FOTD -- January 17, 2004 (Rating 7) Fractal visionaries and enthusiasts: In yesterday's discussion I wrote about precognition. When I wrote it, I was undecided whether to say that I believe in precognition or to claim that I know it exists. I ended up stating that, because of personal experiences, I am convinced that the ability to foresee future events does exist. This is one step short of saying that I *know* it exists. In order to claim that precognition *does* exist as a proven fact, I would need to display the ability to do things like predicting winning lottery numbers at will, an ability I do not have. I would have been more accurate if I had stated that I am convinced that, on rare occasions, we receive hints of great (and not-so-great) events which have not yet happened. The point in question is whether these hints are actual information from the future, which has somehow moved backward in time and worked its way into our awareness, or whether we merely give undue attention to real events that happen by chance to resemble fantasies we have recently experienced. After considering my own experiences on the seven nights of September 4 to September 10, 2001, I have decided that somehow, information of what would happen on the morning of 9-11 did somehow enter my awareness on those earlier nights. I have no idea of a mechanism through which this might have happened. The important thing is that, because of my experience, I am convinced that our relation to the four-dimensional space-time world around us is far more intimate than the "I'm in here and the world is out there" relation presented by our senses. I am not yet ready to take seriously the pseudo-mystical phrase 'become one with...', but I am now convinced that the hard skeptics, while keeping a thread of reason in a world drowning in nonsense, are still missing something big. And I would not be surprised if fractals were somehow involved. Today's image is a scene in the fractal that results when Z^(-2.5) is subtracted from (1/Z) and (1/C) is added. This parent fractal is a double-lobed thing with X-axis symmetry, consisting of a central area of chaos with a zig-zag filament arching out to the east. Today's scene is located in the vicinity of a larger midget on this filament. The image has been rendered with the outside set to 'tdis'. I named it "Iterative Toytown" for no good reason. The name merely reflects the frame of mind I was in when I thought of it. I have inserted the mathtolerance entry into the parameter file because of the high magnitude of the image, which might cause the image to render at the wrong magnitude if the resolution were increased beyond 640x480. After careful thought, I rated the image at a 7, which is above FOTD average and, combined with a render time of 5 minutes, gives the image an overall value of 140. The value can be raised to 700 or so by eliminating the wait for the image to render. This can be done by letting Paul render the image and by then downloading it from his web site at: <http://home.att.net/~Paul.N.Lee/FotD/FotD.html> The Friday weather was cold here at Fractal Central, but with a temperature of 28F -2C and lighter winds, it was not as cold as recent days. The fractal cats must have agreed. They spent over an hour in the yard, investigating the things they had not checked in several days. When the day ended, they settled comfortably for a peaceful evening. I have only a small bit of work to finish before today will be totally free. What will be done with that free time however remains to be determined. Regardless of what happens, I'll be back in 24 hours with another fractal. Until next time, take care, and be assured that the future will come to pass. Jim Muth jamth@mindspring.com jimmuth@aol.com START 20.0 PAR-FORMULA FILE================================ Iterative_Toytown { ; time=0:04:59.40--SF5 on a P200 reset=2002 type=formula formulafile=allinone.frm formulaname=MandelbrotMix4 function=recip passes=1 center-mag=+3.093845088968933/+0.4908436478215898/\ 1.234142e+012/1/70.01/-0.0191153986490802952 params=1/-1/-1/-2.5/0/0 float=y mathtolerance=/1 maxiter=1200 inside=0 outside=tdis periodicity=10 colors=000VVPkLgxBywDssFnoHhjJcfLYbNTZPNURIQTCMV7I\ X2LU5OR7RO9UMCXJE_GGbDIeBLh8Nk5Pn3R8FsEHpJImOJkTKh\ YMebNcgO`lPYqQWMMYPQURURTYNVaKXeHZiD`mAbq7dsEetKfv\ QgwWhxaGbTIZQKWOMTMNQKPNIRJFTGDUDBWA9Y77Z45Z89ZBCZ\ FFZIIZMLZPOZTRZWUZ_XZb_ZfbZieYfcYdaYa`Y_ZYXXYVWXSU\ XQSXNRXLPXINXGMWFKWEJWEHWDGVCEVCDVBCVAAVA9U97U86U8\ 4U73U72ZA8bDDfGIkJNoLTsOYxRbxUgxWlxUixSfxQcuOarMZp\ KWmITjGRhEOeCLbAI`8GY6DV4AT38S3PR3eQ3vP6rO8oNBlMDh\ MFeLIbKKZJNWIPTIRPHUMGWJFZFE`CEb9DaBDaDC`FC`HC_JB_\ LB_NBZPAZRAYTAYV9XX9XZ9X_AVYAUWBSUBRSBPQCOOCMMCLKE\ JIEIGFHFILALPFNTLRXQT`VWcVZgV`kVboWesZgwciycjwcjtc\ jqajo_klXjiUjfUidUkaUlZUmWUnTUpQQpOLnNKlNKjNKiNKgM\ JeMJdMJbMJ`MJZLIYLIWLIULITLIXQF_UDbYBea9he7ki5nm3g\ o8`qDUrINtNGuSKpTOlURhVVcVZ_WaWXeRYiNYlJZpE_tA`w6`\ p5gi4nb3udFdeROfb8ecCdcFdcJccMbdPbdTadWadZ`eb_ee_e\ iZelYfoYfsXfvXfyLkNPeOS_P } frm:MandelbrotMix4 {; Jim Muth a=real(p1), b=imag(p1), d=real(p2), f=imag(p2), g=1/f, h=1/d, j=1/(f-b), z=(-a*b*g*h)^j, k=real(p3)+1, l=imag(p3)+100, c=fn1(pixel): z=k*((a*(z^b))+(d*(z^f)))+c, |z| < l } END 20.0 PAR-FORMULA FILE==================================