The emergence of more and more complex computer programs and the advent of near-sentient artificial intelligences raise the question of alternative living entities outside of the biological field. Can there be a digital life form?

In collaboration with Wageningen University of Research, this reasearch initiates debates and discussions with biologists to explore a possible translation of the principles for biological life set by scientist Tibor Gánti into a framework for digital life. Quantifying life is most likely a method bound to fail, but one might wonder how it will fail exactly.

The result of this research, Al¿ve is a practical attempt at this translation: a digital species living in a smartphone. While bearing reference to the early ‘00’s Tamagotchi fad, this creature does not exist to entertain it’s keeper, it exists to survive. When biological forms must feed on organic matter to grow, digital life calculates itself further with computing cycles. The lifeform physically grows on a phone memory to store itself until it occupies the entire spare storage. To avoid this phenomenon, the owner of the phone could choose to aid the creatures reproduction by splitting it up onto other phones, or to delete the app and be responsible for the creature’s death.