First off, I wasn't sure where to post this, so if it's in the wrong place, can you please move it?

Okay so do you believe that something very minor can completely change the outcome of the world? I do. Something as small as choosing whether or not to turn over while laying in bed or whether or not to reply to a thread on Vizzed. Even something as small as me using the word small in this sentence instead of little. Every decision you make starts a chain reaction. For example, so I decide to wait until after the doctor to eat. When the doctor weighs me, he says that I am just barely in the healthy zone, not overweight (This is completely made up, I am actually underweight). That makes me feel better about myself. I don't go on a diet and I become fat. Everyone makes fun of me because I am fat, and I become depressed. My depression gets the best of me and I commit suicide. While that is a stretch, it is still very possible that it could happen. Every tiny decision you make has a huge chain reaction following it. I talked about this with my dad and he agrees completely. I talked about it with my mom, and she thinks I'm crazy. What are your thoughts?

That is an extremely legitimate question. I too believe that small things can have a big impact later on. Small things add up to big things in the end. 
Hey, take rumors for example. Say one person said that another person has a bad habit. People who heard that will pass it on and on, until most everyone knows about it. Say that the first person to say the rumor lied - it was a small lie that became a web of lies. In the end, the victim might really have been affected by this rumor and may choose to do some horrible things, either to himself or to others, just because one guy started a rumor.

You are certainly not crazy! I think about this frequently when alone. It seems to be morale choices for me. I think into how will this affect me in the future just like you do. It feels right to do somethings and the opposite for bad decisions. I don't believe in karma so it is not in that way. Just how it may effect me or others in a natural, believable sense.

By the way, I think this suits general chat better or crazy house!

Local Mods : Would this be a better fit into General Chat?

MechaMento : Actually, I think the Science forum is a good spot for this, as it's has to do with butterfly effects and such.

The answer the question asked in the thread. Yes, the smallest thing CAN make a huge difference, but there's no way of knowing which small things will change the future drastically.

Light Knight : Thank you for moving it. I also agree with your statement.

I believe this is true.
I know it's true within my own life. For example, if my husband didn't send me a friend request, we never would have met... Similarly, if my parents hadn't gone to the same Halloween party over twenty years ago, maybe they'd never have met, and I wouldn't even exist. :o

Yeah, if Seth MacFarlane wouldn't have been late to his flight. He would have died in 9/11 and I wouldn't be watching the entire American Dad series in my underwear right now.

djent : Oh I think I read about that! He missed his flight because he had a really bad hangover, right?

In a sense, yes. But I in no way believe that every little detail starts a chain reaction that shapes the future. For example, you mentioned saying the word 'small' instead of 'little'. I don't think so. Mainly because with the English language, multiple words not only have the same meaning, but people's reaction to them are the same. In your example of small and little, it would only have an effect if they were two words that gave someone a different reaction. In this case, odds are, their reaction to either word will be the same, resulting in the same outcome. Rolling over the other direction on the bed, I would say most likely no. You could make an argument you ended up crushing a bug that would have bitten you giving you a rash that gets infected. But there could be an argument that the bug was going to die seconds before it would have reached you to bite you. The bug would die anyway, and the distance between the 2 possible locations are too small to effect anything else.

djent used the Seth MacFarlane example. But that is extremely overstretching the concept of minor thing. Late for a flight is not really minor. Odds are, whatever made him late is not something minor like saying a different word or rolling out of bed in one direction instead of the other. So that example doesn't really work.

Annette's example of parents going to the same Halloween party can or cannot be considered valid as well. It depends on your definition of minor event. I wouldn't really say that something like going to a party fits the minor action described in the original post of this thread.

Pretty much, the more insignificant the action, the smaller the 'chain reaction'. But there are events so small that the chain reaction isn't enough to shape the future in a significant way.

Most of the examples people have brought up are not really minor. Most are things that inherently shape a person's future. Going to a part is a decision to go somewhere and put yourself in a different location with different people. Missing a plane obviously makes you either makes you in the sky or on the ground. Making up a lie about someone inherently leads to a person believing in the lie. People talk, so that lie will get passed around. All those aren't really something inherently minor as far as cause and effect.

Deciding to blink twice in a given instance instead of once for no reason is not something that inherently leads to something else. Rolling one way on the bed instead of the other does not inherently have an effect. Saying little instead of small has no inherent difference in reaction or message. Those things are truly minor details, and I don't think they have an effect in the course of cause and effect 999,999/1million times. Not saying it is absolutely impossible, but I think that it is most likely that the examples I listed in this last paragraph have never really altered or shaped someone's future.

Everything is nothing  but a collection of minor things that come together and weave the world.  Imagine the works of Shakespeare.  Those are all just words thrown together.  Words are set up and put in a certain order and you have beauty.  Same with paintings, music, architecture, and great works of art and engineering.
Everything is just a collection of small events happening one after another.

warmaker : That was beautiful. Really well worded and you made an excellent point. That was awesome.

rcarter2 : I'm pretty sure one man out of 7 billion missing a flight counts as minor. Perhaps even miniscule. Or even atomical.

djent : Again, it depends on what you believe is considered minor. If you think that the fact that something involves one man is considered minor, then yes. But the thing is, 1 man missing a plane (no matter who it is) will definitely affect something. That means the difference between that person being in one location or a location hundreds to even thousands of miles away. Something like that is already guaranteed to have an affect on that person or others. There is an obvious cause and effect pattern with an event like that.

