Caveat Lector
it does not really focus on them. Further , some of the reviewed background, such as the section on carbon-based A-life, seems out of place. For that section to be at all accessible, the reader must have some background in biochemistry-not what you would expect in the first chapter of an introductory book. The next six chapters are the real surprise. These are " Information Theory, " " Statistical Mechanics and Thermodynam-ics,'' " Complexity of Simple Living Systems , " " Self Organization to Criticality, " " Percolation, " and " Fitness Landscapes , " These are interesting topics and do provide some foundations for A-life. For example, although few books discuss statistical mechanics as being necessary for evolutionary and A-life systems, they offer much for the analysis of such complex systems. However , the complexity of topics in these chapters make them inappropriate for an introductory book. Furthermore, these chapters don't really " hang together " to sustain a cohesive theme through the book. Rather, they stand as individual " fundamental concepts, " written at the level of researchers in the field. A-life system, Avida. Here is where the author tries to pull together the various concepts presented and show how they apply in an experimental setting. Overall, I get the impression that this is more a book of fundamental principles that the author suggests could and should be applied to A-life (or other related research), thus providing a firmer mathematical foundation for the work. As such, I think the title is misleading. The author (and therefore the reader) would have been better served if all pretenses of introduction were dropped and instead the focus shifted to concepts that form a foundation for A-life researchers. Two aspects of the title " Introduction to Artificial Life " somehow don't seem to square with this book's contents. The first is the word " introduction, " and the second, " artificial life. " For an introductory text, this book is Should you judge a book by its cover? 78 very mathematical; it includes almost 400 equations. Mathematics is a descriptive tool, not an explanatory one, and it's hard to grasp an overview of a field from a jumble of symbols. In any case, introductions ought to be made with passion and enthusiasm , receiving the neophyte into the fold; cold equations and dense expositions of theory do little to engender a sense …