[22 May 2020]: Please note: this is an archived copy of my old website. The content on these pages is no longer being updated. You can find my current website at http://www.tim-taylor.com

Tim Taylor's home page

Tim Taylor
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Welcome to my good old-fashioned home page!

I am a scientist, author, and coder of artificial life technology, based in Edinburgh, Scotland. I have particular interests in open-ended evolution and in the history of artificial life. Currently I work part-time (and remotely) as a Senior Research Fellow in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash University (Australia), and as an associate examiner for the University of London International Programmes. In between these things, I have recently written a book (with Alan Dorin) on the early history of thinking about machines that can reproduce and evolve (we're currently talking to presses about getting it published). I am also just finding time again to start some new development and experimentation with ALife-related systems.

Further biographical details

On two occasions in recent years I have worked as a Senior Research Fellow in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash University in Melbourne. From early 2017 to early 2018 I developed an evolutionary agent-based simulation for them as part of a large project investigating the effects of climate change on pollination patterns of commercial crops. In 2014 I developed Omnigram Explorer, a simple interactive tool for exploring complex computational models.

In between those two stints, I spent 6 months in 2015 working as a research associate on the EvoEvo project in the York Centre for Complex Systems Analysis at the University of York before returning to work independently in Edinburgh.

From mid 2010-early 2014 I worked in the Department of Computing at Goldsmiths, University of London, as the Deputy Course Director of the University of London's International Programmes in Computing (where we offered degrees in CIS and Creative Computing). The programmes had around 1200 students across the world, and my role involved both supporting current students and affiliate institutions, and also developing new offerings and new markets.

From May 2005 until late 2009, I was Chief Technical Officer, and co-founder, of Timberpost Ltd, a company developing Artificial Intelligence-based software for fund management. We worked closely with a number of large banks and financial firms in London, Europe and the USA.

I spent most of the ten years before that doing academic research in artificial intelligence and artificial life. I have strong interests in biologically-inspired systems, and my PhD was in the evolution of self-replicating software agents.

From January 2002 until May 2005, I was a Research Fellow in School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. Within the school, I spent most of that time in the Mobile Robotics Research group of the Institute of Perception, Action and Behaviour, working on the Hydra project, which was an EU-funded effort to develop radically new, biologically-inspired technologies for building robust, reconfigurable and self-repairing robots. During the last six months there I moved to the Institute for Communicating and Collaborative Systems (ICCS), to work on the EC-funded JAST (Joint Action Science and Technology) Project. This involved programming an experimental platform involving eye trackers and a virtual environment (user documentation for my software is available here, and system documentation here).

I have also held research positions at IC-CAVE, University of Abertay Dundee (a computer games research group), and at MathEngine PLC, Oxford (a physics engine middleware supplier for games companies), and commercial positions at Quantec Investment Technology in London, and IBM United Kingdom headquarters in Portsmouth, as well as working as a freelance programmer and web developer.

I hold an MA in Natural Sciences (specialising in Experimental Psychology) from the University of Cambridge, and an MSc (with distinction) and PhD in Artificial Intelligence from the University of Edinburgh.

Other things that keep me occupied include:

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Document last updated: Tim Taylor, Friday, 22 May 2020