[js1138]

4,000,000 years.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought it was impossible, due to the "butterfly effect", to carry this calculation out indefinitely. I thought errors in precision would eventually accumulate and become overwhelming.

I only brought it up because I was challenged on the issue of determinism. I argued that determinism in the physical world was just an assumption and had not been demonstrated, even in classical physics.

If it is impossible to specify critical parameters to the necessary precision in the Newtonian world, it is impossible to demonstrate hard determinism, even in theory.

[Doctor Stochastic]

That's correct. However, cannot carry these out indefinitely. Two problems, one due to the Lyapanov exponent causing indefinite error growth (what I think you mean) and another to the impossibility of getting initial contidions exactly due to Brownian motion. (Not to mention QM uncertainties.)

I would claim that classical physics isn't deterministic, primarily because tiny measuring instruments undergo Brownian motion limiting their precision. QM non-determinism is of a different kind.