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Beyond Chaos: The Underlying Theory Behind Life, the Universe, and Everything [Hardcover]

Mark Ward (Author)
2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)


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Book Description

0312274890 978-0312274894 July 10, 2002 1st
We are surrounded by order that-until now-physics has been unable to explain.

The spread of veins in the back of our hands mirrors the spread of branches on a tree; fern fronds bear a resemblance to the outline of fjords; the best-loved classical music echoes the patterns of our heartbeats.

The theory of Universality is using fractal patterns to explain much of the world around us. Could it be that the same laws that govern systems in their critical states also govern some of the most unpredictable events such as earthquakes, avalanches, the growth of cities and stock market crashes-even the way businesses are run and the way fashions come and go? Is there a common principle, a universal affinity that binds us to the forces of nature?

A consensus is emerging on how complex structures grow and sustain themselves; phenomena that were once thought to be unique now appear to have a great deal in common. Mark Ward examines these theories, explores how they fit into an age-long quest to discover how the universe works, delves into their possible limitations and asks what we can do with this new knowledge.

While identifying patterns does not mean that we can always predict what will happen next, some of the trends scientists are noticing prove that life is not a series of random events. Universality deepens our understanding of natural phenomena and our place in the physical world.

We are surrounded by order that-until now-physics has been unable to explain.

The spread of veins in the back of our hands mirrors the spread of branches on a tree; fern fronds bear a resemblance to the outline of fjords; the best-loved classical music echoes the patterns of our heartbeats.

The theory of Universality is using fractal patterns to explain much of the world around us. Could it be that the same laws that govern systems in their critical states also govern some of the most unpredictable events such as earthquakes, avalanches, the growth of cities and stock market crashes-even the way businesses are run and the way fashions come and go? Is there a common principle, a universal affinity that binds us to the forces of nature?

A consensus is emerging on how complex structures grow and sustain themselves; phenomena that were once thought to be unique now appear to have a great deal in common. Mark Ward examines these theories, explores how they fit into an age-long quest to discover how the universe works, delves into their possible limitations and asks what we can do with this new knowledge.

While identifying patterns does not mean that we can always predict what will happen next, some of the trends scientists are noticing prove that life is not a series of random events. Universality deepens our understanding of natural phenomena and our place in the physical world.


Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

If you believe that one book can reveal everything contained in Ward's wildly ambitious subtitle, then there's a bridge in New York I'd like to sell you. It's true that some intriguing even wondrous science lies behind the recently discovered tendency of order and fractal symmetry to emerge within complex systems. This subject has been presented effectively in other recent books, such as those by Steven Johnson and John Holland, both titled Emergence. The flaw, though, is that Ward, a BBC technology reporter, oversells the phenomenon as some sort of cosmic sophistry that he assures us can give meaning to life. (In the book's final three sentences, he proclaims, "We belong here. We know our place. We know our place and we are home.") When the author sticks to science, he does a credible job of explaining pattern emergence in various systems, from climates to stock markets. When he exalts, however, his points come off about as convincingly as a cross between Obi-Wan Kenobi's promise that "the force is with you" and a diluted bowl of "chicken soup for the physicist's soul." Not recommended. Gregg Sapp, Science Lib., SUNY at Albany
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Self-organizing criticality (SOC) is the physics discipline that studies how a system "flips" from one state to another. Scientist Mark Buchanan speculated in ubiquity (2001) how SOC might explain social dynamics such as bear markets; journalist Ward dwells more on those who made SOC a science. He relates its birth from research into magnets. When heated, magnets lose their magnetism, and, according to Ward, this behavior bothered physicists, one of whom, Leo Kadanoff, advanced ideas about systems poised between order and chaos. Another brain, Kenneth Wilson, received the Nobel Prize in 1982 for devising the mathematics of SOC, which Ward blessedly reduces to plain English for the rest of us. Once past the explanations, Ward hits his stride with anecdotal glimpses into the variety of phenomena--from DNA to heartbeats to fractals--that SOC rules are said to rule. Challenging but accessible reportage. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books; 1st edition (July 10, 2002)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312274890
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312274894
  • Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,698,990 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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8 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Muddled, inaccurate, overblown, and poorly written, May 15, 2003
By 
William J. Ceriani (Pittsburgh, PA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Beyond Chaos: The Underlying Theory Behind Life, the Universe, and Everything (Hardcover)
British journalist Mark Ward's exposition of the theory of Universality and self-organized criticality (SOC) is little more than breathless hype purporting to show that fractal patterns and SOC are present in virtually every aspect of the biological and physical world. While this may or may not be true, Ward's largely anecdotal presentation, with its at times almost-mystical (although nonreligious) tone, unfortunately arouses the suspicion that the theory rests on a shaky scientific foundation. It should also not be too much to expect that a book devoted to the theory of Universality actually give an explicit definition of Universality, which Ward consistently fails to do. The book is introductory and nontechnical, so it is perhaps unfair to expect him to give a solid theoretical foundation to the theory, but the reader is left with an uneasy feeling that the gentleman "doth protest too much." Those interested in chaos theory, emergent phenomona, and SOC would do much better to read the books of Stuart Kauffmann and John Holland or the older nontechnical classic "Chaos: Making a New Science" by James Gleick.

