GOL-037 · technical companion
Counterpart
Death sends a successor toward a counterpart. Carried eight-bit histories can redirect each identity toward the nearest living neighbor of its former target, creating independent links and shared pursuits.
At a glance
- geometry
- Square lattice
- neighborhood
- Eight Moore neighbors + one outgoing counterpart + nearest-living search
- states
- Binary life + directed identity links + eight-bit histories + private tie streams + eight-way bearings
- update
- Synchronous Life and death succession, carried-history matching, independent nearest-living retargeting and recalculated bearings
- renderer
- Canvas 2D
The question
Can ordinary Life produce reciprocal streams when every death tries to continue one step toward a uniquely paired counterpart?
Local rule
Every site holds a living or dormant identity with one outgoing counterpart. Evaluate editable Life rules synchronously. A dying identity attempts a successor one step toward its counterpart; original occupants, ordinary births and competing claims block it. Success carries identity and history, exchanging with the dormant destination identity. Append final alive/dead occupancy to each identity’s eight-bit history. With history rewiring enabled, a four-bit consecutive match anywhere in the real samples redirects that identity to the nearest living cell to its former counterpart’s post-transfer position, excluding itself and that counterpart. Equal screen-space Euclidean distances use private seeded choices; no candidate retains the link. Resolve all outgoing links independently from the same old links and completed field, then recalculate bearings. Shared targets are allowed.
Controls and boundaries
Birth/survival masks accept zero through eight neighbors; empty masks disable a pathway. Edit four history-code bits, enablement and the independent rewiring seed. All sixteen codes are valid. Each completed Step records one final alive/dead sample, including dormant zeroes; successful successors record one. The initial sample counts toward the four-sample warmup. A persistent match can retarget every Step. Bounded edges are default; wrapping changes Life and succession geometry while bearings and retarget distances remain screen-space. Version-one compositions restore with history rewiring off. Disabling stops future changes; Reset reconstructs initial reciprocal pairs.
What to watch
Sparse scouts makes initial death-driven travel easy to see. Watch streams steer, collide and fall dormant. Local Life births may revive blocked references. Cyan marks successful successors; simplified Color shows living occupancy. Activity and eventual order depend on the chosen rules and opening.
Inspect a pair
Pause and enable Inspect cell. Gold outlines the selected identity and violet its outgoing counterpart. Written inspection shows carried history, matched code, former-target search center, exact nearest distance and candidate count, tie-choice stream and next target. A counterpart need not point back after rewiring. Cyan marks successful successors; Color off shows occupancy.
Reproduce an opening
Download the example above, open the simulation, expand the controls, then use Share & reproduce → Import JSON. The example uses authored rules and a fixed seeded starting field; it is independent of the site’s editable default composition. Import starts paused at Step zero.
Share links and JSON reproduce the configured starting conditions, including hidden layers rebuilt by Reset. They do not save an evolved board, hand-painted cells, speed or display preferences. Determinism applies to the same rule version and Step sequence; real-time playback rates vary by device.
Large fields, dense populations and large interaction radii increase the work per Step. Start with a small field and radius, then increase them while paused. Read the configuration format and automated-access guide for compatibility details.