Karl Sims is well known for his artificial life computer animations. Karl Sims is the creator of GenArts, a software solutions and visual effects company for advertising agencies and media companies. Karl Sims work titled Galapagos is an interactive piece that simulates evolution of virtual organisms. In this work computers simulate abstract organisms. Viewers select the organisms they find most appealing and these organisms survive, and grow, mutate, and reproduce. As the evolutionary process goes on new and interesting organisms are created. This work is interesting because viewers act as the evolutionary pressure that dictates which organisms are allowed to survive and pass on their genetics.

Dictating the genetics of  an organism is becoming increasingly common place and while controlling the genetic makeup of an organism may seem unrealistic, this ability is becoming a reality. The abstract organisms are shown here: http://www.karlsims.com/galapagos/galapagos-images.html.

Sources:

http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/galapagos/

http://everything2.com/title/Karl+Sims

http://www.karlsims.com/galapagos/index.html