of order: our solar system.
Much like the life it supports, Earth is constantly evolving. Millions of years of geologic and atmospheric processes have resulted in earth's current climate. The atmosphere thickened and thinned, water covered the planet, and landmasses rose from the sea floor. The exact beginnings of life on earth are still not understood, but the scientifically accepted theory is abiogenesis, the process of inanimate matter becoming animate. In its infancy, Earth was a hot, bubbling cauldron, conditions which were perfect for instigating life. Another interesting theory is panspermia, that life comes from interspace debris that crash landed on earth (are we aliens :O ??). Either way, the implications for chaos in these events should be obvious.
However life made it to earth, it became uniquely adapted to earth's conditions through evolution. Generally, life competes with other life for resources, while also attempting to survive the chaos of existing. Some organisms are eaten, some are crushed by rocks, some contract illnesses, but others manage to prosper and pass on their genetic codes. But any lifeform, prosperous or otherwise, is subject to the whims of its planet, and mass extinction event after mass extinction event rocked the developing biology on earth. Organisms that once sat at the top of the food chain were knocked down multiple pegs (R.I.P. dinosaurs). An evolutionary change is only advantageous relative to the environment, and when the earth is so prone to change, that advantage is likely short-lived (on a geologic timescale). To put it another way, evolution is the order within the chaotic process of natural selection. Mammals currently rule the earth, though we may be witnessing the end of our reign.
In a system as limitless and complicated as space, the exact conditions required to create life were guaranteed to happen at least once. We are the order in a chaotic system.
Stay tuned for part II: my enhanced theory of evolution.
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