Artificial Worlds: Computere Complexity And The Riddle Of Life

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 ...