...thus conforming to a recurring pattern

:)

BTW, your last paragraph doesn't appear on the main page.

Ha, now I can see the last paragraph. Damn fast that butterfly thingy.

Lorenz’ work reached pop culture status and is often cited by people, myself included, with little more than a rudimentary understanding of its technical details.

Mmmph.
I sometimes wonder if anything more than a rudimentary understanding is even possible for most people.

The most important thing I took from Lorenz's book was the unreliability of computer modeling. Whether it is traffic or weather computer models are being misused and over relied upon. Lorenz found that even the most minor input mistake would essentially void the output. We must also remember how easily inputs can be manipulated to achieve the desired results.

For years the global warming crowd clung to Mann's hockey stick graph as proof of a tipping point in climate change. That graph came from Mann's computer models that were later determined to be greatly flawed. It was too late however to stop the lie that was spreading around the world.

Much of computer modeling today is nothing more than a 21st snake oil that is sold as one thing but in reality is something much different. Lorenz provided the skepticism that is lacking in todays science. For that contribution I thank him.

Much of computer modeling today is nothing more than a 21st snake oil that is sold as one thing but in reality is something much different. Lorenz provided the skepticism that is lacking in todays science.

I wouldn't go that far. It's just that expressing data to the third decimal point overstates our ability to measure most things. Everything is expressed as a hard number rather than a range. And things with dozens of variables, like weather patterns, are almost impossible to predict far in advance but we keep putting out forecasts for public consumption.

Would ya believe ...just 2-1/2 years after Don Adams?

I don't believe that Chaos theory holds up for anything mathematically or scientifically conceivable because no matter what happens, it can be explained in hindsight.

on the other hand, when it comes to social, emotional, historical, psychological, and, particularly this year, political science, it's the only theory/explanation that is acceptable. i certainly can't figure out what the hell is going on...

For a good overview of chaos read James Gleick's "Chaos: Making a New Science".

Would ya believe ...just 2-1/2 years after Don Adams?

Yeah. Missed it by THAT much...

The most important thing I took from Lorenz's book was the unreliability of computer modeling. Whether it is traffic or weather computer models are being misused and over relied upon. Lorenz found that even the most minor input mistake would essentially void the output.

My general take was that while modeling can give you trends and even a general prediction, it can't give you a specific prediction because it can't model all of the variables.

Weather prediction is actually pretty good these days, despite the enormous amount of variables involved. Traffic prediction is also getting much better, I think Microsoft is about to release a product based on their traffic analysis algorithms.

They won't be accurate down to the exact degree or mile, but they won't be predicting snow in Florida in June, or that there will be no traffic in NYC during rush hour.

James, I have read somewhere that weather modeling can be reasonably accurate a few weeks out but that it takes longer than that to gather the data and process it so it all is effectively no better than hindsight by the time it is done.