I’m suspicious of your premise that evolution or anything is doing true global optimization. If the frame is the whole universe, all optimization is local optimization because of things like the speed of light limiting how fast information can propagate. Even if you restrict yourself to a Hubble volume this would still be the case. In essence, I’d argue all optimization is local optimization.
The “global” here means that all actions/outputs are optimising towards the same fixed goal(s):
Local Optimisation
Involves deploying optimisation (search, planning, etc.) to accomplish specific tasks (e.g., making a good move in chess, winning a chess game, planning a trip, solving a puzzle).
The choice of local tasks is not determined as part of this framework; local tasks could be subproblems of another optimisation problem (e.g., picking a good next move as part of winning a chess game), generated via learned heuristics, etc.
Global Optimisation
Entails consistently employing optimisation throughout a system’s active lifetime to achieve fixed terminal goals.
All actions flow from their expected consequences on realising the terminal goals (e.g., if a terminal goal is to maximise the number of lives saved, every activity—eating, sleeping, playing, working—is performed because it is the most tractable way to maximise the expected number of future lives saved at that point in time).
In the context of optimization, the meaning of “local” vs “global” is very well established; local means taking steps in the right direction based on a neighborhood, like hillclimbing, while global means trying to find the actual optimal point.
I’m suspicious of your premise that evolution or anything is doing true global optimization. If the frame is the whole universe, all optimization is local optimization because of things like the speed of light limiting how fast information can propagate. Even if you restrict yourself to a Hubble volume this would still be the case. In essence, I’d argue all optimization is local optimization.
The “global” here means that all actions/outputs are optimising towards the same fixed goal(s):
This doesn’t seem especially “global” to me then. Maybe another term would be better? Maybe this is a proximate/ultimate distinction?
Currently using “task specific”/”total”.
Hmm, the etymology was that I was using “local optimisation” to refer to the kind of task specific optimisation humans do.
And global was the natural term to refer to the kind of optimisation I was claiming humans don’t do but which an expected utility maximiser does.
In the context of optimization, the meaning of “local” vs “global” is very well established; local means taking steps in the right direction based on a neighborhood, like hillclimbing, while global means trying to find the actual optimal point.
Yeah, I’m aware.
I would edit the post once I have better naming/terminology for the distinction I was trying to draw.
It happened as something like “humans optimise for local objectives/specific tasks” which eventually collapsed to “local optimisation”.
[Do please subject better adjectives!]