On the concept of universality in our world

Statistics is one of the most powerful ways of looking at the world ever devised. It basically allows you to analyse a wide range of systems and come to conclusions without really knowing what's going on at a deeper level. It's kind of magical, when you think about it, though it surely can become a deadly weapon used blindly.

I'm no statistician. To be honest, statistics kind of scare me with all their mathematical complexities. However, I've studied one of its applications in the context of physics, to be precise, in the discipline of statistical mechanics.

When you look at the natural world, there are many very complicated things going on, which we might not even perceive. Take for example the complex air currents surrounding us or the waves of heat coming from the sun. What these phenomena have in common is that they arise from the interactions of many little things, which might be molecules or perhaps "droplets of light" (a cute name I just thought of for photons).

Think of the incredible number of ways in which these elements can interact! It's endless. There are however certain conditions under which these systems take on stable properties which we identify with our day to day experience (think for example our environment's usual temperature) and with the power of statistical mechanics we can predict these situations. We could also predict new states of matter and then make them up in the laboratory. It's quite an exciting thing!

Now, close your eyes and think for a moment of the vast amount of things you could consider elements. Not only molecules and photons but also electrons, atoms, and who knows what else! Then mix them up and put them in many different situations! How many interesting things can you come up with?

What is quite incredible is the fact that when you take two seemingly different physical systems, such as a magnet and some chemical solution, the mathematics that describe some of their properties are the same. The properties I'm referring to are called phase transitions, like for instance the transition from the solid phase to the liquid phase. For the magnet it's a little bit more complicated but it's basically a transition from a state with magnetization to another without it. The patterns that present themselves in both systems can be mapped from one to the other. It's as if they are the same thing presented physically as different things. More or less this is what we mean by universality. And it goes way further than this simple example.

Universality is presented in many aspects of our world. In physical phenomena as well as biological and social phenomena. There is something about this that makes the mind itch. Is there something else going on here? Are there other guiding principles in the world that we don't know about? Just food for thought...

I leave you with this question: are my actions little elements that compound to greater and greater things?

I can not help but wonder at how deep we can get with this topic. But I guess the greeks knew all about it already! :p