What is life? The physicist Schrödinger said that life is orderly and complicated. Life draws order from the disorder around it. As a pioneer of quantum mechanics , he also made biological conjectures. He said that a living organism has "an amazing talent to gather a stream of'order' on itself, so as to prevent itself from decaying into a mess of atoms." So the birth of life is from disorder to existence. The ordering process is called " negative entropy".
What does "negative entropy" mean? Before figuring out this concept, let's first look at "entropy". Entropy is a physical quantity that describes the degree of disorder in the universe. The more disordered, the greater the entropy. In layman's terms, entropy is the degree of confusion of matter. Negative entropy means to fight against "entropy". For example: ten chopsticks are placed side by side, it looks more orderly, and the entropy is relatively low. When the ten chopsticks are dropped on the ground, the order of the ten chopsticks will be scattered, which also means an increase in entropy. It is impossible to restore order by external force.
Increased entropy is going to chaos, and negative entropy is going to order. Without management and intervention, life will naturally become chaotic to the extreme, which is death. Life through self-discipline, such as exercise, healthy eating, and emotional stability, is negative entropy.
So whether it is the macrocosm of the universe, or the microcosm of quantum , only the pursuit of order can get the lasting development and advancement. On the contrary, chaos and randomness mean the final demise. With the increase of various abnormal phenomena on the earth in recent years, such as global warming, frequent occurrence of plague viruses, etc., will become the greatest threat to mankind. And these are not questions that can be explained by "a snap of Thanos", so the research of the new discipline of Chaos was born.With many seemingly unsolvable questions, we walked into this "Chaos" together.
01 What we need to know about the author
The author of this book is also a well-known science and technology writer and international journalist of James Span. This work is regarded as an Internet pioneer who has had a cultural impact on modern technology. He is widely known for using narrative non-fiction techniques to introduce unfamiliar and complex concepts. He is known as "one of the greatest tech writers in history". His work has been translated into three Ten languages.
About this "Chaos" is his first work in 1987. It was a finalist for the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize and became a bestseller. At the same time, the term "chaos" and " butterfly effect " is well-known. Later, he successively published "Feynman's Biography", "Faster and Faster", "Newton's Biography" and other books. His "A Brief History of Information" published in 2011 won the Royal Society Popular Science Book Award, the American PEN Edward Wilson Popular Science Award, and the British PEN Hessel-Tilterman Award, and became an international bestseller. The Chinese version of "A Brief History of Information" also came out in 2013 and won the 9th " Wenjin Book Award " in 2014.
"Chaos" is Greck's famous work and a popular science masterpiece in the field of chaos theory. It has been translated into 25 languages so far. In this book, it is pointed out that chaos theory is one of the most important scientific knowledge of this era. It created a new natural science and set off a new wave of human thought. Since Lorenz discovered the butterfly effect, chaos theory explained the rhythm of life, the evolution of society, the shape of nature, and the constant of the universe.Those seemingly irrelevant irregular phenomena have been given new meanings, and humans’ perspective on themselves and everything has been completely broadened. The well-known popular science writer Greek explained the mystery of chaos theory in a simple and profound way with his extremely high scientific literacy. This book shows the acumen, perseverance and creativity of scientists beyond ordinary people. Among them, their frustration and joy in the process of pursuing the truth are all presented through the author's vivid writing.
02 Is chaos in our daily lives?
I used to think that when we are in a daze, sometimes our minds are in a state of emptiness or chaos. I can't tell. At this time, perhaps our consciousness has entered another dimension, and the sudden return to God is just the recovery when the consciousness returns to the form. As for where I realized it is still a mystery. In short, most of the moments in a daze we are undoubtedly relaxed, and some people say that at this time we easily enter the flow .
mentioned in the book that cosmologist Stephen Hawkingzen said in a 1980 lecture entitled "The end of theoretical physics?" The physical laws of things have come to every aspect of our lives. Whether it is our minds or the weather on the earth...The achievements of physics have profoundly changed the face of the 20th century.
This book is too "thick", so thick that it requires too much thinking, because it subverts many previous cognitions. Let us look at life and the universe from another angle.
03 Exploring the future direction of chaos from the butterfly effect from the beginning of chaos
When I first learned the subject of physics,Speaking of the speed at which we sneeze, it feels that the power of human sneeze is too great, but fortunately it is on the earth and we can control the trend. What will happen if we sneeze in a universe without gravity? So that later developed the habit of sneezing if it is not in an open space, it must be blocked, so as not to hurt the innocent. So thinking is always subverted again and again with the improvement of cognition.
said in this book that from as early as the end of the 19th century, some scientists have realized that the global warming caused by the greenhouse effect caused by human economic activities has become an unignorable one more than a hundred years later. Reality; the frequent occurrence of extreme weather and disasters such as torrential rains, high temperatures, wildfires, droughts, and extreme cold has made most people, except for a few die-hard deniers, realize that climate change is no longer a theoretical future, but A reality that is happening.
04 said at the end
"Chaos" is destined to subvert mankind's view of nature and science, and it is destined to completely change the way mankind predicts the unknown, explains nature and human phenomena. Changes in weather, migration of organisms, rhythm of heartbeat, evolution of society... Find an orderly structure in the unpredictable "disorder", "complex" and "uncertain", and explore what can't be clarified and predicted by classical science Mystery.
How do we understand chaos in our daily lives? Throughout history, the world has been volatile. As a human individual with limited life, there are many uncertainties in this life. Just like when the epidemic broke out in 2019, as ordinary people, we are limited in our ability to fight the front line of the epidemic, so as long as we stay at home and do not go out to make trouble, we will protect ourselves, and will not cause trouble and trouble to others. , But also indirectly contribute to the country.
Therefore, each of us must be based on the present, based on our own family and career, lay a solid foundation in all aspects of our own, and strive to be a solid young slash young man, we will be welcoming life There are more ways to deal with sudden changes.
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