
Google Earth Fractals - sethbannon
http://paulbourke.net/fractals/googleearth/
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akg
Simply beautiful! I love how advances in technology (like the ability to view
these fractal patterns) allows us to expand art as well as our understanding
of the world around us.

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terramars
these are great and all, but they're all exactly the same.. this is what water
carves pretty much no matter what you do. everything is either glacial, a
mountain ridge, a river, or a coastline. i was hoping for at least a few
spectacular phytoplankton blooms or something unexpected.

~~~
danielbarla
Still, it's pretty cool to see some relatively abstract maths manifest itself
on such a practical scale.

Here's another site with similar images:

[http://www.miqel.com/fractals_math_patterns/visual-math-
natu...](http://www.miqel.com/fractals_math_patterns/visual-math-natural-
fractals.html)

It's hard to recommend parts of that site, it's all awesome.

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peapicker
The rest of Paul Bourke's website is also very cool, so don't miss it!

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evoxed
I was hoping someone else would say this. Some time ago I stopped bookmarking
sites in the browser, relying instead on the principle of "if it's important,
it's memorable"... then I stumbled upon Paul Bourke's page (while looking for
a document/date overview for MacPerpective of all things).

~~~
confluence
I call it the 3-interest rule. If something comes up that I find really
intriguing 3 times in a row from 3 independent and reliable sources
(books/wiki/long form article/comments) - then I go into deep investigative
mode.

I try to soak up as much as I can - not bothering too much with bookmarks
because I'll never come back to it in that fashion (I'm driven by slow-burning
interests/big problems in my field I always think about coupled with short
bursts of deep random investigation into diverse fields that aren't my forte)
and trying to integrate as much as I can within my current mental models
before moving on to other subjects and only returning when the 3-interest rule
is breached once more (it always has with everything I've investigated).

For example: Automation and the reversal of globalisation has come up a few
times from various high signal-low volume sources so I went in deep and have
concluded that China is dead and the future doesn't need humans - at all
(extinction level event).

I just kinda fell into this mode, and this had some effect on my habits:

<http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html>

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soofy
I wonder how hard would it be to measure their mathematical properties, like
fractal dimension. Perhaps using image processing tools. I heard the simple
box counting method is not perfect for complex natural structures. Does anyone
know any published algorithms?

~~~
soofy
There is an attempt here: <http://bit.ly/SXwFDt>

~~~
SquareWheel
Why a bitly link?

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cpolis
This is fascinating! I would love to know the process that the author went
through to find these, i.e. did they just pan over a large area or did they
target certain geographic features. It's interesting that there are entries
from such a wide variety of countries.

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jbattle
It's amazing to think that some of those random looking squiggles are the
center of someone's world. The eye glazes over at the multitude of hills and
river bends - but some must be totally unique and meaningful to someone.

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sonnekki
Would it be silly to attempt to analyze an image of a natural fractal in order
to approximate the equation which forms the fractals?

Has something like that been done before?

~~~
tonymarq
Mandelbrot pushed his discoveries as methods for _modeling_ real-world
objects, including things like what you describe. so, the impetus for his
popularization of fractals was this practical reason. at least, that's how
Mandelbrot promoted fractals

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Grovara123
I think that proof there is a god can be found somewhere between 'Feedback'
and 'Fractals'... would love to check out more information on the mathematics
that exist here.

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cdjarrell
Fantastic! Fractals are beautiful by themselves but when found in nature,
they're just that much more amazing

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aacook
I would like one of these printed and on my wall.

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washedup
I have bought a couple satellite images from the USGS. The prints are large
and very beautiful (and cheap). I would suggest checking it out (sorry for the
horrible looking link):

[http://store.usgs.gov/b2c_usgs/b2c/display/(xcm=r3standardpi...](http://store.usgs.gov/b2c_usgs/b2c/display/\(xcm=r3standardpitrex_prd&layout=6_1_61_50_2&uiarea=2&ctype=areaDetails&carea=0000001915\)/.do)

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treelovinhippie
Made a backup here: <http://imgur.com/a/gFKhN>

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6ren
life imitating mathematics imitating life

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guelo
These are not fractals. Fractal-like at best.

~~~
daliusd
From <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractal>

"The mathematical concept is difficult to formally define even for
mathematicians, but key features can be understood with little mathematical
background."

I'm not even sure if saying that something is fractal-like doesn't make it
fractal? One of fractal properties is self-similarity. Thus if you say that it
is similar to fractals doesn't it make it fractal?

