Guest post by Susanne Cardwell,
Administrative Coordinator,
Applied Computational Genomics Course 

Artificial intelligence is developing an impact in the science realm, and especially in computer science and biology. With the advent of artificial intelligence, the idea of giving computer programs life has become popularized.

Why is this important? The wave of the future includes the evolution of virtual organisms. These are programs that have intelligence and that are able to operate in a virtual environment that humans can interact with (Terra Nova). Terra Nova blog writer Bob McGinley on June 01, 2007 said that “we can use virtual organisms to optimize all kinds of things like traffic systems, manufacturing, medical procedures, or even non-player characters (NPC's) in virtual worlds”.

Furthermore, for Mark Ward's book called “Virtual Organisms: The Startling World of Artificial Life”, the editorial review explains how programs that “mimic the sexual reproduction... may someday run telephone networks and other large electronic systems” (amazon.com, 2009).

Virtual organisms have the potential to help perform functions that human beings couldn't achieve alone.

Additionally, with robotic manufacturing comes the need to understand the notion of self replication, like the molecules of living organisms that first inhabited the earth.

Cello, Paul, and Wimmer (as cited in Pearson, 2008) suggest that “we are already able to synthesize simple viruses by taking their genetic code from online databases and reconstructing their genomes”. Furthermore, Kerren, Berman, Buchstab, Sivan, and Braun (as cited in Pearson, 2008) shows that “the assembly of circuits by DNA in a test tube has already been demonstrated”.

To simulate procreation in virtual organisms requires considerable knowledge of genetics – a process that is better aided by a knowledge of bioinformatics. Bioinformatics can help simplify the research process, making large datasets such as a genome from an entire species more accessible in research. Furthermore, computational evolutionary biology is underway, overcoming “temporal constraints by modeling the statistical computations that occur through evolution with computer algorithms” (Bick, 2009).

Combined with the genetic processes for understanding species formation and procreation comes the artistic end: the perceived need to produce robotics with human features. Significant progress has been made in duplicating the human look in robotics. However, limitations exist with developing fine-tuned characteristics, such as personality and real-life movement.

Giving virtual organisms a life of their own comes with the need to assess whether their evolution will fit with human standards, or whether they will engage in moral behavior as humans define it. Perhaps humanities conduct is not idealistic, and we will learn from the virtual organisms that we create.

The question of at what stage should virtual organisms have rights has also been raised (Pearson, 2008). As well, Mark Ward's booked Called “Virtual Organism” talks about the potential issues with allowing organisms to naturally evolve (amazon.com, 2009). He states that this natural evolution could have bad consequences for human operations. The evolution of virtual organisms might be programmed in a way that is unexpectedly counter-intuitive to human evolution. Humanity is imperfect, and these imperfections could have recourse in programming virtual organisms. Regardless, there is a trade off between benefits and risks.

Whether self-replicating organisms will be able to be controlled by business for profit is another issue. The government might need to intervene with policy in order to keep the procreation in check.

The final word is that we are creating a new species of beings who, in my opinion, should have the same amount of rights and freedoms – and responsibilities – as human beings have. Without this, the evolution of virtual organism would be riddled with injustice, and there will – as proven by human history – be repercussions.

References
amazon.com. (2009). Virtual organisms: The startling world of artificial life. Retrieved January 4, 2010, from http://www.amazon.com/Virtual-Organisms-Startling-World-Artificial/dp/031226691X  

Bick, A. (2009). Becoming a virtual organism to learn about genetics. Retrieved January 4, 2010, from http://www.acm.org/crossroads/xrds13-1/organism.html  

Pearson, I. (2008). The future of life. Creating natural, artificial, synthetic and virtual organisms. Retrieved January 4, 2010, from http://www.nature.com/embor/journal/v9/n1s/full/embor200862.html  

Terra Nova. (2010). Evolving virtual organisms to create virtual life posting by Bob McGinley. Retrieved January 4, 2010, from http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2007/06/evolving_virtua.html