A first for the game, the replicator demonstrates how astounding complexity can arise from simple beginnings and processes - an echo of life's origins, perhaps. It might help us understand how life on Earth began, or even inspire strategies to build tiny computers.
The Game of Life is the best-known example of a cellular automaton, in which patterns form and evolve on a grid according to a few simple rules. You play the game by choosing an initial pattern of "live" cells, and then watch as the configuration changes over many generations as the rules are applied over and over again (see "Take two simple rules").
More @ New Scientist
No comments:
Post a Comment