Jim Muth wrote:
To keep on topic, I would also like to know where fractals come from.
They come from your old Fractint computer, Jim. Except when they sneak in with your morning mail, or the cats catch one lurking in the bushes and bring it in to show off their hunting skills. Sometimes I think fractals spontaneously generate somewhere in the network connections that comprise this peculiar Internet thing (ever read Orson Scott Card's book Xenocide?). (I once saw an experiment at providing a zoomable realtime graph of Internet traffic, it always seemed to have a fractal fringe to it.) And I understand at certain times of the year in exotic foreign lands, they actually fall in great numbers from the sky! (Although their coloration tends to be a bit more monotonous than the ones that come from your Fractint computer and fertile imaginative consciousness that might or might not really be there.) Gee, sometimes I think you're like Bill Cosby's old college girlfriend featured on his LP "Why is there air?" ;) -- David gnome@hawaii.rr.com authenticity, honesty, community