A Nonlinear Dynamics Perspective of Wolfram's New Kind of Science Part V: Fractals Everywhere

This fifth installment is devoted to an in-depth study of CA Characteristic Functions, a unified global representation for all 256 one-dimensional Cellular Automata local rules. Except for eight rather special local rules whose global dynamics are described by an affine (mod 1 ) function of only one binary cell state variable, all characteristic functions exhibit a fractal geometry where self-similar two-dimensional substructures manifest themselves, ad infinitum, as the number of cells (I + 1) → ∞. In addition to a complete gallery of time-1 characteristic functions for all 256 local rules, an accompanying table of explicit formulas is given for generating these characteristic functions directly from binary bit-strings, as in a digital-to-analog converter. To illustrate the potential applications of these fundamental formulas, we prove rigorously that the “right-copycat” local rule 170 is equivalent globally to the classic “left-shift” Bernoulli map. Similarly, we prove the “left-copycat” local rule 240 is equivalent globally to the “right-shift” inverse Bernoulli map. Various geometrical and analytical properties have been identified from each characteristic function and explained rigorously. In particular, two-level stratified subpatterns found in most characteristic functions are shown to emerge if, and only if, b1 = 0, where b1 is the “synaptic coefficient” associated with the cell differential equation developed in Part I. Gardens of Eden are derived from the decimal range of the characteristic function of each local rule and tabulated. Each of these binary strings has no predecessors (pre-image) and has therefore no past, but only the present and the future. Even more fascinating, many local rules are endowed with binary configurations which not only have no predecessors, but are also fixed points of the characteristic functions. To dramatize that such points have no past, and no future, they are henceforth christened “Isles of Eden”. They too have been identified and tabulated.