GreyThumb.Blog

I'd like to highlight the comment left in the Stuart Kauffman video post;

What you really should provide, in this context, is a service where people are finally allowed to comment, and ask questions pubblicly, and then those questions get sent to Kauffmann, who also pubblicly answers. Because there were many, many people in the audience who did not agree with him.

Please leave your questions for Stuart Kauffman here. We will get them to him and hopefully get a response. Many thanks to Pietro Speroni di Fenizio for the idea.

If you didn't make it to ALIFE XI, here's Kauffman's keynote video in three parts.







Many thanks to Jamie Matthews who once again supplied these fantastic videos.

I was taking my usual fix of independent journalism podcasts this morning when I came across this. The CEO of the Center for Independent Media is an old friend of mine, David Bennahum. I emailed David to ask if his non-profit had considered the political aspect of science journalism, particularly propagating junk science, and whether there was a need for either a science journalism component of his organization or a new organization that dealt with independent science journalism specifically.

I reflect occasionally on a post by Justin Hall (who was discussed by Douglas Davis in his Biota Chat) about how independent media can assess the validity of a scientific claim. Clearly, there needs to be a group like the Center for Independent Media that can provide assistance with independent science journalism too.

Cell Stage
Good: It's a fun little mini-game, with some nice effects. The "powers of 10" feel with the growth is very nice. Chasing down creatures that previously you ran from is always satisfying.
Bad: Just a mini-game. The creatures used are always the same, and the range of parts available is very limited.
Overall: I expect this part will be the first to get expansion pack love. It's over too soon, and really just feels like part of the game you play to pick up the bonus ability for later. I'd happily play it for hours, on an ever increasing scale, if there was a bit more to it.

Creature Stage
Good: Nice controls, and the first place where you get to do some real customization. Fighting or Socializing makes a real difference to how you play.
Bad: The preset story line (migration) plays the same way every time. Also the creatures, while visually different, all act much the same. You get some "level 1" guys you can deal with solo, then later higher level guys which forces you to use the pack dynamic.
Also, the Social "dance-off" feels like "hangin' with my homies, we be frontin'". And I didn't like the recent spate of dance-off movies. There are clear advantages to certain body parts. If you want to play for advantage, you are pretty much required to use the Level 4 body parts, since that's the only way to get higher scores in the interaction skills. More cheap parts doesn't appear to equal less expensive parts.
Overall: The section that got the most advertising time, it doesn't play differently enough each time.

Tribal Stage
Good: Um. You get clothes. At least, a few.
Bad: All the controls change. You can socialize with even your worst enemies, and win them over easily. The winning over process is very the same: "Present food, take guys with instruments, play requests, repeat".
Overall: I really didn't enjoy this stage.

City Stage
Good: The city planners proximity system is good, once you work it out. Using the epic creatures against your enemies is fun. Godzilla!
Bad: Military and religious interaction use different effects, but play the same way. Also I've played this section twice, and I think I got the same map each time. The three vehicle types are not very differentiated in ability, only in disability.
Overall: If you like designing vehicles, here's where it's at. As a RTS, it's over quickly. Build a good city layout, tank/boat rush.

Space stage
Good: Lots of planets. Lots of races. Lots of generated events to keep you busy, and each race will give you go-fetch missions.
Bad: You spend most of your time zipping back and forth. Also the 3D space presentation is a little awkward, with the travel range of your ship not always clearly displayed.
The ship editor is lacking rotate knobs on many of its parts.
Overall: Definitely the "end game" content, I'm still playing at this one. I haven't seen any kinds of customization here that matter, though.

All in all
I expected more. Of course, with the amount of hype, both generated by imagining the possibilities, and by the advertising, that's not surprising. I expect many sims style expansion packs, which will add new body parts / clothes parts.

In terms of a-life/biota, this game is definitely not evolution in action. It's Intelligent Design at best, and takes some nice side-steps in avoiding certain questions (where does life comes from? Somewhere life already was).

However, it's pretty, fun, shows what can be done with generated content, and I think will interest a lot of people to thinking "this is what happens when I pick the parts, what would it be like if the evolution was more natural/random".

Review by Peter Newman (Biota.org site admin).

Through the press releases, some independent sites are covering Spore as an artificial life game. Hats off to them. Here is PCGabe;

For those who are uninformed, SPORE is an artificial life simulator game similar to that of The Sims, also developed by EA. But the major difference between the two is that SPORE is focused on 5 different stages of evolution of your creatures life (I say creature because if you plan to make a human in this game you should get ready for your eyes to be burned out of your skull) versues the Sims where the goal of the game is to live your characters life.

There is an AFP article which offers some inspirational hope to future artificial life curious folk;

"It is still probably the most interesting question for scientists and five-year-olds: What is life?" Wright said.

