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From: ceb@csli.Stanford.EDU (Charles Buckley)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics
Subject: Re: Fractals, and Philosophy of Science
Message-ID: <11638@csli.Stanford.EDU>
Date: 8 Jan 90 05:19:55 GMT
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In-reply-to: rick@hanauma.stanford.edu's message of 6 Jan 90 20:00:03 GMT

In article <6937@lindy.Stanford.EDU> rick@hanauma.stanford.edu (Richard Ottolini) writes:
   >Don't abandon "new age" mathematics such as fractals nor worship it.
   >Sometimes years later something will escape from recreational
   >mathematics and be useful.  Two examples:
   >(1) Cellular automata are a serious competitor to differential equations
   >for modeling waves and fluids . . .
   >(2) In computer graphics, quaternian transforms may be superior
   >to homogeneous coordinates for modeling transformations.

Well, not so fast:  
1. the applications of cellular automata you cite are easily
   relatable to differential equations, and anyway CA have
   been respected for some time - the chief obstacle to their
   use was simply a lack of hardware.  Differential equations
   (at least some of them) were solvable by hand, and there are 
   tricks you could use when they weren't, so they grew popular
   when computers were only jokes on and built by the military.
2. Quaternia (singular: quaternion) have also been respectable for
   quite some time - the chief obstacles to their widespread use were
   a perceived obscurity and lack of perceived need, plus the fact
   that much of the best work describing them was done in the Russian
   hinterlands, and remained obscure due to societal chaos for many years.

Fractals are irksome to so many because they produce stunning results
similar to those of phenomena we don't well understand, and no one can
really say why.  This was not true of your companion examples.