Editing Langton's ant (section)

{{short description|Two-dimensional Turing machine with emergent behavior}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2018}}
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[[File:LangtonsAnt.svg|right|frame|Langton's ant after 11,000 steps. A red pixel shows the ant's location.]]

'''Langton's ant''' is a two-dimensional [[Turing machine]] with a very simple set of rules but complex [[Emergence|emergent]] behavior. It was invented by [[Chris Langton]] in 1986 and runs on a [[Square tiling|square lattice]] of black and white cells.<ref>{{cite journal | doi = 10.1016/0167-2789(86)90237-X | last = Langton | first = Chris G. | title = Studying artificial life with cellular automata | year = 1986 | journal = Physica D: Nonlinear Phenomena | volume = 22 | pages = 120–149 | hdl = 2027.42/26022 | issue = 1–3| bibcode = 1986PhyD...22..120L | url = https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/26022/1/0000093.pdf | hdl-access = free }}</ref> The idea has been generalized in several different ways, such as [[turmite]]s which add more colors and more states.