the concept of chaos theory: it is an evolutionary theory that the system suddenly changes from an orderly state to a disorderly state, and it is a study of the ways and mechanisms for the formation of the inherent "random process" in deterministic systems.
The unknowable result caused by randomness. There is a film that is a good explanation of this theory. The film name is Chaos Theory. The plot is probably that Frank records what he should do every day or even every minute, and then he follows the rules day by day through the simple and effective systematic method of time schedule and index card.
In fact, Frank's detailed list of "daily things to do" can be called a legend in itself. He realized that only by doing so can he live a "safe" life, because he hates accidents ... Every decision he makes is well thought out and planned, so he lives a completely predictable life.
Frank's wife, Susan, and his daughter, Jessie, are also forced to follow the pace of his life. They find that Frank seems to be obsessed with such things and has become an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Although this kind of life is very routine and safe, it is inevitable that there will be a sense of frustration because it remains the same. One morning, Susan, who had been depressed for a long time, decided to make a small attempt. She hoped to "loosen" her husband's oppressive schedule, so she moved the clock forward by 1 minutes ... What Susan couldn't imagine was that an unconscious behavior under her impulse eventually became the fuse to release a series of disasters, which made Frank's cautious regular life collapse instantly and plunged into a whole mess. As a result, Frank is likely to be forced to re-examine his life. He will find that even if he is not an efficiency expert who is fully armed with timetables and index cards, he can still use his "random" life to gain the talent of affection, friendship, love and tolerance at the same time.
"Relativity dispels the illusion of absolute space and time; Quantum mechanics eliminates Newton's dream about controllable measurement process; Chaos eliminates Laplace's illusion of deterministic predictability. "
one thing is that the future is uncertain. If you're sure one day, you've hit it.
the development of the second thing is achieved through the order of self-similarity. When you see a cloud, you know it's a cloud, and when you see a mountain, you know it's a mountain. Why? Is self-similarity. These are two basic concepts of chaos theory.
another aspect of chaos theory is the development of personality. It has three principles. One is that the development of things always moves in the direction of least resistance. The second principle is that when something changes direction, it has some structure.
Chaos theory is a method with both qualitative thinking and quantitative analysis, which is used to discuss the behaviors in dynamic systems (such as population movement, chemical reaction, meteorological change, social behavior, etc.) that cannot be explained and predicted by a single data relationship, but must be explained by a whole and continuous data relationship.
the word "two chaos" originally refers to the chaotic state before the universe was formed. Chinese and ancient Greek philosophers held the theory of chaos from the beginning of the universe, and advocated that the universe gradually formed an orderly world from the beginning of chaos. In the orderly universe, western natural scientists have discovered many laws in nature one by one after long-term discussion, such as gravity, lever principle, relativity and so on. These natural laws can be described by a single mathematical formula, and the behavior of objects can be accurately predicted according to this formula.
in the past three or half centuries, scientists have found that many natural phenomena can be reduced to simple mathematical formulas, but their behaviors cannot be predicted. For example, meteorologist Edward Lorenz found that simple thermal convection can actually cause unimaginable meteorological changes, resulting in the so-called "butterfly effect", that is, a certain underground heavy snow, which was found to be caused by the airflow generated by butterflies flapping their wings in different places a few months ago. In the 196s, American mathematician Stephen Smale found that after some regular changes in the behavior of some objects, there was no certain trajectory for the subsequent development, showing a chaotic state of disorder.
the phenomenon of four chaos is caused by the fact that objects constantly copy the motion state of the previous stage according to some rules, resulting in unpredictable random effects. The so-called "a small difference, a thousand miles lost" is the best annotation of this phenomenon. Specifically, chaos occurs in a changeable object or system, which is very simple at the beginning of action, but after continuous changes of certain rules, it produces unexpected consequences, that is, chaotic state. However, this chaotic state is different from the general chaotic state. After a long-term and complete analysis, some rules can be sorted out from this chaotic phenomenon. Although chaos was first used to explain the nature, it is especially common in the humanities and social fields because things are pulling each other. Such as the ups and downs of the stock market, the smooth twists and turns of life, and the complicated process of education.
Five Chaos Theory has been applied in educational administration, curriculum and teaching, educational research and educational test. Because the object of education is people, who are individuals who change and fluctuate at any time, and the process of education basically follows certain criteria and undergoes long-term interaction, it is quite in line with the framework of chaos theory. Therefore, according to chaos theory, the education system is prone to produce unpredictable results. This result may be positive or negative. Whether it is positive or negative, it is important that the effectiveness of education or educational research should accumulate long-term data in addition to short-term observation, and analyze the possible context from it to increase the predictability of educational effect and use it to expand educational effect.
Three main assumptions and three new realities of the decision-making basis in the past
According to the chaos theory, Glass proposed that the three main assumptions used as the decision-making basis in the past are no longer valid. These assumptions are:
Assumption 1: The enterprise is a closed system of "keeping promises". The outside world has little interference with the actions decided by the enterprise.
assumption 2: the business environment is stable. Managers can fully grasp the business environment, so as to formulate detailed and specific strategies.
assumption 3: managers have sufficient knowledge of the causal relationship of events. They can follow the trail and find out the changes that each event will lead to.
In Glass's view, these old assumptions have been replaced by three new realities:
Reality 1: The enterprise is a complex "open" system, which not only affects its environment, but also is greatly influenced by the environment. This means that the enterprise's actions may not achieve its expected results.