The book is also plagued with numerous factual errors. (His reference to Beethoven's Eroica Symphony as a late work, produced in the same general period as the Ninth Symphony and the Diabelli Variations, has been cited in another review.) Additionally, Mr. Ward's writing style and his many lapses in grammar, syntax, and punctuation make the book irritating to read and make one wish that a good editor had taken the manuscript firmly in hand. Awkward shifts in tense within a single sentence, lack of subject-verb agreement, and Mr. Ward's apparent disdain for commas make what is actually a simple book a chore to read.

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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Not beyond, still in the middle of it, January 6, 2003
By 
Chiara Lama (Roma, RM Italy) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Beyond Chaos: The Underlying Theory Behind Life, the Universe, and Everything (Hardcover)
I read introductory books to be informed on a field I am not familiar with: so I expect clarity and relevance. Ward's book is far from that. The Preface, the Introduction and the first chapter are devoted to promise information about a new theory behind everything, but you never get there. Facts, names and theories are put together, but they don't seem to add up to nothing. Where I am able to check, the book in not correct (Beethoven's Eroica is not a late composition).
Really disappointing.

Not a service to the theories it is meant to support and divulgate.
Somewhere, it should be said that this is just the American edition of an English book called "Universality".

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Lots of speculation, no substance, March 13, 2004
By 
Ramesh Gopal (Albuquerque, NM United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Beyond Chaos: The Underlying Theory Behind Life, the Universe, and Everything (Hardcover)
The book is disjointed and speculative so that it is hard to take any of the arguments seriously. It is strange to find this in a book about science, but then perhaps it is not a science book! Some remarks comparing scientific research today with demonology several hundred years ago make you wonder. It is almost as bad as `The Web of Life' by Fritjof Capra (conversely if you liked that book, you will like this one too). Oddly enough, although the book claims not to be about Chaos but about `Universality', it is Chaos that appears in the title. I am fairly familiar with the research into chaos theory, but having read this book I still cannot really tell you what `Universality' is, other than that it seems to involve everything (!). In any case, the book presents even the better data on the subject poorly.

On a general note, in thinking of fractals (discussed extensively but loosely in the book) I wonder if we are not over-interpreting the data. After all, mathematicians have known all along that mathematical models can represent a variety of natural processes and yet have no causal relation to them. Similarly, when we see fractals in a wide variety of biological structures and processes, is it because fractals are fundamental to them, or because, as I suspect, a fractal can be used to model anything? Is it the chicken or the egg?

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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
It is 28 May 1583. Summer is beginning to take up its lease. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
stock market movements, early oceans, fractal pattern, mean field theory
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New York, Game of Life, Per Bak, Benoit Mandelbrot, Gene Stanley, Jim Springer, Kevin Bacon, Leo Kadanoff, Jim Lewis, Santa Fe Institute, Harvard University, Hermes Trismegistus
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