Electronic Organisms

• are simple, because they need not contain the creative infrastructure of the algorithmic division of labor
• but they also have to be simple, because otherwise they could not be algorithmically controlled off-line by humans.

• have to be complex, because they have to contain all the creative infrastructure necessary for their creation, reproduction, maintenance and action,
• but they can easily afford to be complex, because there is no need for detailed communication with a programmer.

Electronic Organisms have the ability to react immediately to unforeseen challenges, without the need for a programmer to recognize the situation and deal with it by modifying a program. Electronic Organisms do so by recurrence to fundamental goals and organizing principles, just as programmers do so now.

Electronic organisms will live, grow and evolve in the rapidly growing world of installed computers and networks, just as microbes, plants and animals live in natural ecosystems.

Strong forces are pushing technology towards electronic organisms. Rapidly growing installed processing power worldwide is creating expectations of novel functions of increased complexity. Novel computer functions produce a quadratically growing need for coordination. Software production is a black hole for human intellectual power, and society will soon no longer be able to satisfy that demand. The result is the software crisis. The example of animal and human nervous systems and of organisms in general lead the way to the solution of these problems.

A general expectation that autonomous electronic organisms will create security problems is due to a fundamental misunderstanding.