The first strange attractor was discovered by Edward Lorentz in 1962 while developing models for weather forecasting This discovery provided the foundation for the discipline we now call Chaos theory The solution to a system of equations which converges to a single point is called a finite attractor If the solution converges to a periodic orbit, it is a periodic attractor If neither case is true and the solution is a fully determined curve that has no recursion and is a fractal, it is a strange attractor More of an explanation will require some heavy duty math