This document demonstrates a fabulously astounding angle of modern mathematics and science chaos

theory. Chaos occurs when a physical system just fails or refuses to obey any standard law of science and its
behavious becomes wild and erratic, even frightening to an extent. Mathematics, despite the wonders it has
achieved by reducing nature to sets of differential equations, draws a blank when it comes to dealing with
chaos. In this document, we will be using MATLAB to illustrate the chaotic behaviour of a reasonably simple
equation which is described below:

tn+1 = r * tn * (1 - tn)
Here, t is a series of values and tn denotes the nth term in the series. It is assumed that the initial value of the
series t1 is a positive number between 0 and 1. Also, the multiplication factor r is a positive constant. Let us
first take a look at the MATLAB program used to realise this series and plot it using a graph:
function x = chaos (r,t1,n)
f=inline('r*t*(1-t)','r','t');
t=[];
t(1)=t1;
for i=2:n
t(i)=f(r,t(i-1));
end
plot(t); axis tight;
If you are not a user of MATLAB, chances are that the code might look a bit Greek to you. User inputs to the
program are r (the multiplication factor), t1 (the first term of the series) and n (the number of terms for which
the user wants the series to be calculated). The variable i is used as a loop to generate the series, the function
f is the generating function which is the equation given above and the plot command is used to graph the
function. You need not bother with the technicalities of the program any further. Oh and ya, the name of the
function is chaos. Let's examine how this behaves for different values of the multiplication factor r. For
convenience, value of t1 and n will be kept constant at 0.7 and 50.

Case 1: r<=1
Here, the series always decays to zero.

0.6

0.6

0.5

0.5

0.4

0.4

0.3

0.3

0.2

0.2

0.1

0.1

10

20

30

40

50

r=0.4

60

70

80

90

100

10

15

20

25

r=0.8

30

35

40

45

50

Case 2: 1<r<=3
Here, the series always settles to the value (1-1/r).

0.68

0.65

0.66

0.6

0.64

0.55

0.62
0.5

0.6

0.45

0.58

0.4

0.56

0.35

0.54
5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

10

15

20

r=1.5

25

30

35

40

45

50

r=2.5

Case 3: 3<r<=3.56994
3.56994 is known as the Feigenbaum parameter. Here, the series always takes on an oscillatory
behaviour.

0.8
0.75
0.75
0.7

0.7
0.65

0.65

0.6
0.6

0.55
0.5

0.55

10

15

20

25

30

r=3.2

35

40

45

50

0.45

10

15

20

25

30

r=3.4

35

40

45

50

Case 4: 3.56994<r<=4
This is where chaos ensues! Observe how the series behaves

0.9

0.9

0.8

0.8
0.7

0.7

0.6
0.6

0.5

0.5

0.4

0.4

0.3
0.2

0.3
5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

0.1

50

10

15

20

r=3.7

25

30

35

40

45

50

r=3.9

If the value of the multiplication factor is more than 4, the series ceases to exist and dies down to minus infinity.
The following figure shows all the previous graphs together along with the case for r>4:

0.6

0.6

0.4

0.4

0.2

0.2
20

40

0.6
0.5
0.4
20

40

0.6
0.55
20

40

0.8
0.4
20

40

20

40

0.6
20

40
2

0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2

0.6

40

0.8

0.75
0.7
0.65
0.6
0.55

0.65

20

x 10

160

0
20

40

-2

50

Such is the power of chaos that a simple second-degree equation involving two variables can behave in
extreme fashion. This equation can, by the way, be used to model the population of a particular area subject to
growth and constraints. It's evident that things in our planet do not take place in a very straightforward manner
that can be easily described.