'Fractalist' Benoît Mandelbrot dies

[n2doc]

Physics & Math
Valerie Jamieson, chief features editor

(Image: clawan/Shutter/stock)

Benoît Mandelbrot, who died a month shy of his 86th birthday on Thursday, wanted to be remembered as the founding father of fractal geometry – the branch of mathematics that perceives the hidden order in nature.

He became a household name, thanks to the psychedelic swirls and spikes of the most famous fractal equation, Mandelbrot set. (Recently, a 3D version of the set was discovered, called the Mandelbulb.)

Fractals are everywhere, from cauliflowers to our blood vessels. No matter how you divide a fractal nor how closely or distantly you zoom in, its shape stays the same. They have helped model the weather, measure online traffic, compress computer files, analyse seismic tremors and the distribution of galaxies. And they became an essential tool in the 1980s for studying the hidden order in the seemingly disordered world of chaotic systems.

By his own admission, Mandelbrot spent his career trawling the litter cans of science for fractal patterns and found them in the most unusual places. His job title at Yale University in New Haven, Conneticut, was deliberately chosen with this diversity in mind. "I'm a mathematical scientist," he told me. "It's a very ambiguous term."

more
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2010/10/fractalist-benoit-mandelbrot-d.html

[Poll_Blind]

1. Salut!

You really changed the world. You really did. Talk about an amazing individual.

PB

[napoleon_in_rags]

2. And yet he didn't...

Die, I mean. hundreds, maybe thousands of years from now people will be looking at the mathematical objects named after him with the same wonder we contemplate the theorems of Pythagoras today. What an incredible achievement. Thank you Mandelbrot.

[pokerfan]

3. In honor of his passing, one of my own

Courtesy of GNU XaoS...

[mattvermont]

4. not to diminish your celebration

but he died last year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benoit_Mandelbrot

[pokerfan]

7. ooops

I should have followed the link before assuming that this was news...

[napoleon_in_rags]

10. Well I'm glad you posted it, I didn't know and now I have thanked him. nt

[pokerfan]

11. I wasn't the OP

I just responded as well all did. But then again I didn't know either.

[napoleon_in_rags]

12. Wow, my misunderstandings are self replicating fractally...

I'm just going to leave this thread alone now. :)

[pokerfan]

13. lol (nt)

[girl gone mad]

5. Again?

[eppur_se_muova]

8. A series of diminishing deaths, each similar to the previous one, only smaller ... nt

[napoleon_in_rags]

9. LOL! Hahaha. nt

[Jack Rabbit]

6. RIP

Madelbrot Set Created by Wolfgang Beyer with the program Ultra Fractal 3 from Wikipedia (Creative Commons License, Attribution/Share Alike)

[bananas]

14. Dave Clark Five: Bits and Pieces

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoRLIJJSG4o

[drokhole]

15. Fractals, for the win!

[mattvermont]

16. romanesco broccoli is

my favorite vegetable for this reason

[sofa king]

17. "Mandelbrot's in heaven..."

"...At least he will be when he's dead,
Right now he's still alive and teaching math at Yale
He gave us order out of chaos, he gave us hope where there was none
And his geometry succeeds where others fail
If you ever lose your way, a butterfly will flap its wings
From a million miles away, a little miracle will come to take you home "

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIj30SOoIDM&feature=related