Natural selection is the algorithm Nature uses to maximize the probability of reproduction of organisms. With Genetic Algorithms (GAs), engineers imitate this process in order to optimize a set of parameters in an engineering problem… or a dune buggy! The great application at boxcar2d.com uses simulated physics to evolve 2D cars that are optimally fast [...]

Here’s another classic from the 80′s: an artificial life simulation, where bugs move on a virtual Petri dish, hunting for bacteria. If they manage to survive until adulthood, and accumulate enough energy from bacteria, the bugs reproduce and generate two copies of themselves. In the reproduction process, the genetic code undergoes small mutations, so that [...]

I decided to get my feet wet with Flash + ActionScript programming with a classic of the 80′s: 2-dimensional Cellular Automata! A 2D CA is a grid of cells, each of which can be in either an “alive” or “dead” state. The state of each cell evolves in time, according to simple update rules based [...]