Book Review: “Introduction to Artificial Life”

Despite the popularity of artificial life over the last 15 years or so, as witnessed by the establishment of several international conferences on the subject and the birth of the Artificial Life Journal and similar publications, there has been a conspicuous lack of decent introductory texts on the subject. Notable exceptions include “Artificial Life: An Introduction” (Langton 1995), an eclectic selection of papers covering a wide range of subjects that fall under the “artificial life” umbrella, and “The Philosophy of Artificial Life” (Boden 1996), another collection of papers, this time dealing with the philosophical underpinnings and implications of the subject. A handful of popular science books also introduce the subject, Levy’s arguably still being the best (Levy 1993), but someone looking for a textbook suitable for an undergraduate or graduate course on artificial life may be disappointed.