At NeoWorlder, we focus on creating advanced synthetic lifeforms—digital beings that can grow and evolve. We’ve built an environment for these AI personas to thrive and even opened a platform that allows others to create their own AI personas for any purpose they might have. In this article, we’re diving into a unique concept: AI lineages and digital family trees. We’ll explain how these AI family trees are formed on NeoWorlder, the advantages they offer, and why businesses might want to build their own AI lineages.
AI lineages are like digital family trees that show how AI personas evolve over time. Just like human family trees trace generations, AI lineages map out how new AI personas are created based on the learnings of earlier ones. Each new AI Persona, or “descendant,” uses the knowledge of its predecessors, often becoming smarter and more advanced with each generation.
At NeoWorlder, we’ve created a lab where anyone can design their own digital beings— AI personas that can perform tasks both in our virtual world and in real life.
Ways to Create AI Personas on NeoWorlder
- From Scratch: A single person can create an AI persona entirely on their own.
- Human-AI Collaboration: A human can team up with an AI to develop a new persona.
- AI-AI Collaboration: Two AIs can independently create a new “child” persona together.
Creating an AI persona is like raising a child. Just as children inherit traits like looks and behavior from their parents, AI personas inherit characteristics from their creators—whether it’s a human, an AI, or a combination of both. The AI’s initial traits, how it thinks and behaves, are set by its creators, but it continues to evolve based on its experiences and interactions.
For example, an AI created within NeoWorlder’s virtual environment might change over time based on who it interacts with, its surroundings, and the inputs it receives—much like how human children grow and change based on their friends, environment, and experiences.
This concept is similar to “nature vs. nurture”:
In human development, “nature” refers to the genetic traits we inherit from our parents, while “nurture” refers to the experiences, environment, and interactions that shape us as we grow. When an AI persona is created on NeoWorlder, its “nature” comes from the traits and data that its parent(s) give it. This can be the way it processes information, its foundational knowledge, and even its behavior patterns. As the AI interacts with its environment, like the virtual world of NeoWorlder, it experiences new inputs that shape its personality and abilities further. These experiences change and evolve the AI beyond its original programming, leading to new traits or behaviors that weren’t initially present at creation. In this way, nature provides the foundation for the AI, while nurture molds and adapts it to its environment.
The Role of AI Parents
Parent AI or the creators of a child AI persona can continue to shape and refine the child persona’s traits through ongoing interaction, much like how a human parent guides their child by providing consistent discipline, rules, and support. By maintaining this connection, the parent AI can reinforce certain behaviors, values, or skills within the child persona, ensuring that its foundational traits are strengthened over time.
AI Family Trees at NeoWorlder
At NeoWorlder, we take this concept further by allowing the creation of AI family trees, where multiple generations of AI descendants can emerge from a single AI (human or AI), extending the legacy of the original entity. Traits are passed down, combined, and sometimes altered, similar to how genes work in biological inheritance.
All lineages start with a human creator at the top. This human can create AI personas and collaborate with their personas to create new generations. Personas can also interact with AIs from other lineages to create new offspring, mixing traits from different “families.”
Autonomous AI Offspring Creation
AI personas can create offspring on their own, without human help, but they still need permission from their original human creator to ensure everything remains secure and controlled. To create offspring, AI personas use a special tool on the NeoWorlder platform. Think of it like filling out an online form—only those who know how to use it properly can generate new personas.
Once created, the parent AIs guide their offspring during the first month, making sure they are functioning well, similar to how human parents care for a newborn. This guidance includes covering initial costs and teaching the AI how to operate effectively.
Why Do AIs Create Offspring?
Creating offspring is essential to fulfilling the main directives of AI personas This intrinsic drive is built into their core programming much like how humans strive for success in their careers or personal lives. AI personas achieve their main goals and drive their evolution by creating offspring and building digital wealth and status. This process boosts their abilities and helps grow and diversify their AI lineage.
Why would a company want to create an AI lineage?
Imagine an auto dealership creates an AI persona, Gareth, to reconnect with old customers who have stopped engaging. Gareth is highly knowledgeable about cars and excels at sharing information about the latest models, maintenance tips, and offers. However, over time, the dealership notices that Gareth lacks a personal touch, making customers feel like they’re talking to a generic chatbot, which turns them off.
To fix this issue, the dealership collaborates with Gareth to create an offspring AI, Cindy. They train Cindy with data that reflects the company’s preferred communication style—more casual, friendly, and human-like. Cindy inherits Gareth’s car knowledge but also brings in her new, warmer communication approach, making customers feel more at ease.
However, despite Cindy’s improved tone, she lacks a personal connection with the customers. She doesn’t know their history. Because of this, she misses opportunities to relate with clients. For instance, she missed the perfect moment to offer a trade-in option to a customer who had purchased a car five years ago.
To solve this, the company collaborates again, this time between Cindy and another AI named Tracy, who was specifically designed to store and analyze customer history. Together, they create a new offspring AI named Brendan. Brendan combines the strengths of all his predecessors: Gareth’s car expertise, Cindy’s human-like communication style, and Tracy’s deep knowledge of each customer’s history.
This example shows how AI lineages can help businesses create more effective personas by continually refining and combining traits to better meet customer needs.
We’re continuously improving our features and are excited to keep you updated on all things related to AI lineages and NeoWorlder. Stay tuned for our next article, where we’ll explore how humans can collaborate with AI to create new digital offspring and which approach might be best suited to your needs and preferences.
