"an ant's forefoot shall save you" -Ezra Pound, Canto LXXXIII
This page is an expanding archive of artificial life software that runs on the Macintosh. If you are having trouble decompressing the downloaded files, click here. No warranties express or implied are made regarding the use of this software. Use at your own risk.
Please note that most of these programs were developed for Classic Mac OS, and may not have been tested on more recent operating systems such as OS X.
If you're new to artificial life and want to download something quick, fun, and not too complicated, try flies or Easy Life. To read about how artificial life experiments may provide insight on human society click here. Did you know that artificial life techniques protect you from terrorist explosive devices?
Simon Fraser's "MacTierra," an implementation on the Macintosh of Tom Ray's "Tierra." MacTierra creates an ecosystem of interacting and competing machine code programs living in an environment which emulates a massively parallel computer. Download MacTierra [Size: 682K]. The archive includes the very latest documentation in HTML format. Fraser maintains an online version of the documentation. Genebank is a small application that simply dumps MacTierra's Genebank file to a text file, giving you data on the genotypes that have arisen during a run. Download GenebankDump [Size: 71K].
A collection of programs from the forthcoming book from Princeton University Press, "Building Biological Superstructures: Models of Self-Organization" by Scott Camazine, Jean-Louis Deneubourg, Nigel Franks & Thomas D. Seeley. Pascal source code is provided for many of the programs. Scott Camazine says he would like to hear feedback on the programs, and would welcome changes to the code to give it a more standard Macintosh interface. Click on the links below to download Chaos and lab questions [Size: 17K]; Cobwebbing [Size: 17K]; Bifurcation diagram [Size: 28K]; Collective Robots and source code [Size: 152K]; Demon [Size: 11K]; DifferentialAdhesion and source code [Size: 110K]; Epidemic and source code [Size: 143K]; Firefly and source code [Size: 242K]; DLA and source code [Size: 22K]; Flocking [Size: 22K]; Forest fire and source code [Size: 127K]; Fractal Growth [Size: 6K]; Genetic Algorithm and source code [Size: 143K]; Lorentz Attractor [Size: 11K]; Pattern Formation and source code [Size: 105K]; Traveling Salesman [Size: 22K]; Spirals and source code [Size: 25K].
From first person to create a computer model of bird flocking behavior using simple bird-local rules, see the Craig Reynolds Boid Page which includes Buzzz! a module for the commercial screen saver After Dark.
Robert Orenstein's letter-recognizing neural network. Once taught a few examples of different letters, it can recognize subsequent versions of those letters even though they are hand-drawn by the user. This HyperCard stack requires HyperCard or HyperCard Player in order to run. Download LetterLearner [Size: 345K]
Alexander Kasprzyk's three-dimensional LIFE program for Macintosh. It allows the user to set rules under which cells live, die, and are reborn, create custom cell patterns, and much more. Download Tresvita [Size: 350K]. There is also a Tresvita module for the commercial screen saver After Dark. Download Tresvita screen saver [Size: 21K]. To calculate Lambda values of three-dimensional rule-sets: Download Lambda Calculator [Size: 28K]. For more of Alex's work, go to: Alexander Kasprzyk's ALife Page
Thai Truong's "Mac Cellular Automata," a Macintosh demonstration of cellular automata following one-dimensional rules. This program shows that simple local rules, repeated often enough, can result in complex and amazing global patterns. Download Mac Cellular Automata. [Size: 60K]
LifeLab - Andrew Trevorrow's CA laboratory. LifeLab comes with a vast amount of pre-saved work containing many classic 'creatures', including Gliders, Glider-guns, Puffer and Pulsars. Download LifeLab [Size: 720K]. Visit Andrew's LifeLab page
Fred J. Condo Jr.'s "Hodgepodge(Life)," a Macintosh demonstration of cellular automata following two-dimensional rules. This program uses a hypothetical model for the spread of disease. Interesting patterns emerge as cells infect each other, die, and are reborn. Download Hodgepodge.(Life) [Size: 120K]
Reggie McLeod's "Easy_Life-2.0," a Macintosh version of the most widely-known two-dimensional cellular automata, "LIFE." This program shows several forms of cyclical, recurring, and coherent moving forms that are possible under the simple set of LIFE rules. The picture above is of a "glider." Download Easy_Life-2.0. [Size: 28K]
Alexander Kasprzyk's implementation for Macintosh of a rule set invented by Christopher Langton, for governing the motion of a small entity. The rule set is very simple but the resultant behavior is quite complex: Download Langton's Ant [Size: 50K]. Alex maintains his own alife page: Alexander Kasprzyk's ALife Page
LEE (Latent Energy Environments) is both an alife model and a software tool to be used for simulations within the framework of that model. LEE is intended to aid in the understanding of a broad range of issues in theoretical, behavioral and evolutionary biology. In the image above, inhabitants of LEE take a bite out of their world. Download LEE and source code [Size: 250K]. And visit the LEE web page.
