Re: The Game of Life

From: Fred Chen <flipsu5.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sun, 26 Dec 1999 19:32:40 -0800

David Lloyd-Jones, you wrote:

> Hal Finney writes:
>
> > It has been found that "Life is Universal", meaning that you can
> > construct a Universal Turing Machine out of the Life rules. It would
> > then be possible to program it to simulate any mathematical or logical
> > system, hence SAS's should be possible.
>
> But only if the outside world supplies the necessaries. I don't insist on
> John Horton Conway, or even Hal Finney, but I do insist that the machine be
> plugged into the wall.
>
> It's really a pissoff to see people writing about these patterns being
> "self-organizing." They're organized by the throughput from the power
> company.
>
> -dlj.

The fundamental question here was whether a universe that is essentially a 2D
infinite grid where the only operating laws are the Game of Life rules would
give rise to intelligent self-aware (or self-conscious) artificial life forms,
given the appropriate starting configuration.

This rapidly became a question of whether the Turing-machine-computational
aspect of this universe would be sufficient to generate the self-aware
substructures (SAS's). Through the most recent postings, we have heard
supporters of a whole spectrum of responses to this question. Conservatively, I
don't think we will know enough (in 3rd person perspective) to capture all
aspects of human consciousness in a single machine, and if we did somehow,
accidentally, I don't think we'd be able to realize it. This is just Godel's
result.

The evolutionary aspect of life as we know it is probably a pretty crucial part
of developing the self-awareness that we ourselves experience. Evolution is
based on survival, so this would tend to nurture the emergence of a
self-awareness geared toward preservation of self. I am not sure this is a
proof that even the lower evolved life forms have consciousness, since they
could be operating by involuntary reflex-type behavior.

It is difficult to imagine if a straightforward Turing approach would be able
to capture the evolutionary process, which would seem to require random
environmental inputs. Then again, there is an artificial life program by Tom
Ray, introduced in 1990, called Tierra, which is used to simulate Darwinian
evolution. I don't know if this program has been found to be a Universal Turing
Machine.

Happy Holidays,
Fred
Received on Sun Dec 26 1999 - 19:36:03 PST