Order from Chaos

[TMA_1]

I wrote this for myself not too long ago. It is a philosophy that seems to be universal.

See, intelligence is not really in the form of adaptation. Obviously this is a noble quality, and is required for all life-forms to exist. Intelligence though stems (and this is very general, so dont pick on this as much as listen to the idea) from abstract ideas. We get our creativity from chaos, because we can sort through abstract ideas and actually understand to a certain degree of the chaos around us.

because of this all thinking beings from what I can see have an almost subconscious drive and desire to make order out of things in this life. We are naturally chaotic and because of this we strive for order. For some reason all human beings have this drive. Some look to science in order to solve questions that have always been a mystery to us. From the mundane to the extremely profound, we search for answers. Some people look to religion to solve the problems because many just arent satisfied that natural answers could solve all our questions. And this is true to an extent because natural answers depend on a chaotic universe.

We can see our desire for order in everything. Right now if you are reading this you are obviously capable of reading english (though my english is obviously pretty bad.lol). The fact that we make languages is a great example of this. We want to communicate with eachother more efficiantly, and desire to order ourselves through a more clear and precise means by speaking or reading. You also have a computer in front of you. We use computers to find order in chaos by using it as an even more efficiant means of communication worldwide, as well as using it as a mathematics base to calculate things that would take massive quantities of time any other way. You probably have TV's as well, and you might even be listening to music. We even find pleasure in rythmic tones of sound which is a testament to our desire for order.

do any of you guys see what I mean? what do you think of this? do you guys agree?

[The_Sadukar]

Hmmmm.... You seem to be right.

[nemafakei]

Of course. The human mind is a pattern-seeking device, looking even for order where there is none. This adaptable guesswork is the basics of our intelligence itself. It is an extension of the association ability - we do not just associate the black and yellow stripy thing that just stung us with pain, but, after a few experinces, all kinds of black and yellow stripy things with pain, for we notice the pattern (no pun intended).

[Caid Ivik]

World is chaotic and we are made to bring order into it. That's our divine spark, ben Maimon would say  ;D

[Dude_Doc]

All organisms are striving for making itself better, but no organism can ever be "the best", because there simply isn't enough time. This example is pretty much like Edrics communism, we can always strive for a better society, but as long as we can foresee the future now, this utopian vision maybe are impossible. And even it is a part of the "making it better"-thing...

[Egeides]

The human isn't the only one bringing order (though we certainly do it more, with intelligence). Simple ants bring order, they can even bring a territory to be more and more densely populated by a better exploitation of the ressources. We could also say the same of complex organisms, formed of many cells which tend to organize themselves to form something with a higher level of organization. Nature is organizing things (not perfectly EVERYTHING, but it brings some more organization).

[Dante]

Everything in a general sense - more on that in a moment - , strives for order, even things that are not alive. Atoms themselves react only in ways that will bring about further stability (unless forced in another direction). Animals try for their own form of order, as do plants, rocks, planets, etc.

All this considered... it's funny how the exceptions to the rule are humans. Note that I do not mean humanity in general, but specific humans. There are members of this species that, like no other, deliberately seek out and exploit chaos. They attempt to prove it, to glorify it, and destroy order in all forms. Not necessarily physically, but mentally. I'll give a few examples.

• Some philosphers go out of their way to 'prove' that nothing can be known, that there is no order, and that chaos is the natural state of things. To this end they use logic, or as much evidence as they can gather, to show that order will always be superficial and chaos is inevitable. We came from chaos, we will go to chaos, all order is fleeting and skin-deep.
  
• There is a branch of physics dedicated to proving that there is no such thing as order. The physicists go beyond even atoms to quarks, electrons, strings and whatever to show that at the most sub-atomic level, everything is random, and chaotic.
  
• Anarchists! Those people who glorify chaos and go out of their way to encourage it. These people might join either one of the two professions above, or not. They might just live their lives in a completely random way, or even encourage chaos in others by, for example, blowing things up.
  
• Then there are kind of semi-anarchists. They use the methods of the philosopher (sometimes coupled with religion) to denounce all order, but continue to live an orderly life; taking pleasure from the contradiction and using it to further their chaotic-ness. Unlike the philospher they are not trying to reach a definate conclusion, but merely using the method to disprove order and justify any chaotic actions they might commit.

These are the examples I can think of, and it is intuitively obvious that none of them are found anywhere outside the human species, that we know of. Personally I suspect those bees are philosophising in secret... But you can see, not everything searches for order. Somewhat ironic that it should be members of the very species that most tend to associate with order and non-randomness.

[Acriku]

Can anybody put their finger on what is chaos? It is conceptual or literal?

