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From: G.Joly@cs.ucl.ac.uk (Gordon Joly)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: computer life?
Message-ID: <1511@ucl-cs.uucp>
Date: 16 Mar 91 20:12:08 GMT
Sender: news@cs.ucl.ac.uk
Lines: 37


Kurt Thearling writes:
 > [...]
 > You might be interested in "Self-Reproducing Automata and the Origin of
 > Life," Robert C. Newman, Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith,  
 > vol. 40, no. 1, pp. 24-31.  In this article the self-reproducing automaton
 > designed by Chris Langton is analyzed to show that life is designed.
 > 
 > From the abstract: "... Langton's very simple self-reproducing automaton is
 > described in detail.  The complexity of Langton's automaton strongly
 > suggests that life is designed rather than accidental."
 > 
 > Newman computes the time to required consider all of the possible designs
 > for such a self-reproducing automaton.  This time is (in his estimate) 
 > 3 * 10**139 years.  He then assumes that the universe is 20 billion years
 > old to determine that the probablility of producing the self-reproducing
 > automaton via random formation is 10**-129.
 > 
 > 
 > kurt
 > 
 > -----------------------------------------------------------------------
 > Kurt Thearling                                  Thinking Machines Corp.
 >                                                        245 First Street
 > kurt@think.com                                     Cambridge, MA  02142
 > -----------------------------------------------------------------------


Interesting. Could somebody confirm that John von Neumann's work on
self-replicating agents pre-dated Watson and Crick's discovery of DNA
by several years?

Gordon Joly                                       +44 71 387 7050 ext 3716
Internet: G.Joly@cs.ucl.ac.uk          UUCP: ...!{uunet,ukc}!ucl-cs!G.Joly
Computer Science, University College London, Gower Street, LONDON WC1E 6BT

   "I didn't do it. Nobody saw me do it. You can't prove anything!"