Reality 2: The environment is changing rapidly (constantly creating opportunities and threats). Top managers can't expect to work out a detailed strategy that is still completely effective when put into practice.
Reality 3: The simple linear causality model as the basis of traditional decision theory has failed. Therefore, the consequences of various events are unpredictable
Enlightenment of chaos theory to the concept of internal control
Chaos theory is a rapidly developing new science, which is devoted to the study of complex, nonlinear and dynamic systems. Chaos theory is not about disorder, although it seems so literally. On the contrary, it can be seen as a way to better understand order.
chaotic systems have three key elements: one is sensitive dependence on initial conditions; The second is the critical level, where nonlinear events occur; The third is fractal dimension, which shows the unity of order and disorder. Chaotic systems are often self-feedback systems, and the things that come out will go back and come out after transformation, and the cycle will be endless. Any slight difference in initial values will be exponentially amplified, so the system is inherently unpredictable for a long time.
Chaos theory leads to a famous hypothesis: as long as there is a butterfly flapping its wings on one of the planets, the weather patterns of the two planets that are considered identical may be quite different. According to this assumption, the ineffectiveness of long-term weather forecast is obvious. Even the smallest anomaly at the atomic level will have great unexpected consequences after a long time.
Chaos theory supports the view that it is impossible to predict all those countless small events that deviate from the planned arrangement. At an accidental point in time, the accumulation of these small events may have disastrous consequences. This is a bit like the finiteness concept on which COSO framework is based. Basically, the author of COSO and many others insist that it is unreasonable to make internal control effective enough to prevent adverse events.
in the COSO framework, the extensive concept of internal control emphasizes that internal control is a reasonable guarantee, not an absolute guarantee, for the achievement of business objectives, compliance objectives and reliability objectives, which is usually regarded as an inherent defect of internal control. The concept of reasonable assurance is unintentional but still misleading, which implies the possibility that adverse events will not occur due to effective internal control. When it is believed to exist, this level of assurance may hinder the improvement of management by pursuing the quality of internal control. However, staying at the level of reasonable assurance means that when major unfavorable factors occur, it is always impossible to make a clear judgment. The question becomes this: Does a reasonable guarantee really exist?
The author of p>COSO suggests to solve the rationality problem with the idea of cost-benefit analysis. Cost-benefit logic may be a risky trap, attractive from the front, but potentially fatal from the back. In other words, when a major adverse event occurs, in addition to fines, punishments and sanctions, companies almost always take some remedial actions to prevent similar events from happening in the future. At that time, the cost-benefit analysis had no effect. The difficult question is: If the internal control technology is considered necessary now, why isn't it considered necessary before the adverse events occur? -the question of rationality has arisen again.
Chaos theory puts forward a slightly different perspective. Major adverse events will always happen, if we accept chaos theory. No level of control can completely eliminate it. Chaos theory has nothing to do with the concept of cost-benefit which plays a decisive role in COSO framework. The concept of cost-benefit applied in COSO is used to decide whether an existing control technology should be implemented. If the benefit is higher than the cost, it should be implemented. Therefore, if the management thinks that the cost of control is too high, it should not be implemented. This is correct in theory, even if the control can prevent the occurrence of major adverse events.
the concept of internal control is based on the view that there are inherent defects in how much control can be relied on in order to get the desired results. Many authoritative works on internal control, including COSO framework, have discussed these defects. They include human error-prone nature, costs and benefits associated with internal control, and the possibility of fraud caused by conspiracy. Therefore, internal control cannot absolutely guarantee that any desired result can always be achieved. In the words of COSO framework, "no matter how well the internal control is designed and implemented, it can only reasonably ensure the realization of the entity goals."
The revelation is that trivial mistakes can be tolerated. However, if chaos theory is applied, it is these small mistakes that last for a long time, coupled with other anomalies, that lead to catastrophe. There are many examples of this phenomenon. For example, the bankruptcy of Bahrain Bank, a banking giant with a long history, originated from the unsupervised behavior of an individual. Sumitomo Bank of Japan also suffered billions of dollars in losses due to the behavior of a trader. In this case, the reason for the loss was copper futures trading. Afterwards, people realized sadly that there was a lack of control over derivatives trading in both cases. A drunken captain led to environmental disasters in most parts of Alaska and huge losses for Exxon Oil Company. It's only after the event
that I know that the control is lax. The space shuttle is made up of thousands of parts and components, but it is the tendency of the oxygen in its booster rocket to solidify in cold weather that leads to the tragedy of the space shuttle Challenger and its unsuspecting crew.
Chaos theory shows that it is futile to eliminate the possibility of small errors through internal control. There are too many small deviations from convention, and the effect is too unpredictable. Therefore, it is impossible to foresee and take adequate preventive measures. Who can reliably predict the consequences of missing a phone call, being late for work or forgetting to bring a document needed for a special meeting? These things are mixed with countless other harmless things, which happen everywhere every day, and we all make mistakes like this.
therefore, at the conceptual level, we cannot rely on internal control to prevent the occurrence of major adverse consequences. If these things are not out of malice and obvious negligence, they are random in nature. In this sense, they are similar to force majeure. It is reasonable that organizations with higher levels of internal control will encounter fewer disasters, but it has yet to be confirmed. However, at present, it is advisable to pursue the highest possible level of internal control, so that there may be fewer disasters.