MTV paraphrases Australian Gamer's concern;

The larger flaw, however, is not one that can be fixed. It’s the nature of the game: “Spore” in uneven. This is the imperfection of a game made of five connected games, the inevitable imbalance that results from any one stage-game hinging on another that isn’t as fun or doesn’t produce the same feeling of consequence connecting player to character. Players will have favorites but will be forced, on first playthrough, to go through them all. The connected games are tone-shifters, for better and for worse, and some “Spore” players will likely be disappointed when the leaps the game makes from stage to stage don’t meet their hopes of what the next step could be. Where, for example, is the stage that determines how a town of the player-created creatures, or even a family of them, relate to each other?

More in tonight's discussion on Biota Live.

I was preparing for Friday night's Biota Live when I thought I would read what the Australians are saying about Spore. My long-lost friends at Australian Gamer may have the first review. It's colorful [NOTE: language warning] - as you'd expect - but it gives interesting food for thought in terms of gameplay. Enjoy!

UPDATE: IGN AU has a slightly more "Halo"ed first review. I guess it didn't lock up for them.

Roy Plotnick emailed the Biota Conversations list this article from today's New York Times;

Today’s computers make it vastly easier for scientists to build these models. They have also allowed researchers to study evolution by building digital organisms. Scientists at Michigan State University and the California Institute of Technology, for example, have developed software called Avida that allows tiny computer programs to behave like real organisms. They make copies of themselves and mutate (randomly changing lines of programming code).

It's almost like there should be some collective field involved with this means of studying evolution by building digital organisms.

Thanks again to Jamie Matthews, BBC's Digital Planet posted an interview from ALIFE XI of Seth Bullock, Jason Noble and Richard Watson. The MP3 audio may be online for a short period of time only. If it is removed, I'll make sure there is a cached copy somewhere and update this entry accordingly.

You may want to check out Jamie and friends' tumbelog, ruleset.org, for more on science, art and artificial life with a distinctly British twist.

Littered with typos, I found the following through a CNET interview with Will Wright;

What are some of the research influences for Spore?

Wright: A lot of Richard Dawkins' work. Edward O. Wilson, back in the very early origin of light (sic.) phase. Stuart Kauffman wrote about autocatalytic sets, which are theories about the origin of life, like did life come to Earth on a comet or did it originate out of self-organizing chemical sets.

I have a hypothesis that Will Wright's lack of use of the term artificial life comes from an experience leading up to Digital Biota 2. As this relates to my own experience, I can't talk too much about it bar to say it motivated my editorial duties with Biota.org and may motivate Will Wright not to use the term artificial life.

More than a decade later, artificial life is a distinctly different thing. I could be wrong in my hypothesis, but it would be a terrible thing for Will Wright not to use the term artificial life when clearly it motivated his development of Spore. (Digg this)

The GreyThumb chapters are growing thanks in large part to Facebook. I may have missed a couple, but here are the current list of chapters;

Los Angeles
San Francisco Bay Area
Indiana (Bloomington)
Boston
New York
North Carolina (Greensboro/Raleigh)
London
Brighton
Netherlands
Melbourne (Australia)
Second Life

We are still trying to unify the mailing lists for these groups. If you live in/near any of these locations and you are interested in more information, please get in contact.

I received word from Jamie Matthews that these posts on the Intelligent Design blog may be something artificial life developers could assist with, perhaps.

From the conclusion to We Can Make Software that Comes to Life.

At least he got the requirement for organization right. Maybe Bullock will get a clue and figure out that complex things don’t just "self" organize like a magic origami. What a dope. Where do they find these clueless chuckleheads and how do they possibly get advanced degrees?

And the follow up Laws of Nature, again the conclusion;

It will be a case of one intelligence creating another intelligence. That will do nothing more than add further evidentiary weight to the proposed law that intelligence only comes from intelligence.

I guess the clueless chuckleheads who read this blog can post reasoned responses at the source. Enjoy.

I had a particularly interesting chat with Jamie Matthews on his impressions of the ALIFE XI conference and his MSc at Sussex. They have also published the proceedings online.

Thanks to Gerald de Jong (and his son Mitch) for the link to the Powder Game. It is a time vacuum.

The video of Zann Gill's talk at GreyThumb Silicon Valley on July 29th, 2008, has been put on Google Video by Al Lundell. Many thanks to Al.

If folks want to participate in the Biota Live with Zann on 8pm Pacific, Friday, August 22, the Biota podcast page has more information about calling the show or participating in the text chat.

Thanks to Bruce Damer, here are some photos from GreyThumb Silicon Valley on Tuesday night. Audio will follow in the Biota podcast feed.

You may wonder what it is like giving a presentation at a GreyThumb. Last night's GreyThumb Silicon Valley was attended by at least forty people. Scott Schafer gave a presentation. Here is his account.

Bruce Damer emailed me a slew of photos and audio from GreyThumb London last night. I have put a small selection up. Enjoy!

Enough said.