the.com/nonlinear
where a tiny nudge can end the world or change nothing at all.
means a system where output isn't proportional to input, so effects don't scale predictably with their causes.
from from math describing equations whose graphs refuse to be straight lines; borrowed by science to describe any system where doubling the cause doesn't double the effect.
butterfly effectnonlinearity's most famous publicity stunt.
weather forecastinglimited by nonlinear equations, not lazy meteorologists.
brainsneurons fire nonlinearly, which is why thinking isn't arithmetic.
linear systemssolvable exactly; nonlinear ones mostly just simulated.