Artificial ecosystems for creative discovery

This paper discusses the concept of an articial,ecosystem for use in machine-assisted creative discovery. Properties and processes from natural ecosystems are abstracted and applied to the design of creative systems, in a similar way that evolutionary computing,methods use the metaphor of Darwinian evolution to solve problems in search and optimi- sation. The paper examines some appropriate mechanisms and metaphors when applying articial,ecosystems to prob- lems in creative design. General properties and processes of evolutionary articial,ecosystems are presented as a basis for developing individual systems that automate,the discovery of novelty without explicit teleological goals. The adapta- tion of species to,t their environment drives the creative solutions, so the role of the designer shifts to the design of environments. This allows a variety of creative solutions to emerge in simulation without the need for explicit or human- evaluated tness measures, such as those used in interactive evolution. Two example creative ecosystems are described to highlight the eectiveness,of the method presented. Categories and Subject Descriptors