I always assumed it was something to do with looping, because I've become fascinated with loops, and how your hair kind of contracts in on itself. But I'm wrong. I don't really understand it but fortunately my hair understands it for me.

yup just as when you wash the water running down your hair does a few things (i observed this very closely 1 day)

1st the surface tension of the water steamming down a strand of hair pulls the hairs together in\to sections

2nd as its streaming down it maybe nearly smooth but the slightest disturbance 1 hair out of place or just the haead moving or the water stream being redirected sklightly by any other factors creates turbulance wich can move the hairs around and startthem tangling..which further disturbes the lanular flow of the water making it mote turbulant and making the hairs get more tangled

im pretty tired so i may have made that lil confusing..lo

Nice thnx for breakin it down eagle man. that makes alot of sense when u used the metaphor of X-mas lights.

well i started wit the twist n rip method, eventually i took them all out so i can allow my dreads to form completely on their own.

and ive noticed that if u stick your head out the window when u have 10" of hair blowing in the wind, it tangles up like crazy. no touching, all wind power.

not exactly tho thats a very minor part of it but if that was how it hapened in intirity it would take 7 years because you shed every hair in a 7 year cycle

when you get a tangle..a single knot the hairs are no longer straight or even.. ..even lenhgths i mean so they loop as a single hair loops say this was the straight hairs || now you have a knot its more like

|>
@

ok poor example but say @ is a tangle or knot above it the hairs ar no longer even and straight so its easy for another hair to slip into that |> loop and create a new knot

then when you sleep o9m them the tangles compress and tighten

as you move during the day more tangles pile up on 1 another

all thuis time 99% are attached to your head only 1 or 2 in each drad might fall off anfd become tangled as your thorry described

100 hairs from your whole head which averages 2 hairs per dread typicaly

u might have thousands of hairs in a dread that just knot up from movement and compression

ok lets look at 2 other examples

hoses abnd cristmass lights

you roll them up neatly every year but somehow they always end up s knotted mess rigght?

even though the boxes ar stored ain an attick or basement and ignored all year the boxes might get moved once or twice and just by moving them the xmass lights get hopelessly tanged

as soon as order switches to chaos chaos takes over the disorder of uncombed hair or un-coiled wires becomes more chaotic once the neat order is disrupted ..a single knot is all it takes to have hundreds more build onto it