Artificial Worlds

Computers, Complexity And The Riddle Of Life

By: Richard Morris

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Paperback | 1 January 2003 | Edition Number 1

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208 Pages

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In their laboratories, complexity scientists have been experimenting with complex chemicals that display some of the characteristics of life, and have created electronic computer-virus-like life-forms that are born, die, reproduce, mutate, and evolve. Through these artificial worlds they have actually been able to monitor evolution as it happens, since it takes place at a much more rapid pace within a computer - where new species can evolve in as little as an hour. Among the phenomena that these scientists hope to observe are the evolution of multicellular life forms, and possibly even the evolution of electronic intelligence. Could it be that life itself is an emergent property that arises spontaneously when a chemical system attains a certain degree of complexity? At the cutting edge of discovery, this exciting new branch of science has fostered a rare and intriguing dialogue between innovators across a broad range of disciplines, from mathematicians, computer scientists, and economists, to anthropologists and biologists. Richard Morris makes this major field of inquiry accessible to a popular readership as never before, while he reveals its potential to solve the greatest of all questions to puzzle humankind - what is life?

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction Computing & I.T.Computer Science Mathematical Theory of Computation Miscellaneous Items Science Science in General Popular Science Biology, Life Sciences Life Sciences in General Evolution Graphical & Digital Media Applications

3D Graphics & Modelling Philosophy of Science

Preface	p. ix
What Is Life?	p. 1
What Is Life?	p. 4
Complexity versus Reduction, or What Happens when You Pull the Plug in the Bathtub	p. 7
What Is Complexity?	p. 11
Compute, Compute, Compute	p. 12
The Origin of Life	p. 15
Life in a Computer	p. 16
Complexity in the Laboratory	p. 17
New Horizons or Empty Promises?	p. 18
Laws of Complexity	p. 20
Creating Life in the Laboratory	p. 21
The Origin of Life	p. 22
Is Creating Life Really That Easy?	p. 24
Which Came First: RNA or Proteins?	p. 27
Creating Life	p. 29
Synthetic Life	p. 34
Two Outlooks on the Origin of Life	p. 37
Self-Replicating Proteins	p. 38
The Evolution of Complexity	p. 43
Defining Complexity	p. 46
The Cambrian Explosion	p. 50
The Burgess Shale	p. 51
The Permian Extinction	p. 54
Disparity versus Diversity	p. 55
Can the Sciences of Complexity Study the Emergence of Complexity?	p. 61
Fitness Landscapes	p. 63
Natural Selection	p. 65
The Problem of Heredity	p. 67
Mendel's Peas	p. 69
Genetics versus Natural Selection	p. 70
Is Natural Selection Everything?	p. 71
Darwin's Dangerous Idea	p. 74
A Real Muddle	p. 76
Fitness Landscapes	p. 77
A Throne Covered with Crocodile Skin	p. 81
Artificial Life	p. 85
Paleontologists versus Geneticists	p. 88
Don't Bother the Grownups	p. 90
Gould's Snails	p. 91
Revolutionary Theory or Minor Correction?	p. 92
Life inside a Computer	p. 95
Two Kinds of Evolution	p. 97
The Evolution of Complexity (Again)	p. 98
Is Artificial Life Really "Life"?	p. 101
Is Natural Selection the Whole Story?	p. 103
Cosmic Evolution and Biological Evolution	p. 104
A Short History of the Universe	p. 105
What about Biological Evolution?	p. 108
Back to Biology Again	p. 110
But What Does It Have to Do with Reality?	p. 114
A Little Organism with a Big Name	p. 117
Philosophical Differences	p. 119
Artificial Life on the Internet	p. 123
Tierra	p. 124
And What Does All This Have to Do with Evolution?	p. 127
Sex	p. 129
Problems, Problems	p. 131
The Evolution of Complexity	p. 133
Intelligent Electronic Life	p. 135
Two Biodiversity Reserves	p. 137
Sons of Tierra	p. 138
Varieties of Artificial Life	p. 140
Swarm	p. 141
"SSWOOORMM"	p. 144
Swarms	p. 147
Research Using Swarm	p. 150
Swarm and Archaeology	p. 152
But What Does All This Have to Do with Life?	p. 154
The Fate of Creative Scientists	p. 156
The Promise of Complexity	p. 157
Scientific Success	p. 158
Controversy	p. 160
Artificial Life as Philosophy	p. 164
A Strange Kind of Science	p. 166
Bibliography	p. 171
World Wide Web Resources	p. 179
Index	p. 187
Table of Contents provided by Rittenhouse. All Rights Reserved.

Artificial Worlds

Computers, Complexity And The Riddle Of Life

At a Glance

Paperback

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Defective items

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