You are looking at that event the the view of one man out of billions. If you look at it like that, yes it is a minor thing. But I still consider that not a minor event because no matter who the person is, missing a flight already has the expectation to effect others. That is why nobody wants to miss a plane.

The examples that tgags123 stated in his opening posts were things that happen that have no obvious effect on your life or another person's life. Something as small as deciding to turn over while laying in bed or saying the word "small" instead of "little". The question is pertaining to things THAT small. Compared to those types of events, 1 man out of a billion missing a flight is as subtle as 9/11 itself. 

So again, thinking in terms of 1 man out of billions makes that a small event. But any person missing a flight, famous or not, has near guaranteed odds to have noticeable effects. Try to look at events that are so small that it should have no noticeable impact on your life. That was the initial question of the thread.

Causeality.
Cause and effect.
Its pretty self evident.
Its easiest To perceieve when you work youre way down.
E.g someone hits you, you are liable to retaliate, in future you will have a nefative approach to them.
Instead same person complements you, you become friends, go to a gig together, meet your future wife.
You miss your bus, maybe you would have met someone who would play a partin your life. Maybe you are late to something and it causes a long lasting problem.if you made it to the bus these things reverse.
If you find a pound coin you stop to pick it up. You are now several steps behind where you would of been before. Its like missing a set of lights, it can offset your entire journey because you dont make it through before rush hour, you might mention something to your passenger while you wait that later influences your path forward.
Variability is almost infibite like so much else in the universe, and its really beyond complete comprehension.
Its kind of like chaos theory (if ypu dont know what that is take a stroll to wikipedia, its quite interesting, if immensely complex.)

thenumberone : yes, chaos theory implies that even the most insignificant things can cause tremendous outcomes. Even the things that inherently have no significant cause/effect impact. So what do you believe? Yes, missing your street light has effects. But do you think that a simple twitch of your foot while you are sleeping can truly cause real disturbance in the future?

rcarter2 :
I think that most things in the world do have an effect. One thing done differently could change events. Thats assuming that change is possible and its not pre determined e.g. fate.
I dont think things that go unobserved tend to have much effect. Unless you wake someone up by twitching your foot i dont see that doing much. My view on it is mostly based on deduction and guesswork so i wouldnt rigourously defend that everything has far reaching effects, im pretty stead fast that most minor things build the big thing, much like objects down to molecules down to atoms down to neutrons (and whatever goes below that).
And much like the balance of nature, where we have seen wild effects. The pollution of humans, the acid rain, the changing of the waters ph, the death of the fish, the death of the animals that eat them, like crocodiles.
Your relationship with friends is defined by each memory you share, your morality by who you meet, what you see and experience, what youre taught. Like wise i think the things you do, almost all, play a part in your life and development, and hence the development of those around you. If they spend time with you its time not spent with others, more effect. If you convince them of something maybe they convince someone else, maybe the next guy acts on it, or your line of thought gains ground until more developments unfold.
A ripple in the water.

rcarter2 : It can have an effect, no matter how small.

For example: your foot twitching moves it slightly enough that your foot is in a small state a plantarflexion, and although extremely small, the difference from if your foot didn't twitch is enough to cause your muscle fibers in your calf muscle to be shortened a little more. Other events during your day and what you ate increases your chances of getting a spam in your calf that night, and your foot being in a position causing slightly shortened calf muscles for 5 hours is enough to give you a "charlie horse" when you wake up.

Now a twitch has "become" a spasm. What wakes you up is the phone ringing, as you leap out the bed, you miss your step due too the pain of your foot being placed on the floor, and fall, hitting your knee on the floor. It's not extremely painful, but enough for you to take a second to curse and slowly get up. You missed the phone.

The phone call was of your child who had drunk to much that night, and calling from a payphone (cell was dead) to get a ride. Too embarrassed to call again, your son shrugs and gets behind the wheel car, intoxicated.

Now, the odds of your foot moving after a twitch is not tiny... but sure the odds of all the other events lining up are. But at any given moment, there are millions of little events that line up and make things happen. Perhaps instead of moving your foot, the twitch was enough to wake your wife (who was resting her foot on yours), and got her to change positions... opening the door to a variety of other possibilities.

Light Knight : And how about a realistic scenario where a hair from your head lands on the corner of the room instead of an inch from the corner? Just as an example. I say realistic because your twitch scenario was not. Your assumption on the cramp was that the foot stayed in that position. I am talking about your typical isolated twitch where it doesn't move the appendage. You would just feel it if you were awake. But in this case, it doesn't move your foot. Hence, nobody wakes. Your muscle position remains unchanged. Virtually, no movement really took place. Or how about during rapid eye movement in sleep. Would it have any cause/effect if your eye moved to the left one more time than it moved to the right?