Chapter 80 14.5 Sex in Form Libraries

Ratsam had a similar experience when exploring his space.From time to time he breaks into what he calls instability.In some areas of possible form, significant changes in genetics can only result in negligible changes in form - this is the basin in which Sims are stranded.He had to go toe to toe with Gene to get a little formal boost.In other regions, small changes in genes can also cause large changes in form.In the former area, Ratsam's progress in space is extremely slow; in the latter area, even the slightest movement will send him running on a rampage for a long distance. In order to avoid overrunning and speed up the progress of discovery, Ratsam will deliberately adjust the magnitude of the mutation when exploring.Initially he'll set the mutation rate high so that he can quickly sweep through the space.When the shape becomes more interesting, he will lower the mutation rate, so that the gap between generations becomes smaller, and he can slowly approach the hidden shape.Sims has managed to automate his system to perform a similar approach.As the evolved images become more complex, his software dials down the mutation rate for a soft landing on the final form. "Otherwise," Sims said, "you'd be insane trying to fine-tune a frame."

These pioneers also came up with several clever ideas for parade.The most important thing is mating.Dawkins's biomorphic realm, though fertile, is ascetic, with no hint of sex to be found.All changes are achieved through asexual variation of a single parent.The world of Sims and Ratham, by contrast, is driven by sex.The most important thing these pioneers realized was this: In an evolutionary system, mating behavior can vary in any number of ways! Of course, the most traditional "position" is: both parents provide a part of the genes.But even this most prosaic mating can go several ways.In a library, breeding is like picking two books and merging their texts into one "child" book.You can have two kinds of offspring: "in-laws" or "out-laws."

"In-law" offspring inherit traits between their parents.Imagine a line segment connecting Book A and Book B.The offspring (Book C) may be located at any point on this line segment.It could be right in the middle - if it inherited exactly half of each parent's genes; or it could be closer to one side - say one-tenth from the mother and nine-tenths from the father. "In-laws" can also inherit the contents of the two books in a way of interleaving chapters, just like the gene fragments from parents are interleaved and arranged together.This method can keep those gene segments that have some relationship with each other (usually can be expressed by some approximate function), so it is more likely to "reduce the chaff and keep the chaff".

Another way to think of "in-parents" is to imagine that creature A is mutating (in Hollywood parlance) into creature B.All the alien creatures produced during the entire metamorphosis process from A to B are the "in-law" offspring of the couple. The position of the "relative" is a point outside the deformation line of the parents.The "relative" of a lion and a snake is not some point in the middle, but more likely a monster with a lion's head and a snake's tail but with a forked tongue.There are several ways to make monsters, one of which is very basic: randomly select some of the characteristics possessed by both parents, stir them in a large pot, and then pick up what they count. The descendants of "foreign relatives" are more wild, more unpredictable, and more out of control.

The weirdness of the evolutionary system doesn't stop there.Mating can be counterintuitive.William Latham is now promoting polygamy in his system.Why should mating be limited to two parents?Latsam's system allows him to choose up to five parents, each with a different weight for "lineage".He told a group of sub-forms: Next time, it should be more like this, and that and that, and a little bit like this.Then he made them combine and together they produced the next generation.Latham can also give negative weight values: for example, don't like this.This is equivalent to setting up an "anti-parent". Anti-parents engage in mating to produce offspring (or not at all) that are as different as possible from them.

Going a step further in natural biology (at least what we know so far), Latham's mutant program follows the breeders' footsteps in the library.For genes that remain unchanged during a particular breeding process, the mutator program considers them to be preferred by breeders, making them dominant genes; for those genes that vary, the mutator program considers them experimental and are not favored by breeders, so they are defined as recessive genes to reduce their influence. The idea of ​​tracking evolution to predict its future course is so intoxicating.Both Sims and Latham dreamed of building an artificial intelligence model that could analyze the bit-by-bit progress of breeders as they explored within the formal space.This artificial intelligence program will deduce the elements common to each step of the selection, and then go to the depth of the library and find the form with a certain characteristic.

At the Pompidou Center in Paris, and at the International Ars Electronica Linz in Austria, Carl Sims presented his artificially evolved "Great Thousand" to the public.On a platform in the middle of the long display corridor, a connecting machine hummed.Accompanied by the machine's thinking, the jet-black cube shone red.A thick cable connects the supercomputer to 20 monitors arranged in an arc.A footrest is installed on the floor in front of each color screen.By depressing a foot pedal (covered below with a switch), the visitor selects a particular image from the row of screens.

I had the good fortune to breed images on the Connector 2 at the Linz fair.At first I chose an image that looked like a garden full of poppies.Sims' program bred 20 offspring at once.Two of the screens were filled with gray, meaningless stuff, while 18 other screens displayed new "flowers," some fragmented, some in new colors.I have been trying to make the picture more colorful.In a room filled with computer heat, I was sweating in no time running back and forth between the pedals.This physical strength is like gardening—carefully tending those shapes so that they grow into adults.I kept evolving finer floral patterns until another visitor reversed the evolution and made it look like a neon plaid.I was dumbfounded at the sheer number of beautiful patterns the system uncovered: geometric still lifes, hallucinations, exotic textures, grotesque icons.Delicate, colorful works come to the screen one after another, however, if they are not selected, they disappear forever.

Sims' contraption breeds non-stop every day, handing the hand of evolution to the whims of the rogues passing by.The connection machine records the past and present lives of each choice.From this Sims gets a database of images that people (at least museum goers) find beautiful or interesting.He believes that it is possible to abstract some inner meanings that can only be understood from these rich data, and use them as selection conditions for breeding in other areas of the library in the future. Perhaps, we will be surprised to find that there is no uniform selection criteria.Perhaps, any highly evolved life form is beautiful.All things are beautiful—even in their own ways.Neither the monarch butterfly nor its host, the milkweed pod, is more conspicuous or more banal than the other.Parasites are also beautiful if viewed without prejudice.I vaguely feel that the beauty of nature lies in the process of species evolution, in the important fact that the form must be completely biological.

Still, something (whatever they are) distinguishes these chosen forms from the mottled gray specks that surround them.The comparison between the two may reveal more connotations of beauty for us, and even help us figure out what "complexity" really refers to.