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Show 3.2.6 C om p le x Scientific Simulations Computers were originally developed as machines for efficient and rapid execution of long series of symbol manipulation without human intervention. The main types of applications were number crunching and data manipulation. But eventually, another important type of computer applications emerged: usage of computers as a general purpose modeling and simulation tool. This type of computer applications is called conversational computing [66]. Applications in conversational computing demand a close coupling between a user and a computer. Conversational computing includes highly interactive tasks, mostly development and exploration of complex models of natural or artificial systems. The importance of conversational computing is increasing with the increasing complexity of processes we want to deal with. The use of introspection in complex simulations is described in a case study, an artificial life simulation. Artificial life involves computer simulations of life-like phenomena. These simulations are representatives of the most complex models, because they exhibit extremely unpredictable behavior, large data structures, and long running time. Traditional approaches to obtain the simulation's behavior, such as print statements of selected variables or a regular output of the entire simulation, are an incomplete solution. The selection of interesting aspects of the simulation to be displayed is made impossible by its unpredictable behavior. Besides, the set of interesting aspects changes dynamically during the simulation. The output of the entire simulation at regular intervals is prevented by a large size and long running time, since the amount of data produced would soon be prohibitively large. The problems of interaction with artificial life simulations were solved by using Dynascope, a software implementation of introspection. A simulation runs continuously as an executor with only a rudimentary output. The bulk of interaction is provided by directors. These are dynamically constructed by a human user de |
