Artificial Life

Abstract

Artificial life that is also known as “ALife” is an interdisciplinary study of life and life-like processes. Its two most important qualities are that it focuses on the essential rather than the contingent features of living systems and it attempts to provide an understanding into living systems by artificially synthesizing extremely simple forms of them. Artificial life uses three different kinds of synthetic methods: soft artificial life that creates computer simulations or other purely digital constructions that exhibit life-like behavior, hard artificial life that produces hardware implementations of life-like systems, and wet artificial life that involves the creation of life-like systems in a laboratory using biochemical materials. Alife is vigorous and diverse, this chapter discusses what artificial life is like, reviews the history of artificial life and illustrates the current research thrusts in contemporary “soft”, “hard”, and “wet” artificial life with respect to individual cells, whole organisms, and evolving populations. The chapter also illustrates philosophical issues, discuss some of their complexities, and suggest the most promising avenues for making further progress