Langton’s Ant
Langton’s ant follows two laughably simple rules: on a white cell, flip the colour, turn right, move; on a black cell, flip it, turn left, move. For thousands of steps it draws chaotic splatter — then, around step 10,000, it abruptly locks into building an endless diagonal "highway" of period 104. Nobody has proved it always must. Run one ant or several, at any speed, and watch emergent order crystallise out of chaos.
Runs 100% in your browser — simulations are computed locally on your device.
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Notes
- White cell: turn right; black cell: turn left; flip the cell and step forward either way.
- The highway is period 104: every 104 steps the ant repeats its pattern two cells further out.
- The ant is Turing-complete, and the highway conjecture — that it always emerges — remains unproven.
- Runs 100% in your browser — simulations are computed locally on your device.
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