When I was an undergraduate at NYU I once saw this fantastic sculpture in a window of one of the many down town buildings that the university owns.
The sculpture was compsed of a massive tangel of thick, stiff wire that was mounted on a blank wall and well lit form above.
At first glance the tangle of wire on the wall was the kind of unremarkable, abstract nonsense that frustrates both lovers and haters of abstract art.
But once I took a step back and I was able to see the shadow that the wire cast on the wall I saw why the tangle of wire was in the window.
The artist had drawn a beautiful portrait with the shadow line cast by the wires.
I came across this picture on the Creative Synthesis blog which reminded me of that moment on the streets of NYC when I saw past the tangle of wire to the image in the shadow.
It makes me wonder how much of the order we see in the universe around us is the shadow of chaos.
And how much of the chaos and noise we observe in the universe is really just poorly lit signal.
