2D Four Colour cellular

Automaton
(Surface explorations)

NKS-2006
Dr Robert H Barbour
Unitec
New Zealand

1
 Wolfram Context

Open Problems and

Projects.
• Six different mentions of ‘Gray
Code’
• One mention of exploring more
than two colours in a cellular
automaton.
2
 Problem
• A space is to be searched
• Progress reports are required from time
to time
• The search process must be replicable
and reversible
• The algorithm describing the search
behaviour must be as simple as possible

3
A context: model solution as a Cellular
automaton
• Cellular automata require two entities,
and
– a display system,
– agreed rules for managing entity
behaviour
– a recording system is useful.

4
 Motivation

• To identify a spatial search algorithm that could

model event time.
• To identify a means of externalising the
algorithm to study its behaviour.
• To implement the algorithm in a suitable
computing environment linking Gray Code and
CA.
5
 The Entities

• We have two ‘entities’.

– A two dimensional matrix of cells much like an

unshaded chess board.

– A space searching virtual ‘Ant’ that moves in single

steps from one cell to the next.

6
 The Algorithm
• Move a Vant (virtual ant) from one cell to the next.

– On leaving a cell change the cell colour in the

following sequence: white-green-black-yellow.
– On leaving a cell turn left 90o if the cell colour was
black or yellow and right 90o if the cell colour was
white or green.
– Record the cell colour and the ant coordinates.

7
 Binary Logic
• Represents true and false conditions
• A basis of digital computing representation
• Does not represent sequences of change well
• 0,1,0,1,0,1,0,1,0,1… provides no parsimonious
way of distinguishing between sets of
interactions.
• Langton’s Ant (demo Ant Farm here) 2D
two colour CA.
• Integer Sequence A102358 (Visit iterations) (Barbour, 2005) and Integer Sequence
A102369 (Iteration Intervals) (Barbour, 2005).

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 Quaternary Logic

• Quaternary Logic adds representations that

disambiguate the direction through sequences .
• Two bits are required for the four representations
(a Gray Code.).
• 00, 01, 11, 10, 00, … note the single bit change

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 Quaternary Logic applied
• Quaternary logic/Gray Code allows the reporting of specific changes
in cell visits.

– Cells in the grid unexplored (or forgotten) 00

– Some cells explored (data added) 01
– All cells explored (data complete) 11
– Some cells forgotten (data lost) 10

10
 Interaction Cycle

Becoming true, being explored

unstable
01
false true

stable 00 11

10
unstable
Becoming false, being forgotten

11
 Interaction Sequence

Unstable
01

stable 00 11 00

Unstable
10

Interaction Sequence

12
 Change or not?

11
Change
01
01 Change occurs,
or not,
00
in sequence
Either
00 01 towards or away
from
No Change
11 (or learning
about cells’
00
space)

13
 The Binary tree of change

00 Completed
10
sequence
11 11
Change
11
01
01 01
00

00 01 11

No Change 01
01
00 No change
00 00

14
 Interaction World lines
• World line traces the actual status sequence
through the possible worlds in an interaction.

11 11

11
01
01 01 World Line 00010101
00

00 01 11 World Line 00000111

01
01
00
00 00

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 Demo here
• This cellular automaton uses colours to
distinguish where in the cycle of visits the
Ant has reached on any iteration

• White = 00 unexplored
• Green = 01 exploring
• Black = 11 explored
• Yellow = 10 forgetting
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 Probability of a particular outcome
during a particular iteration
• From any particular start an assessment may be made of the
probability of a particular outcome by enumerating the
possibilities during each iteration.
• The first five iterations generate an integer sequence:
– 00, 01, 11, 00
– 1, 0, 0, 0
– 1, 1, 0, 0
– 1, 2, 1, 0
– 1, 3, 3, 1
– 2, 4, 6, 4
– Leading to the conclusion that the most likely
single outcome after the fifth iteration is 11 or
‘true’.
– (see Integer Sequence A094266)
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Probability of a particular outcome over
a number of iterations.
• The cumulative totals from the columns of the four alternatives gives
the changing probabilities ‘going forward’ from a particular status.
• 00, 01, 11, 01 representations.
1, 0, 0, 0. false
2, 1, 0, 0. false
3, 3, 1, 0. false
4, 6, 6, 1. moving to true
6, 10, 10, 5. moving to true
12, 16, 20, 15. true or agreement
28, 28, 36, 35. true but moving away
(see Integer Sequence A099423)

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 Interaction Model in use

• Space is searched by repeated cell visits.

• The pattern of visits can be exteriorised using the recent
path function and the cell visits function.
• The cellular automaton regularly ‘returns to base’
• The status of visited cells in the searched grid is known
simultaneously on iterations: 4, 8, 32, 64, 416, 832 that is
Integer Sequence A094867, the six completed single
colour squares.

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 Summary
• Search Status refers to the aggregate of cell visits having
the same attributes (colour or some other marker) in the
searched space.
• Two bits provides the representation, while quaternary
logic provides the underlying reasoning.
• Unpredicted emergent regularities in some Integer
sequences and unpredicted completed squares in the
Ant Farm.
• Relationship between Gray Code and CA shown

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 References
1. Barbieri,M., F. De Martini, G. Di Nepi, P. Mataloni (2003) Experimental Detection of Entanglement with Polarized Photons arXiv:quant-
ph/0307003 v1 1 Jul 2003
2. Barbour, R.H. (2004) A099423.Online Encyclopaedia Integer of Sequences.
http://www.research.att.com/projects/OEIS?Anum=A099423,
http://www.research.att.com/projects/OEIS?Anum=A099423, A102358, A102369,
3. Barbour, R.H. (2005) LQTL. in Beziau & Costa-Leite, UNILOG-2005 Handbook.
4. Barbour, R.H.& L.D. Painter (2004) A094266 Online Encyclopaedia of Integer Sequences.
http://www.research.att.com/projects/OEIS?Anum=A094266
5. Barbour, R.H. & J Chapman (2004) A094867 Online Encyclopaedia of Integer Sequences.
http://www.research.att.com/projects/OEIS?Anum=A094867
6. Beziau, J-V & A. Costa-Leite (eds) (2005) Handbook of the First World Congress and School on Universal Logic UNILOG'0 2005,
Montreux – Switzerland http;//www.uni-log.org5 March 26th - April 3rd
7. Chapman, J. (2004) Personal Communication.
8. Endriss, U. (2003) Modal Logic of Ordered Trees. Unpublished PhD Thesis, King’s College, London.
9. Ganguly, N. et al., (2003) A survey of Cellular Automata. Technical Report Centre for High Performance Computing, Dresden
University of Technology, December 2003.
10. Gray, F. (1953) Pulse code communication, March 17,
17, U.S. patent no. 2,632,058.
11. Hazelhurst, S. (1996) Compositional Model Checking of Partially ordered state spaces. DPhil Thesis University of British Coilumbia.
12. Prior, A. (1967). Past Present and Future: Oxford University Press.
13. Sarkar P. (2000), A Brief History of Cellular Automata. ACM Computing Surveys. Vol. 32 No. 1 March.
14. Wolfram, S.(2002) A New Kind of Science, Wolfram Media, Champaign, Illinois

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