vastly affect the outcome that is
unpredictability and that is one of my
favorite quotes from Jeff Colvin’s
character from Jurassic Park widely
renowned Quixote shins and fiction and
probably one of the only coyote shins
and fiction none other than dr. Ian
Malcolm if you aren’t familiar with him
you’re lying because everyone will
everyone’s watched Jurassic Park he was
one of my favorite characters from the
original film and everybody loved him
some were in it for his sarcastic
demeanor others for his physique but
personally my admiration was instigated
from his explanation of the chaos theory
like many characters in film before him
he attempted to explain the theory it’s
usually conceptualized using the
butterfly effect though not wrong in his
initial explanation like anything in
film in film it’s it isn’t always
accurate and now in true fashion I will
attempt to explain the theory to the
best of my abilities they’re with me
though I’m clearly not a qualified
mathematician so really what is chaos
theory it’s a branch of study under
mathematics that focuses on the initial
conditions of dynamical systems quite a
mouthful I know dynamical systems are
essentially patterns of motion anything
affected by the environment around it
the examples are like complex weather
patterns to even the flow of water
through a pipe and even the swinging of
a clogs pendulum the everyday examples
surround us and we are more often than
not too oblivious to marvel at at all
the study spotlights the idea that there
is a sensitive dependence on initial
conditions essentially what comes first
if there’s even a slightest change at
the beginning it can have massive
repercussions in the later state it
would be easy to understand if it was
conceptualized and it was in the form of
the butterfly effect and MIT
meteorologist Edward Lorenz came up with
the question does the flap of a
butterfly’s wings in in Brazil set off a
tornado in
axis it was used in the case of whether
essentially small short-term predictions
tend to be accurate however long-term
predictions and unless all the factors
are accounted for long-term predictions
are really no better than guesses since
then the theory and the phrase and the
question have been modified in pop
culture multiple times usually in movies
about time travel and now i’m going to
give you an example so for example i
could be walking along the pavement on a
wednesday evening I’ve just been
thinking about a book that I’ve you know
ordered a couple of weeks before a book
that is essential to my course something
that’s going to help me pass with flying
colors and it just so happens that it is
being delivered on that particular
Wednesday evening so my usual route home
requires that I take a left as soon as I
cross the road but this particular
Wednesday I’m feeling dangerous I’m
feeling excited for my books arrival
it’s going to make me a new person and
so I jaywalk 10 meters before the zebra
crossing unsurprisingly this turns out
to be a mistake I don’t see the massive
truck her sling towards me down the road
don’t worry there no one was harmed in
the making of this hypothetical scenario
so the truck driver swerves and I’m
saved and I apologize profusely and then
I run from the scene I’m far too awkward
I don’t realize that all of the contents
of the truck has fallen out but i’m sure
there’s bystanders around i’m sure he
got help picking everything up and so I
go home and I wait I wait for my books
arrival and I wait for weeks and it
never arrives little did I know that
that truck happened to be carrying my
book it was the bookshops truck and I
had inadvertently not helped myself in
any kind of way and and so I feel sad
and I feel dejected and I feel betrayed
by my book shop because my book never
arrived leaving me unprepared for exams
unprepared for exams failing my cause
setting in for a dead-end job and never
amounting to any of my personal goals in
life quite dramatic towards the end but
hey that’s the butterfly effect and so
this got me though what I do here and so
this gum and so this got me thinking
the butterfly effect if crudely crudely
simplified quite literally means that
things that start up small perhaps
meaningless actions can escalate to
unprecedented proportions I mean think
about the amplification is exponential
it means that every action we carry out
will have an effect and that effect will
hopefully be the intended one sometimes
not but in effect nonetheless and that
effect will catalyze people’s actions
and so on and so forth until the chains
are interwoven tightly on a mathematical
level the theory is so multifaceted that
unless you spent years and years
studying dynamical systems you would
underestimate the sheer complexity of it
all like me with that example but on a
metaphorical level and let’s stick to
the metaphorical because I’m a
literature student and that’s what we do
it’s quite clear what the theory alludes
to our significance in our system or if
you’re a cynic our lack of a lack of
significance the thing is coming to the
conclusion that you might be in a
relevant part of the universe takes its
toll you start thinking that nothing
really matters usually teetering on the
edge and falling into nihilism but
really it’s a double-edged sword one
tiny change in the natural timeline of
things and a natural disaster strikes
but the change is inevitable if anything
the change is the only constant we have
and you can’t meticulously plan
everything out in life what you can do
is instigate actions that will propel
your life in a positive direction carry
out actions that you feel will make a
difference no matter how trivial it’s
the idea that our actions are
instigators for something bigger
catalyst for something bigger it’s where
movements like the random act of
kindness conf comes from its where
strikes come from where protests comes
from it’s where change comes from and so
you will never really understand your
true impact on someone’s life until
you’re taking out the picture so why not
try and make it as memorable a snapshot
don’t lose the opportunity to in essence
create a picture that people will look
back on with fond smiles cause chain
reactions in people’s lives for the
better because
if something as small as a butterfly’s
wings can set off a tornado who’s to say
that another’s will not stop it thank
you
[Applause] [Music]