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From: johnc@plx.UUCP (John C.)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Breeding Computer Programs (Danny Hillis talk)
Message-ID: <2421@plx.UUCP>
Date: 9 Jul 90 17:32:54 GMT
References: <1990Jul8.011033.947@dhw68k.cts.com> <26983651.27423@ics.uci.edu>
Reply-To: johnc@plx.UUCP (John C.)
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Organization: Plexus Software, Santa Clara, CA
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I read about Danny Hillis' experiments in a transcript of his 
"Simulated Evolution" talk delivered at Esther Dyson's 1990 Personal
Computing Forum.  (Dyson introduced him by saying, "Danny Hillis
founded Thinking Machines some years ago with the goal of creating a
computer that could be proud of him and his people.")

Hillis summarized his sorting-algorithm evolution results:

  "As it turns out, it's not the best 16-element sorter in
  the world.  If I had done this in 1968 this would be the
  best program for sorting.  But in 1969 somebody found one
  that requires only 60 lines of code instead of 61.  So it's
  not the best sorting program in the world, but it's a
  pretty good one and was produced entirely by this automatic
  process."


-- 
John Ciccarelli
Plexus Software, 5200 Great America Pkwy, Suite 200, Santa Clara CA 95054
email: ...sun!plx!johnc,  voice: 408-982-4842,  fax: 408-727-4864