UTeach Presentation By Jacob Schrum
Who Am I? Jacob Schrum Born in Honolulu, Hawaii Undergraduate at Southwestern University PhD Student at University of Texas
How Did I Spend My Time Growing Up? Legos Videogames
School Learn Computer Programming – Taught myself C/C++ in high school – Classes in web programming – Internships/Competitions Goal: Work on videogames? – Downloaded game design tools – Taught myself what I could
College: Undergraduate Formal Programming Experience – Put the “Science” in “Computer Science” – Learned about Data Structures, Algorithms, and Artificial Intelligence Independent Studies – Lego Robot – Research, Honors Thesis – Evolutionary Computation
College: PhD Student Current Research: Games and Evolution – Evolutionary Computation to get Intelligent Agents
What Is Evolution? Evolution: change in inherited characteristics of populations over successive generations ChildrenGrandchildren
What Is Evolution? Natural Selection: favorable traits become more common in populations when they increase reproductive success ChildrenGrandchildren
Examples Peppered Moth Galapagos Finches Industrial Revolution Environmental Protection Laws Various types of beaks adapted to the types of food available: seeds of various sizes, insects, etc.
Evolution in a Computer Neuro-Evolving Robotic Operatives (NERO) – User changes “fitness function” to determine who reproduces – Robot soldiers can evolve to do numerous tasks – [DEMO] –
Evolution in a Computer Consider Ms. Pac-Man – Make some programs that play Ms. Pac-Man – Have each play the game and save the score – Remove half of programs with lowest scores – Replace with slightly modified copies of better half – Repeat [DEMO]
Other Creative Uses of Evolution Galactic Arms Race – [Online Demo]Online Demo
BotPrize Can you program a bot that looks like a human? Bot exploring level: antalus-jumpy-retrace-01.mpgantalus-jumpy-retrace-01.mpg BotPrize Quizzes:
Auxiliary Slides
What Is Evolution? Evolution: change in inherited characteristics of populations over successive generations Natural Selection: favorable traits become more common in populations when they increase reproductive success – Populations produce more offspring than can survive – Individuals vary, affecting survival and reproduction – Traits are heritable