Words from the man heself on a set of rules that was very important to me during my late teens and into my mid 30's. Conway's Life was the first real program I would do up for  many a new computer/rig. I spent many hours playing with the patterns, messing with configurations to produce various outcomes and in the letter days tried to wrap my head around Turing Machines in the Life setting.  If you have never mucked in the fields of Life you should . 
John H Conway on his love/hate relationship with his most “famous” invention. More on how he invente