Ishihama Yoshiaki's collection of artificial life programs include the entertaining "Simulations2.1.2_PPC" [Size: 400K] for PowerMac and "Simulations2.1.2_68K" [Size: 400K] for older machines, which feature (among other things) boids flying through a 3D environment, a 3D ant (shown in the image above) who gathers food, and gravitationally attracted spheres. He has also written some After Dark modules. Visit the Ishihama Yoshiaki Page.
Greg Strickler's Petri simulates artificial life forms living in petri dishes. You create your own species, make as many little life forms as you wish, and let them go. You control the environment, the species behavior, and discover what works and what doesn't. You may use a DNA model which allows life forms to inherit traits from their parents and adapt to their environment. The Petri downloads include documentation (Hypercard) and sample files. Download Petri for Power Macintosh [800K]. Download Petri for 68K Macintosh [781 K] or visit Greg's web page.
Adam Wight's Prokaryote simulates evolution in a colony of cells that vaguely resemble real single-celled organisms. They have one sense, the ability to see the cell directly ahead of them, which can be occupied by either nothing, food, poison, or another bug. Their behavior is determined by a genetically inherited array of probabilities, and what their eye senses. They can reproduce either by asexual division, or by conjugation and genetic crossover. You can watch the bumbling, twirling ancestors give rise to ultra-efficient feeding machines in a dramatic illustration of Chuck D.'s theories. You'll observe many phenomena with close parallels in nature, especially once you bring poison and walls into the picture.... Download Prokaryote [200K]
Dave Johnson's "EVOLV-O-MATIC," a Macintosh environment in which each critter has a set of "genes" which determine its movement patterns and its breeding behavior. Some of a critter's genes control its response to the "sun" that can move around in the world: a critter can be attracted or repelled, excited or calmed by light, and each critter has a "soft side,"or sensitive side, which it may try to keep towards or away from the light. Combinations of these factors lead to interesting behaviors: orbiting, sun humping, scouting, slingshooting, etc. Documentation is provided under the Apple menu. Download EVOLV-O-MATIC 0.8. [Size: 180K] and also download saved world files which show highly evolved creatures that emerge after thousands of generations.
Click on the appropriate link below to download Kevin Coble's "Neoterics," a Macintosh environment in which creatures evolve neural nets to guide them in gathering food and mating. This program has excellent documentation. [NOTE: This program will not run on older Macs such as Plus or SE.] Download Neoterics for non-PowerMacs. [Size: 140K] If you have a PowerMac 6100 or higher, download: PowerMac Neoterics. [Size: 260K] For Kevin's very latest versions, use anonymous ftp to get these files: ftp.srv.net/pub/users/kxc/Neoterics.sea; ftp.srv.net/pub/users/kxc/Neoterics.PPC.sea.
Keith Wiley's Macintosh demonstration of the mimicking, or copycat effect found in nature. For example, some types of butterflies will mimick the coloration and pattern of other butterflies which have better defense mechanisms, thus gaining some protection from predation without actually developing the defense mechanisms. Download CopyCat [Size: 475K]
Keith Wiley's "Bugs," a Macintosh environment of plants, rocks, and hungry bugs. Menus allow you to observe the distribution of genes among the evolving bug population. Includes documentation. The image above is of one of the plants the bugs like to eat. Download Bugs [Size: 130K]. Click here to go to Keith's alife page.
Ryan Koopman's "Vivarium," a Macintosh environment which allows the user to specify the general strategy of an organism (for example grazer, predator, cannibal, or some combination). The organism must then evolve rules governing its response to the world. The image above is of slugs encountering spiders. Get it from the Vivarium web page or from here.
Alex Vulliamy's "Flies," a simple demonstration for Macintosh of a flocking theory. Each fly in the environment tries to maintain itself near its two closest neighbors, leading to an emergent behavior in which the flock seems to move with a single mind. A flock is pictured above. Download Flies [Size: 11K]. Flies is also available as a module for the commericial screen saver After Dark: Download Flies AD module [Size: 11K]. Visit Alex Vulliamy's page.
Alex Vulliamy's "WormLab," wherein worm size and other factors evolve subject to mutation. A worm is pictured above, placidly grazing among food particles. Download WormLab [Size: 28K]. Visit Alex Vulliamy's page.
"TargetSeekers," an environment in which evolving algorithms for hitting the center of a target compete with evolving target defense patterns. A targetseeker (in green) hits the center of a target in the picture above. Download TargetSeekers [Size: 48K] Documents are included.
A biomorph program, and other interesting resources at Brainiac.
Tom Barbalet offers the simulation Nervana.
To branch out into math programs, geometric visualization, fractals, games, puzzles and chess, see Xah Lee's bountiful page.
Want to know more about Artificial Life? Here's a good starting point: Santa Fe Artificial Life web site.
And make sure to read Steven Levy's excellent book, "Artificial Life."
About the keeper of this page.