Cycles
The most fendamental principle in the universe
This idea was enlighted by Daniel Dennett. To me, his book Intuition pump and other tools for thinking is all about cycle. If you let me use a word to summarize his book, I would use the word Cycle.
Cycles are everywhere.
Look at ourselves. When we wake up, sleep, that's a cycle. When the sun rises, set, that's a cycle. When the water evaporates, precipitate, that's a cycle.
Look through a microscope, when we eat, our stomach will turn the fuel—food— into energy that supplied whenever we move, think or just to be alive. This is called Krebs cycle.
Look through a macroscopic level, can you think of a phenomenon that is governed by cycles?
Evolution!
Look all these billion years, how we turn from bateria into this so complicated mammal, it is an art of mother nature. How does evolution works? it allows speicies to make random copying "error" from their DNA, others may call it mutant. From this error, some species may distinct, some may evolve. It depends on luck. But from mother nature's perspective, it is all about improvement. Each error made by the DNA can be seen as an improvement for that species. It allows it to adapt the system(environment) more effectivly and efficiently.
It was an Aha! moment for me when I noticed the basic algorithm behind the mother nature. That why cycles are so powerful!
We use cycles to power our car. That cycle is called Otto cycle. (Truck use Diesel cycle)
We use cycles to power our plane. (Brayton Cycle)
We use cycles to cool our home. (Refrigeration cycle)
We use cycles to generate electricity. (Rankine cycle)
Almost the entire industrial revolution is built on top of Cycles. Even our computer, CPU operates from instruction cycles.
Our software. They uses loops to operate the command.
**Why loops can also be seen as cycles? **
Let's define Cycle first, what is a Cycle? Repeating sequence of action. What does loop do? Repeat.
That's why computer has so much power, it just operates its cycle really fast.
**How can we use this thinking tool to improve ourselves? **
Well, imagine we are working as part of a cycle. How do you improve the cycles efficiency? we can do it by the following:
- Increase your operation speed. This is why computer is so powerful. Not because they are smart, it is because they operate so fast. Billions of cycles per second. So whenever we find we can increase our operation speed or the number of operation, we can improve our output.
- Increase your improvement for each time you operate.