Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Mathematical Equations of Perfection in Nature by Kat Magendie


“Nobody’s perfect,” I thought as I took my mountain walk one morning. “Is this a feeling of joy?” I wondered as I inhaled clean mountain air. Alongside the road I walked that morning many wildflowers and wild grown plants, some unique and rare and beautiful, grow seemingly random. A Daisy caught my eye, then another and another. I wondered, “Is there a perfect circle of yellow inside that flower?”

I am not a mathematician, and indeed, mathematics puzzles me, frustrates me—always logical, always right, always perfect? I am such a rabid Right-Brainer. I imagine the right hemisphere of my brain is swollen and pulsing, the synapses firing off chaotically, but with their own kind of weird organization when necessary to be in polite society; however, I imagine my left hemisphere as a bit flat and aloof, sitting stoic at a desk while reading important stuff that it won’t share with the right brain (because the right brain can’t or won’t listen).

I wonder then, if a mathematician were to measure the golden inside of the Daisy, would it be a perfect circle? It looks to the eye to be. Is it? I need to know, for the eye gauge is not enough; is the soft sun inside of the Daisy a perfect circle? Who will measure for me and then let me know? And if it is not, would I enjoy the Daisy any less? Why of course not. I just have a need to know if there is some order to the Daisy that I never noticed before. I imagine mathematics both calms and excites the innards of the left brainers as my creative chaos both stills and energizes my right brain.

Are there other “Orders To The Universe” that mathematics can solve? Somewhere out there are people whose left brains pulse like my right brain and can figure all this out.

But this morning, I’ll just be grateful for the daisy, with the (perfect?) little happy circle in the middle. I’ll be thankful there are left-brainers who can figure out the mathematical equations of perfection in nature.

5 comments:

Terri Tiffany said...

Loved this though and be glad you are a right brainer cause the left brainers might not enjoy it as much!

Barbara Quinn said...

Left brains and right brains seem to balance it all out.We definitely need em both in the world! I really enjoyed your insights.:-)

Angie Ledbetter said...

Thank God no math is needed to love and enjoy the beauty of Nature! Loved this post.

Glenda Council Beall said...

I would never think mathmatically about a daisy or any flower, but this post is most interesting. I might look at flowers differently from now on.
I love this blog. I'll come back often.

patresa hartman said...

oh oh oh! kat! but you CAN solve these mysteries. righties and lefties are investigating all the same stuff just via different circuitry. :)

for instance... i read an article about genomes this last week, and through sequencing dna of people from all races, ethnicities, regions, etc... they found that at a genetic level we are 99% identical. that all of our differences occupy only 1% of who we are. 1%! we war over 1%!

my point here, is that chaotic, inquisitive, pondering right brainers already knew that. so lefties and righties knew the same exact thing, just using different angles.

i love these discussions. seriously love them.

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