Intelligence Exhibited by Ants Screen Saver

Sometimes the program seems to come up with its own intelligence, demonstrated, for example, by its suddenly learning how to count. Check out this binary counter it came up with on its own.



To really appreciate the counter, you have to see it in action. Here's an explanation of how it works. It moves back and forth through the image rebounding only when it finds a dark color. When it finds a light color, it simply passes right over it to the next one. The result is that the length of the whole image increases by one pixel every 2 to the x ticks, where x is the number of ticks elapsed so far. In other words, it is a base two counter.

Here, the program figured out how to play ring around the rosie, or is it Duck, Duck, Goose. Maybe the ant is just chasing its tail. In any case, the pixels alternately switch from dark to light and back again by going around the "circle", first traversing the inner circle, then the outer circle, then back to the inner circle again, ad infinitum.


Send comments to author, Victor Engel at victor@victorengel.com.

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