Chapter 3
Santa Fe
The Santa Fe institute had long become accustomed to the presence of Ian Malcolm, the legendary pessimistic chaotician. A collaboration of scientists from many fields formed in the mid-eighties, Santa Fe had some of the most brilliant minds on Earth. They came from all over the world, from many different fields; Economy, Biology, Physics and computer science. But Ian found many of them unimaginative and irksome, claiming them to be corrupted by modern day fashions and ridiculous traditions. Malcolm was seen frequently at the speaker's podium, giving lectures on various mathematical proofs. His work on many theories that he helped form, such as 'Life at the edge of chaos' had made him one of the earliest pioneers in the emerging field of Chaos Theory. His work was well documented around the world and he had even gained the honor of having a chaotic phenomenon named after him; the so called Malcolm Effect; the theory that that complex systems followed a pattern, such as weather or stock markets, in which at a certain point events would spiral out of control. But most of his popularity had arisen from his connection to International Genetic Technologies, and how his theories had been put into practical circumstances at Jurassic Park. The chaotician disliked this publicity entirely, as he was frequently forced to answer absurd questions from the press. Many people came to his speeches purely because of the fact that he had visited the "InGen islands" on two occasions. Over time he expected it to quiet but it did not. He was barraged by colleagues for full explanations of the events that had occurred. He had often said in public that it had been far easier before he had made his second trip. The events at Jurassic Park were known only to a handful of civilians, all of whom were bound by non-disclosure agreements. But after the incident in San Diego InGen's secret was blown wide open. The whole world knew what John Hammond had done, but they wanted details. Evidently Malcolm would be barraged more than most as his work involved far more people.
Now Ian stood at his usual station, behind his podium. He stared out over his audience, which even for his standards was abnormally large. He had expected this; it was a rare sight to see him speak about Jurassic Park or anything to do with InGen while in public. Several hundred people had managed to cram themselves into the comparatively small room, which had once served as a chapel, most of who looked like college students. They wore bright colorful clothing, chatting merrily, whereas the Santa Fe scientists sat clustered in a more secluded corner, eyeing the youths reproachfully. The room was dimly lit, but a large spotlight had been directed at the stage to make Malcolm's dark figure more discernable from the background. Above Malcolm a large sign had been hung above the stage.
JURASSIC PARK
"An accident waiting to happen"
Dressed fully in black, Malcolm paused before speaking. "Over a decade ago John Hammond approached me with the idea of genetically engineering extinct animals to be brought back from the dead. Cloning was a vastly popular subject; it was rapidly spreading and advancing. It had been speculated over for many years before hand, after all DNA had been extracted from a piece of Quagga hide and from Egyptian Mummies, it was even considered possible that a specimen could be cloned from frozen mammoth remains. Yet nobody could figure out where to get a viable source of Dinosaur DNA. It remained a mystery for some time. Hammond solved that problem ingeniously; he stockpiled the fossilized remains of ancient tree resin known as amber. He hypothesized that at some point ancient insects would have bitten animals, just as they do today. They then would have landed on the branches of trees and occasionally become entombed within the sticky sap. If Hammond could get enough of this material he reasoned that eventually he would find a fossilized insect that contained perfectly preserved Dino DNA. And he was correct, he went on to create the wonders that exist today. A wonderful idea, as I am sure many of you may think. A chance to investigate ancient animals from the past, perhaps even experiment with the mystery of extinction that has so stubbornly evaded human understanding in the past. But Hammond wouldn't stop there, he wasn't going to merely clone these animals. He was going to put these animals on a secluded island off the coast of Costa Rica, in a kind of amusement park. Hammond claimed that this was the only way to fund this new technology, and he was quite right, it was hardly any cure for cancer. He asked that I make a mathematical proof for the Isla Nublar project using Chaos Theory, and I did just that. I found that John's little project would—however much he would deny it—be inherently unstable. Jurassic Park was supposed to be a completely contained ecosystem, in fact everything on that island, except for the air of course, was never supposed to leave. Such a feat is impossible with complex systems, especially living systems. Hammond underestimated his animals; he didn't expect them to act alive. I told him that life cannot be contained or controlled by man, life will break free, no matter the size of the obstacles it faces. Life finds a way. Hammond chose to ignore my recommendations, and went ahead in building his park. Yet despite all of his little security measures, despite all of the state of the art technology it was still vitally flawed. But Hammond never saw this, and he would never believe it. In fact he would refuse to accept this inherent instability, right until it came up and bit him in the ass. Jurassic Park failed, just as I predicted it always would. Something as simple as a disgruntled employee destroyed his carefully planned procedures, just as it always happens in complex systems. Tiny, insignificant details escalate and eventually destroy delicate and finely tuned calculations. And the consequences at Jurassic Park were far larger than most applications of complex systems. In short, Jurassic Park was, and remains to this day, an accident waiting to happen."
The room was filled with thunderous applause and cheering, a few people gave loud whistles. Malcolm frowned and leaned on the podium. The noise was coming from the students in the audience; obviously they didn't know how things were usually done at Santa Fe. The scientists looked shocked at such a reception, it was bad form to show such enthusiasm, especially after something such as a lecture on Chaos Theory. Malcolm stood for a long time until the noise died down, then a reluctant smile crossed his face.
"I'm glad that our young friends from the local university are as passionate about something as amazingly interesting as Chaos Theory, almost as interested as I am. Thank you for listening," he said. Embarrassed looks crossed the student's faces. The room was filled with the scrapping of chairs as everybody got up to leave.