Conway's game of life
Conway's game of life (abbreviated CGL) deals with a cellular automaton game called Life, which was meant to simulate the ecology of one-celled creatures. It was invented by John Conway in 1970. [1]
CGL is a simple game whereby random squares on a grid are filled. These are deemed to be "alive". Under a set rule based on the number of filled adjacent cells a cell either continues to live, dies, or is born.
Despite being based on simple rules the outcome cannot be estimated in advance, only by running the simulation can you get any results. Despite it being based on a random initial state possessing, patterns form very easily. One common pattern is the glider, a configuration of cells which can move an unlimited distance across the grid without interacting with other groups.
CGL have become increasingly studied in ecology as it give an interesting perspective on the behaviouer of ecosystems. It is often cited as an example of how evolution can occur in that with a simple rules and random starting positions complex patterns can form. Nonetheless, CGL has failed to provide any evidence that the sort of large-scale evolution required for evolutionary theories of the origin of species: while simple patterns like gliders may arise, despite numerous attempts, CGL has failed to produce complex, self-perpetuating behavior on a large scale.
In mathematics it is cited as an example of chaos.
References
The Science of Discworld 2: The Globe by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen, has a good easy to understand discrition of Conway's game of life.
