Fractals and evolution

As evidenced by some posts on this site, I have recently gotten back in to [[fractal art]], and I usually use either a program called Apophysis or Mandelbulb 3D to perform the renderings. Fractal art is basically a way to create digital artwork using mathematical algorithms, while using the power of the computer to actually perform the calculations. I enjoy this particular genre because of the abstractness and because the sheer number of potential designs is pretty much limitless.

I have also begun to appreciate the genre in another regard: its resemblance to the process of evolution. I’m about halfway through Richard Dawkin’s “The Greatest Show On Earth,” and early in the book, he mentioned his little program called, “The Blind Watchmaker.” He has a book by the same name. The idea behind the program is that the user essentially begins with a very simple form (a dot) and by selecting one of many potential “genes” by which to modify the current “biomorph,” the user can synthesize a new “organism” on the screen and see evolution at work by selecting a particular “gene” over another. Obviously, no one is “selecting” which genes will be passed on to subsequent generations in real life. In nature, variation takes place because of the environment, predation and any number of other factors. But the program synthesizes the basic process, similar to some other evolution “games” in which users can manipulate simple “organisms” on the screen, add variation and see them develop into different forms.

Here is a set of biomorphs that I rendered using Dawkin’s programy. These biomorphs are more than 200 “generations” old:

In fractal art, the same concept applies. Once you select the basic shape that you are going to manipulate, you can then “mutate” the shape using one of many “trends,” which are analogous to real life genes. The “trends” apply unique characteristics to the original shape, and the user can manipulate how strong the influence is for each gene. I was creating fractals a couple years ago when I first read “The Blind Watchmaker” and first learned of the biomorph program, but the resemblance to evolution, for whatever reason, did not occur to me at the time. But once this occurred to me, I was quite fascinated to learn that I was, in one sense, creating artwork using a similar process as that of real life evolution on a very small scale.

Here are some screenshots from Apophysis that show the various trends and the program’s “mutation” tool.

Some random coolness

I was just doing some stumbling around today and found a few nifty sites. Here’s some random examples of coolness from Cyberspace:

Fractal Lab: Here, you can play around with fractal art without having to download a program onto your computer. Just create the fractal right in the web browser. Of course, since fractals are fairly complicated digital images rendered using algorithms, push the settings too high and your browser and/or computer might freeze, depending on the badassery (or not) of your particular system. I created this image while playing around:

Fractal Lab

B-Rhymes: This is a handy tool for poets or song writers. Plug a word into the search, and the site returns words that rhyme but those that might not be so obvious. Unless a person is trying to write a terrible poem or song, for instance, one probably should not rhyme “fun” with “sun.” This search returns more uniquely crafted rhymes. For instance, I entered “stereotactic” and got such gems as “peripatetic” (Consequently, this is my screen name in [[Counter Strike: Source]] with one letter variation), “extragalactic” and “bacteriostatic.”

Flickr Related Tag Browser: This is a different kind of browser that works within a more spatial context, grabbing images based on whatever word a person enters into the search field. I put in the word, “poo,” and here is a screenshot of the result:

Flickr Related Tag Browser

Each of the words in the white rectangles can be clicked to get their respective search results.

And my favorite of the day …

Conflict History: This site offers an interactive map that traces all the battles and conflicts on the planet dating back to B.C. The timeline at the bottom is scrollable, and when loaded, the battles for the particular time periods are highlighted in red and more information is available for each of them. The first war that I could find was the [[Kurkshetra War]], dating back to 2993 B.C.

Conflict History