
Writing Hamlet with a Genetic Algorithm - GarethX
http://www.glthr.com/20monkeys/help/
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moron4hire
This style of problem is probably the most common sort used to demonstrate
genetic algorithms. It is also not a very good use for GAs.

When GAs are applied in this way--i.e. generating a goal state directly, with
a known goal state to which they are compared directly, generating a fitness
value that is nothing more than progress towards the goal state--then the GA
is no longer a GA. It becomes not much more than an inefficient hill climbing
with a smattering of random walk thrown in.

These sorts of problems get used in demonstrations because they are simple to
understand. We get to spend more effort on the mechanics of annealing,
breeding, running generations, etc, without having to spend significant effort
on the fitness function. But the fitness function is where most of the real
work of applying GA to novel problems actually lies (after figuring out how to
model solutions as genes without a linear dependency between alleles). It's
also a fundamental component of neural networks (the ability to evaluate not
just whether a solution is right or wrong, but to give a value for how much
right or wrong). So personally, I find such demos to be woefully incomplete.

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tempodox
Man, that english is bad. Proofreading was obviously skipped. Reading the
outcome is no fun. Also, I can't find no screenshot with no zoom icon.

