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Our planet is both chaotic and stable, depending on the timescale we are looking at. Chaotic on the long timescale, but pretty stable given the much shorter ti
by miroljub 4y ago
Our planet is both chaotic and stable, depending on the timescale we are looking at.
Chaotic on the long timescale, but pretty stable given the much shorter timescale of known human history.
- nradov 4y agoIf you believe that then I think you haven't spent much time out in nature. Some wild species populations boom and crash in chaotic ways even in areas that haven't been impacted much by humans. Nature is far from stable on any time scale longer than a year.
- HPsquared 4y agoDoesn't it all average out over time though? I suppose things like erosion do cause permanent changes but other than that?
- lproven 4y agoISTM like you haven't fully grasped the fractal nature of, well, nature. At one scale, it's chaos. 1 or 2 scales up or down (in time or in space) it's stable. It's like that all the way up and all the way down. Oh, and not only are the scale levels not just spacial or temporal but both, but the number of levels is itself non integer. But the point is that even chaotic systems often display order if you find the right place or perspective to stand and look. You can't say "it's not stable". Not ever. Rocks aren't stable over aeons. Galaxies aren't. Protons aren't if you wait long enough. But it is often possible to measure the rates of change and of complexity and say, look, given greater levels of complexity, then lower rates of change will probably hold... Even given a famine or a plague that's currently devastating one region.