Tribe.net. Local Connections Mark http://alife.tribe.net/thread/81427506-f7e6-4425-82ff-65511f4ea07b#e8142d6b-4bf8-43a4-a863-7603af09015d 2004-09-08T05:17:10Z 2004-09-08T05:17:10Z

Generally, the same thing can happen in alife that happens in biological evolution: genomes evolve to contain enough redundancy to buffer a lot of mutations, but some mutations are simply lethal.

Mark 2004-09-08T05:17:10Z phil http://alife.tribe.net/thread/81427506-f7e6-4425-82ff-65511f4ea07b#7c50414c-2a82-4f32-a139-e583644ac5c6 2004-08-14T23:13:02Z 2004-08-14T23:13:02Z

Well perhaps you could give us your first thoughts on a marxist answer to this question (which I read about avoiding biases in genetic encoding schemes) I had a friend who wrote his PhD thesis on synthesizing Marx with Artificial Life : http://computing.unn.ac.uk/staff/CGJF1/thesis.html

phil 2004-08-14T23:13:02Z Loures http://alife.tribe.net/thread/81427506-f7e6-4425-82ff-65511f4ea07b#a7b12159-2a6c-45b4-95b8-8e9b31161518 2004-08-14T18:04:32Z 2004-08-14T18:04:32Z

I will have to read the texts to respond in an intelligent manner. This question could stand a well thought out marxist response. I do not capititalize marx because marx is a tool of analysis for me and I do not want to associate with the old CCCP, people's republic of china or cuba. Those experiments in centralized government have ended in oppressive regimes that no true marxist would in their right mind advocate. Marxism is not about centralized control but about freedom, flow, flux! :-)

Loures 2004-08-14T18:04:32Z phil http://alife.tribe.net/thread/81427506-f7e6-4425-82ff-65511f4ea07b#28cef69d-3c45-48c8-ad32-1ea611c79b56 2004-08-13T21:19:38Z 2004-08-13T21:19:38Z

Have a look here ... http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/users/inmanh/

phil 2004-08-13T21:19:38Z $item.owner.firstName http://alife.tribe.net/thread/81427506-f7e6-4425-82ff-65511f4ea07b#54c070e6-acb2-431c-8572-c92c10c4ca2e 2004-08-13T16:47:17Z 2004-08-13T16:47:17Z

Newbie here. I've been giving a-life cursory thoughts for a couple years now, but have never actually programmed anything. I'm reading Richard Dawkin's "The Selfish Gene", juxtaposed with Douglas Hoffstadter's "Metamagical Themas" and the spirit of the two put together got me to thinking about it more lately. Here's my question: With software a-life, how does one simulate random mutations/inversions/recombinations/etc. in the code for the a-life without putting too many restrictions on the possibilities in order to avoid errors. What I mean is that if the "genes" are just code, it seems you would have to regulate the nature of the mutations so as to avoid instructions that would mess up the flow of program execution, e.g. a mutation that in effect makes a JUMP instruction outside of the program causing all hell to break loose. Of course there are ways you could prevent this, but spelling out the "allowed" mutations seems contrary to the spirit of a-life. What kind of solutions are there for for this?

$item.owner.firstName 2004-08-13T16:47:17Z