Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 25, 1993 TAG: 9304230115
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: STEVE KARK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
And like a lot of the scientific stuff published these days, much of it is altogether beyond the understanding of simple folk like me, those of us kicking around out here in the intellectual bottomlands. We're still trying to figure out an easy way of opening a bag of potato chips while driving.
But you know, what little I've read about this chaos stuff seems like nothing new to me. If I understand it correctly, what the theory says, when boiled down, is that things are a lot more unpredictable than scientists previously thought.
In other words, where scientists once thought events in the universe more or less followed well-worn paths, they now propose that these same events sometimes appear to weave about randomly, like cows after eating too many rotten apples.
Well now, I may not be able to tell you much about the more complicated parts of this fine theory, but most anyone out here in the hollow could have told you things happen at random.
The farmer likely knew about ol' Betsy's weakness for cider when he put a fence around the orchard, but he also appreciates the situation's basic unpredictability. He knows there's no telling what might happen when cows get to leaning and scratching up against a length of fence.
And they tell me scientists are building careers on this kind of research?
The folks who fund studies like this should have asked us first. We would have set them straight and saved them a lot of money, too.
It doesn't take a degree in physics to understand the basics behind all this stuff. Take, for instance, this business about Isaac Newton and the apple. As the story goes, he is supposed to have found his famous principle of gravity after he saw an apple fall from a tree.
Well, any fool knows not to sit under a tree full of ripe apples. Tell us what happens next. That's the tricky part. Which direction will the apples roll when they hit the ground? How many will roll outside the fence? Enough to tantalize Betsy and her cud-chewing companions?
Can Newton's laws of motion tell us what'll happen to a herd of cows when they eat the apples after they've been lying there a while, fermenting in the hot sun?
Nope, they can't! That's applied physics for you. Who cares where the nearest galaxy is headed? I'm more interested in knowing where that half-ton of unsteady beefsteak might be going.
I haven't forgotten the Einsteinians and the unified-theory hot shots who followed. But I'll admit, I'm less concerned about the state of subatomic particles than I am about the state of my pea patch tomorrow morning.
If the laws of nature are supposed to apply anywhere in the universe, I should be able to use 'em out here as well. And if there is a theory that shows that galaxies are driven by the same laws as invisible atoms, it should also apply to anything in between. To cows, for instance.
The study of bovine motion deserves just as much respect as the study of celestial or subatomic motion.
It sure does in this part of the known universe. Try waking up some morning to find a couple of cows chomping on your broccoli patch and tell me your perspective wouldn't come a little closer to home.
Steve Kark is an instructor at Virginia Tech and a correspondent for the Roanoke Times & World-News. He writes from his home in scenic Rye Hollow, in a remote part of Giles County south of Pearisburg.
by CNB