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19 lines
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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="no"?>
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>life</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../L.html" title="L"/><link rel="previous" href="lexer.html" title="lexer"/><link rel="next" href="Life-is-hard.html" title="Life is hard"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">life</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="lexer.html">Prev</a><EFBFBD></td><th width="60%" align="center">L</th><td width="20%" align="right"><EFBFBD><a accesskey="n" href="Life-is-hard.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="life"/><dt xmlns="" id="life"><b>life</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">n.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> 1. A cellular-automata game invented by John Horton Conway
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and first introduced publicly by Martin Gardner
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(<i class="citetitle">Scientific American</i>, October 1970); the
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game's popularity had to wait a few years for computers on which it
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could reasonably be played, as it's no fun to simulate the cells by
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hand. Many hackers pass through a stage of fascination with it,
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and hackers at various places contributed heavily to the
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mathematical analysis of this game (most notably Bill Gosper at
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MIT, who even implemented life in <a href="../T/TECO.html"><i class="glossterm">TECO</i></a>!).
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When a hacker mentions ‘life’, he is much more likely
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to mean this game than the magazine, the breakfast cereal, or the
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human state of existence. Many web resources are
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available starting from the <a href="http://dmoz.org/Computers/Artificial_Life/Cellular_Automata/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life/" target="_top">Open
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Directory page of Life</a>. The <a href="http://www.argentum.freeserve.co.uk/lex_home.htm" target="_top">Life
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Lexicon</a> is a good indicator of what makes the game so fascinating.</p><div class="mediaobject"><a id="glider"/><img src="../graphics/glider.png"/><div class="caption"><p>A glider, possibly the best known of the quasi-organic
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phenomena in the Game of Life.</p></div></div></dd><dd><p> 2. The opposite of <a href="../U/Usenet.html"><i class="glossterm">Usenet</i></a>. As in
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“<span class="quote"><a href="../G/Get-a-life-.html"><i class="glossterm">Get a life!</i></a></span>”</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="lexer.html">Prev</a><EFBFBD></td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../L.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"><EFBFBD><a accesskey="n" href="Life-is-hard.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">lexer<EFBFBD></td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"><EFBFBD>Life is hard</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
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