\nCodon

Inspired by the reading of AN EVOLUTIONARY ARCHITECTURE by John Frazer and the generative toolbox.

Structure generations based on John Orton Conway’s Game of Life.  The goal is to explore the emerging resulting patterns of the genetic algorithm whilst stacking all generations. The automation requires an initial finite array of cells and a maximum number of generations. Their initial state (life or death) is randomly assigned based on an arbitrary threshold. The script calls a recursive routine that decides the state of each cell (life or death) depending on the state of their neighbours (8 in total) at the end of each iteration. In order to best approximate an infinite game board, the automation wraps at the edges.

The stacking generates unexpected & elaborate patterns in xyz directions. The search for emergent behaviours is on.

The initial script has been developed in Python for Rhino5. This version is not optimized but presents a clear function split. The sumNeighbours function is inspired from an elegant solution by algorithmicdesign.net

Code:

import rhinoscriptsyntax as rs
import math
import random

def RandomGenesis(intGridi,intGridj):
arrPt=[]
for i in range(intGridi):
arrj=[]
for j in range(intGridj):
rnd = random.random()
if rnd>0.97:# density threshold for initial cells
arrj.append(1)
else:
arrj.append(0)
arrPt.append(arrj)
return arrPt # arrPt is a list of i no. lists _ each list contains j no. elements (1s or 0s)

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