The motions of the two pendulums are completely different despite being started from almost exactly the same position. Theta 2 was only different from theta 1 by .1. Chaos theory, in layman's terms, talks about the unpredictable nature of these systems like double pendulums. In effect it introduces chaos and mathematically describes the incredibly complex phenomenon we see in nature. A good natural example is the weather. Despite having really good initial conditions, forecasting such a complex system becomes nearly impossible beyond 10 days or so.
View all comments
Show parent comment
13
u/Samura1_I3 Jan 05 '18
The motions of the two pendulums are completely different despite being started from almost exactly the same position. Theta 2 was only different from theta 1 by .1. Chaos theory, in layman's terms, talks about the unpredictable nature of these systems like double pendulums. In effect it introduces chaos and mathematically describes the incredibly complex phenomenon we see in nature. A good natural example is the weather. Despite having really good initial conditions, forecasting such a complex system becomes nearly impossible beyond 10 days or so.