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Daniel Dennett speech about ALIFE
EricL:
Actually, I think the bot article selection thing you mention in your blog is a cool idea and much more useful than my Terminator Skynet style free for all where they are let loose on the internet and use it for their own private playground.
Endy:
Somehow the organism would need to deliberatly slightly mutate it's children's code. (natural levels of mutation on the net being largely non-existant) One problem is that there's currently no good language to code the creature in, most languages being too brittle/complex to allow sensible mutation outside of a compiler.
Perhaps a sort of Compiler/Interpreter shell surrounding the evolvable code. The outer shell would be standard code, but the inner code would be mutatable. The outer code could then "reproduce" offspring with the mutated code.
Somehow you'd also have to let it loose too... The feds may or may not show up the next day.
I *think* that standard Anti-viral programs would be able to catch it. It would always need the same basic outer shell so it should be trackable.
Alright, gotta get going.
Endy
Numsgil:
Yes, I think combining the virtual machine with the organism is the ticket. The naked OSes of modern operating system are not fault tolerant enough for a naked evolvable creature. If the creatures tote around their own environment, then you have a shot at something real.
EricL:
--- Quote from: Endy ---Somehow the organism would need to deliberatly slightly mutate it's children's code. (natural levels of mutation on the net being largely non-existant)
--- End quote ---
Delibertly inducing random mutations when copying itself would be easy. It turns out that most biological mutations arn't "natural" (I.e. external). They are infact internal or "intentional" meaning that the vast majority of mutations occur as a side effect of DNA copying or repair. One can take the position (I do) that selection has favored imperfect copying mechanisms which exhibit certain rates of mutation. Said another way, perfect copying/repair is possible but it has been selected against (or never selected for). Never mutating is bad since there would be no diversity to respond to changing environments. Thus my use of the term "intentional".
--- Quote from: Endy ---One problem is that there's currently no good language to code the creature in, most languages being too brittle/complex to allow sensible mutation outside of a compiler.
--- End quote ---
It's not clear to me that naked assembly would not be suitable. Yes, the vast majority of mutations would result in faults, but that might simply result in strong directional selection towards programs which did not fault and which created offspring that did not fault. It would be bloody at first, but given the right bootstrapping and scale, I think it's possible for nothing more than a "zerobot" naked exe that does nothign but make random imprefect copies of itself to evolve.
--- Quote from: Endy ---Perhaps a sort of Compiler/Interpreter shell surrounding the evolvable code. The outer shell would be standard code, but the inner code would be mutatable. The outer code could then "reproduce" offspring with the mutated code.
--- End quote ---
This is essentially how I would do it though I would make the entire thing including the "shell" mutable. It woudl happen anyway I.e. at some point, mutations would evovle which started mutating the shell. As above, this would lead to many non-viable offspring, but it is the most flexable and open ended.
--- Quote from: Endy ---Somehow you'd also have to let it loose too... The feds may or may not show up the next day.
--- End quote ---
Ah yes. Small sacrifice for creating an entirely new branch of life. (Honest, I'm kidding. To any future jury which may be reading this let me say: I didn't do it!)
--- Quote from: Endy ---I *think* that standard Anti-viral programs would be able to catch it. It would always need the same basic outer shell so it should be trackable.
--- End quote ---
Individuals which got caught or which called too much attention to themselves, say by crashing or eating up too many resources, would be selected against. The survivors would be the ones that kept a low profile, that learned to avoid AV programs, that perhaps even started doing something useful. Hell, they could be living amoungst us already! Someone shoudl write a SF novel with this plot. Oh wait, that someone is me!
Sprotiel:
--- Quote from: EricL ---Individuals which got caught or which called too much attention to themselves, say by crashing or eating up too many resources, would be selected against. The survivors would be the ones that kept a low profile, that learned to avoid AV programs, that perhaps even started doing something useful. Hell, they could be living amoungst us already! Someone shoudl write a SF novel with this plot. Oh wait, that someone is me!
--- End quote ---
Iain Banks' Feersum Endjinn describes the end result of such a process (though obviously not the "amongst us already" part). And the theme is also present in Ken MacLeod's The Star Fraction.
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