Math, Shampoo and Sustainability

I make my own shampoo because I think it is better for the environment. When I tell people that, the response is sometimes that this has no leverage. What good is it if I don’t buy shampoo but fly once a year? Looking solely at the carbon dioxide I emitted, the answer is obvious. The shampoo doesn’t matter. It’s simple maths.

That is one way to look it at.

Here is another one. And more math:

Fractal geometry. Fractal geometry is a field of maths from the 1970s, mainly developed by Benoit Mandelbrot. Fractals can best be described in examples: clouds, mountains, coastlines, cauliflowers, and ferns are natural fractals. Their forms are irregular and complicate – and for most eyes – beautiful. When you look closely at fractals, you find that within the fractal, it scales down. A tiny section of the coastline is stunningly similar to the whole coastline. A tree is composed of branches which is composed of branches which is composed of branches which is composed of branches… Fractals scale. They are self-similar, which means that the shape looks like itself however much you zoom in or out.

What does this have to do with how we live our life and self-made shampoo?

Looking at our life from a perspective that it is fractal, that repeats itself, zooming in and out, the only right thing to think is of every action as something that matters. Even self-made shampoo.