By the middle of the next century, he will be able to create it. Of the two it is hard to say which places the larger burden of responsibility on our shoulders. Artificial Life is the name given to the simulation of natural forms and processes using materials other than those found in nature. It is not so much a general method of investigation, but perhaps a type of philosophy that supposes that life can be defined in general terms by its mechanisms, not in any particular materialisation. Artificial forms are evolved within the machine and made discernible by computer visualisation.
Users interact with the work using a touch screen.
By pressing on words and symbols different sections of the videodisc are projected on a large screen in front of the viewer. The work is a poetic interpretation drawing on the dualist debate and the philosophical implications of evolutionary theory . As an interactive, it is a collection of abstract thoughts, simulations, ideas, information and poetry, all a multiplex of links into an interactive web of spectacular computer synthesised imagery. It is a passionate, individual vision that is directed towards examining representations of ourselves through our use of machines. In many ways the work is a type of futuristic natural history museum made visible through the synergetic combination of mind and machine - a document of a type of life that exists only within the abstract pluriverse of computational space.