On behalf of Stange Law Firm, PC posted in Child Custody on Thursday, March 6, 2014.
While physics has solved many complex theoretical problems, sometimes one wonders if they have any direct applications to the world in which we all live. A similar thought occurred to a physicist who had a particularly difficult problem. His child custody arrangements were complex, as he had been married twice, had children with both of his ex-wives and he was currently in a relationship with a woman who had children from a prior relationship.
He and a fellow mathematician, who conveniently was versed in chaos-theory, developed a model that could be used to create a child custody plan that would allow the parents to have their children one week and then have a week alone with their partner. They found that very complex relationships, like his own, were problematic.
However, he found that his own situation was so complex that the model did not work that well. It did function for situations up to five people, and they are investigating gathering demographic data to use with the test, in the hope that it could assist family court judges in working through child custody disputes.
If nothing else, being mathematical and abstract, in many cases, it may help parents work through various scenarios to arrive at a workable solution tailored for their situation.
By taking some of the emotion and psychological baggage out of the equation, former spouses may be able to see the forest and the trees of their problem, and recognize the sometimes-limited choices they must draw from to create a viable child custody agreement.
Source: Psmag.com, “Can Physics Solve Custody Battles?” Bettina Change, February 27, 2014
