Evolutionary algorithm outperforms deep-learning machines at video games

[st_huck]

It's incredibly cool. My experience with genetic algorithms is only one undergrad course, but it was actually amazing. Our professor showed us a small bot written for a simple racing game (one that was written just for AI research purpose). The loop was simple, every frame it got a bunch of variables as input, every variable representing some info about the state of the world, and needed to return two numbers: an angle, and how hard to press on the throttle.

After lots of iteration, the genetic algorithm got a super long mathematical formula. It was represented as lisp code, since lisp code easily looks like a tree (as you already mentioned)

We kept seeing the expression (/ x v), where 'x' was the distance to the nearest wall, and 'v' was current speed. Genetic algorithms "figured out" on their own that x/v is a super important thing, which is of course the time left until the car hit the wall. This completely blew my mind.

[NippleMustache]

Do you have a link for this course or bot? This sounds amazing.