Cyclic Incrementality in Competitive Coevolution: Evolvability through Pseudo-Baldwinian Switching-Genes

Coevolving systems are notoriously difficult to understand. This is largely due to the Red Queen effect that dictates heterospecific fitness interdependence. In simulation studies of coevolving systems, master tournaments are often used to obtain more informed fitness measures by testing evolved individuals against past and future opponents. However, such tournaments still contain certain ambiguities. We introduce the use of a phenotypic cluster analysis to examine the distribution of opponent categories throughout an evolutionary sequence. This analysis, adopted from widespread usage in the bioinformatics community, can be applied to master tournament data. This allows us to construct behavior-based category trees, obtaining a hierarchical classification of phenotypes that are suspected to interleave during cyclic evolution. We use the cluster data to establish the existence of switching-genes that control opponent specialization, suggesting the retention of dormant genetic adaptations, that is, genetic memory. Our overarching goal is to reiterate how computer simulations may have importance to the broader understanding of evolutionary dynamics in general. We emphasize a further shift from a component-driven to an interaction-driven perspective in understanding coevolving systems. As yet, it is unclear how the sudden development of switching-genes relates to the gradual emergence of genetic adaptability. Likely, context genes gradually provide the appropriate genetic environment wherein the switching-gene effect can be exploite

Stability in Bullying and Victimization and its Association with Social Adjustment in Childhood and Adolescence

This study examined the concurrent and longitudinal associations between stability in bullying and victimization, and social adjustment in childhood and adolescence. Participants were 189 girls and 328 boys who were studied in primary school and in secondary school. The mean age of the participants was 11.1 years in primary school and 14.1 years in secondary school. The measures consisted of peer reported social and personal characteristics. Children who bullied in childhood and adolescence were less liked and more disliked in childhood, and more aggressive and disruptive both in childhood and adolescence, than children who bullied only in childhood or adolescence. Children who bullied or who were victimized only in childhood did not differ largely in adolescence from the children that were never bullies or victims. Children who were victimized in adolescence closely resembled those who were victimized in childhood and adolescence in terms of being liked or disliked, being nominated as a friend, and shyness. The study stresses the need to distinguish between stable and transient bullies and victims

W.F.G. HASELAGER

On the potential of non-classical constituency Horgan and Tienson doubt that classical cognitive science will be able to solve the frame problem but have some expectations with respect to connectionism. Since the frame problem arises in contexts where a potentially large amount of complex knowledge is involved, connectionism has to prove that its models can represent and use well-structured information. Indeed, Horgan and Tienson note that the key question for the viability of connectionism is whether representations with some kind of non-classical encoding of constituency are susceptible to richly structure-sensitive processing. I will examine several connectionist models and point out three reasons for doubting that work of this kind can scale up to the extent required for dealing with the frame problem. I will conclude that connectionism as of yet has no principled and satisfactory way of effectively representing structured information in a distributed way. Hence, the frame problem provides a difficulty to connectionism that is no less serious than the obstacle it constitutes for classical cognitive science

Sharing blood: A decentralised trust and sharing ecosystem based on the vampire bat

Item does not contain fulltextBNAIC 2012: The 24th Benelux Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Maastricht, The Netherlands, 25-26 October 201

Human SLAM, indoor localisation of devices and users

The indoor localisation problem is more complex than just finding whereabouts of users. Finding positions of users relative to the devices of a smart space is even more important. Unfortunately, configuring such systems manually is a tedious process, requires expert knowledge, and is sensitive to changes in the environment. Moreover, many existing solutions do not take user privacy into account. We propose a new system, called Simultaneous Localisation and Configuration (SLAC), to address the problem of locating devices and users relative to those devices, and combine this problem into a single estimation problem. The SLAC algorithm, based on FastSLAM, is able to locate devices using the received signal strength indicator (RSSI) of devices and motion data from users. Simulations have been used to show the performance in a controlled environment and the effect of the amount of RSSI updates on the localisation error. Live tests in non-trivial environments showed that we can achieve room level accuracy and that the localisation can be performed in real time. This is all done locally, i.e. running on a user's device, with respect for privacy and without using any prior information of the environment or device locations. Although promising, more work is required to increase accuracy in larger environments and to make the algorithm more robust for environment noise caused by walls and other objects. Existing techniques, e.g. map fusing, can alleviate these problems

Cognitive science, representations and dynamical systems theory

Abstract. In this contribution we point out that the assumption of representation in the explanations and models of cognitive science has several disadvantages. We propose that the dynamical systems theory approach, emphasizing the embodied embedded nature of cognition, might provide an important, non-representational alternative. We stress the importance of the challenge, raised by Andy Clark (Clark & Toribio, 1994: Clark, 1997), to dynamical systems theory to deal with ‘representation-hungry’ cognitive tasks. We indicate a possible way to answer that challenge in a empirically applicable manner. We suggest that investigations of this kind strengthen a motto that can be used as an antidote to the traditional representational cravings of cognitive science: ‘Don’t use representations in explanation and modeling unless it is absolutely necessary.

The effect of a semi-autonomous robot on children

This research focuses on designing the behavior of an semi-autonomous robot that supports the researcher while still being in control of the interaction. We present a study on behavioral intervention design in which elements of Pivotal Response Treatment elements are embedded into a game played by a robot and a child. The introduction of more autonomy in robot behavior and interaction increases the time that a researcher can focus on the child. In order to understand whether children perceive an autonomous robot differently than a remotely controlled robot, we examined the preferences of children. Using a within-subject design, fourteen typically developed children played with a robot that performed behavior either autonomously or through remote control. The results show that both robots were evaluated as equally engaging for the children. Thus, autonomous robots allow the operator to focus less on remotely controlling the robot and more on the interaction