Synthesis and Simulation Working with Digital Evolution Digital life broadens our conception of life, and is a useful tool for some kinds of biological studies.
Digital life has some unique properties that make it easier to study than organic life.
Because it is inside the computer to begin with, it is much easier to obtain data about digital life. In fact, when digital organisms are confined to a single computer, it is possible to collect data about any aspect of their existence without affecting the system . This is impossible with real organisms. For example, it is a routine matter to sequence the entire genome of every digital organism at birth, and this sampling has no effect on the evolution of the system. Also, digital AL systems can be easily manipulated to an extent not possible with real life, and if desired, an experiment can be exactly repeated, in order to make observations that were not made in the original run.