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Chaos
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The place to begin is the ChaosForum site at www.chaosforum.com. Here you'll find a broad range of links to topics such as a quick introduction to chaos theory, a set of interesting FAQs, and a bibliography. Next, check out the chapter, "Thinking Past the Obvious" in Joseph O'Connor's book, The Art of Systems Thinking: Essential Skills for Creativity and Problem Solving (Thorsons, 1998). For a really cool article on how to apply chaotic software to manufacturing processes, read "The Man from CHAOS" by William Green at www.fastcompany.com/online/01/chaos.html. You'll find more details on the Coopers & Lybrand simulation in the Forbes article, "Playing the Game of Life," which is posted online at www.forbes.com/forbes/97/0407/5907100a.htm. The Santa Fe Institute is the "mecca" for computational approaches to complex systems. Don't miss the online demos of chaos simulations at www.santafe.edu/projects/swarm/examples/index.html. For some perspective on the entire chaos movement, connect to foxnet.cs.cmu.edu/people/spot/nab/perplexity.html and read "From Complexity to Perplexity." You'll find additional links about chaos theory, the Butterfly Effect, and Edward N. Lorenz at the ThinkQuest online library (library.thinkquest.org/library/index.html) by searching for "chaos."
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Additional Links

Systems Thinking: You Can't Have the Butter and the Money from the Butter   A classic image from chaos theory is that a very small action--the flapping of a butterfly's wing--can have an enormous impact on a dynamic system--weather patterns that create hurricanes. To fully understand this idea, you also need to understand systems thinking. This section of a Web site called the Change Management Toolbook clearly explains systems concepts and illustrates them with easy-to-understand examples and graphics. The author of the Web site is Holger Nauheimer, who is an organizational development consultant in Germany.

Chaos and Complexity: What Does That Have to Do with Knowledge Management   If applying chaos theory to situations in the business world (or your life) seems to be an overwhelming challenge, this article can help lead the way to a deeper understanding. The author, Michael R. Lissack, a research associate at Henley Management College, U.K., outlines how the language of complexity theory can serve as useful metaphors in management contexts.
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