23
Dec
New Delhi : Ever observed the flock of pigeons taking off in a jiffy? Suddenly they take-off helter-skelter but within a flash, they are in a formation. The sudden emergence of spontaneous order is called self-organisation. While the random flight is periodic, the emergence of formation is harmonic. In the self-organisation, individual components organise their collective behaviour to create global order by interactions amongst themselves rather than through external intervention or instruction. Periodic oscillations are prevalent in nature and can have good or bad outcomes. The periodic oscillations in a flute are, for example, soothing, while those of a bridge…