I don’t know how to get Breve to evolve stuff, but Michael Goodfellow has a great simulation of evolution that attempts to evolve a computer program (a finite-state machine with 40 states) capable of following a trail of food. Its input is whether or not there is food in front of it, and its output is whether to turn left, turn right, move forward, or do nothing. I’ve already evolved creatures suitable for two types of trail (the one the applet uses by default, and one where each line of food is followed by a second line whose length indicates which way to turn). They sometimes stumble upon the optimal solution, but figuring out how to get them to do that can be an interesting challenge.
Breve is a more comprehensive simulation, though it doesn’t run in the browser. (hat tip Steve Rayhawk)
I don’t know how to get Breve to evolve stuff, but Michael Goodfellow has a great simulation of evolution that attempts to evolve a computer program (a finite-state machine with 40 states) capable of following a trail of food. Its input is whether or not there is food in front of it, and its output is whether to turn left, turn right, move forward, or do nothing. I’ve already evolved creatures suitable for two types of trail (the one the applet uses by default, and one where each line of food is followed by a second line whose length indicates which way to turn). They sometimes stumble upon the optimal solution, but figuring out how to get them to do that can be an interesting challenge.