[Caid Ivik]

Good question, Acriku. Philosophers mentioned by Dust Scout present chaos more as lack of reason, world based on spontaneous manifestation, and of course irrationality of being itself, as reflection to postkantic era, which described the world as dynamical process led to perfection. While these, let we call them "chaotics", thought about human struggle for order as futile trying to counter spontaneous "will" of the world, previous ones thought he was a tool of this will. Physicians think about chaos as enthropy, disorganization, based on number of "sole" objects, On the beginning, there was only one "point", but it exploded and does so further. Problem is that science and philosophy use other scales. Philosophy measures order by how is it seen by a human, scientist as how it would be seen by God.

Difference is simple. When you was your hair and wait until it becomes dry, process goes trough "order" of universe. Altough you think your hair "stand" chaotically, they just followed right order of things, trough electricity, dried water etc. If you take ie brush (or how you call it) and put a form to the hair, you have reached the order in human view.

[GUNWOUNDS]

Difference is simple. When you wash your hair and wait until it becomes dry, process goes through "order" of universe. Although you think your hair "stands" chaotically, it just follows right order of things, through electricity, dried water etc. If you take a brush (or how you call it) and put form to the hair, you have reached the order in human view.

nice explanation.

[Caid Ivik]

I've just had a model situation on my head  ;D

[TMA_1]

I am a simple guy, so I simplify. Often if done right that is an okay thing to do in my book.

to me chaos is the system of the universe. To me chaos is more evidant than order.

I think the question should be, "what is order?".  Honestly I think that is a more obscure idea than chaos.

[nemafakei]

The concept of order depends on the context.

In a society, order is conforming to common rules at society-level.

In our view of the universe, order has more to do with complying to simple rules. I say simple, that's not quite the word I'm looking for.

We view an ordered galaxy as one adhering to trends common to galaxies. A disordered galaxy does not - but still complies with the more fundamental laws of physics.

Order consists mostly of predictability of form at a given level. That is not necessarily to say predictability of content - an ordered society can have individuals who obey all the laws, but have creative and original talents, and the exact composition of every ordered society will of course differ.

Chaos consists of deviation from such structure.

As humans, we observe the forms, and appreciate the order. We do not necessarily create order (though in our own societies, we can).

"it's funny how the exceptions to the rule are humans"

Hm. Be careful. Even if some humans are the only animals who deliberately seek chaos for its own sake, this may be because we're the only ones with a real concept of order and chaos. Other animals do rock the boat of their own society, though with no ideology, of course.

[Egeides]

Good question, Acriku. Philosophers mentioned by Dust Scout present chaos more as lack of reason, world based on spontaneous manifestation, and of course irrationality of being itself, as reflection to postkantic era, which described the world as dynamical process led to perfection. While these, let we call them "chaotics", thought about human struggle for order as futile trying to counter spontaneous "will" of the world, previous ones thought he was a tool of this will. Physicians think about chaos as enthropy, disorganization, based on number of "sole" objects, On the beginning, there was only one "point", but it exploded and does so further. Problem is that science and philosophy use other scales. Philosophy measures order by how is it seen by a human, scientist as how it would be seen by God.

Difference is simple. When you was your hair and wait until it becomes dry, process goes trough "order" of universe. Altough you think your hair "stand" chaotically, they just followed right order of things, trough electricity, dried water etc. If you take ie brush (or how you call it) and put a form to the hair, you have reached the order in human view.

I think that in fact natural order is not necessarily esthetic order. The esthetic is not necessarily conform to the laws of nature. Sure, natural order is beautiful in itself, but natural order is not necessarily as ordered as natural order + well-functioning society + well-balanced humans in this society. The highest level of order (complete order) would necessarily include esthetic order, since our world include humans positively affected by beautiful things.

[SpiceGuid]

order and patterns are reassuring but also boring and dangerously routine.

i would say what we seek is much more ambitious, we seek rules and patterns so we can isolate the singularities.

what we really seek is the Bene Gesserit dream: we seek to control the singularity.

once you face the singularity, you can forget the surrounding pattern.

but if you can't face the singularity, you are a prisoner of the pattern.

in the singularity lies the change, not in the pattern, whatever new.

in the singularity lies the hope and the danger, the future and the fate.

of course you can build with the pattern, whitout ever facing the singularity, but then you only build the tautology.

i don't think "we are naturally chaotic and because of this we strive for order".

on the contrary i think we are naturally patterned and that make us retive to the singularity.

[nemafakei]

Within every singularity, there is yet another rule that describes it, and humanity enjoys the challenge of harnessing the singularity - finding the rule that underlies the previous approximation.

[SpiceGuid]

yes, but remember that Einstein is Nobel priced for photo-effect, not for relativity. that says it all about how we are frightened by singularities, both individually and collectively.