Re: We will not find any utility maximization related outside selection process—so we are not maximizers when it comes to happiness, global well-being, ecological responsibility, and so on.
Is exhaustive search a “selection process”? What about random search?
These are certainly optimisation strategies—and if they are “selection processes” then are there any search strategies that are not selection processes? If not, then “selection process” has become a pretty meaningless term.
It’s like saying that you can’t find an optimum unless you perform a search for it—which is hardly much of an insight.
Search, or at least its results, is what selection works on. You could even think of evolution as a dual process with mutations as searches of possible genetic combinations followed by selection for survival and reproduction.
I strongly recommend Jonathan Baron’s “Thinking and Deciding”; he conceptualizes all thinking, decision making, creativity as the dual process of searching and selection. It’s a very interesting book. (I’m reading an older edition and am not yet finished, so I don’t know how well he makes the case in total, or how he may have modified his ideas for later editions. But what I have read so far is fascinating.)
Is exhaustive search a “selection process”? What about random search?
If yes, is there any search strategy that is not a “selection process”? (If no, then what is it?) Otherwise, “selection process” is just a rather useless synonym for “search”, and the cited thesis just says you can’t find an optimum unless you actually look for it.
If no, that defeats the cited thesis—that optimisation only results from selection processes—since exhaustive search optimises functions fine.
The post talks about “selection processes” without saying what that term actually means. If you think for a moment about what that term means, the claim seems likely to either be wrong, or trivially true.
That is probably not what it means. There are various definitions of selection—e.g. see Hull 1988 for one example:
Selection: ‘a process in which the differential extinction and proliferation of interaction causes the differential perpetuation of the replicators that produced them’.
Re: We will not find any utility maximization related outside selection process—so we are not maximizers when it comes to happiness, global well-being, ecological responsibility, and so on.
Is exhaustive search a “selection process”? What about random search?
These are certainly optimisation strategies—and if they are “selection processes” then are there any search strategies that are not selection processes? If not, then “selection process” has become a pretty meaningless term.
It’s like saying that you can’t find an optimum unless you perform a search for it—which is hardly much of an insight.
Search, or at least its results, is what selection works on. You could even think of evolution as a dual process with mutations as searches of possible genetic combinations followed by selection for survival and reproduction.
I strongly recommend Jonathan Baron’s “Thinking and Deciding”; he conceptualizes all thinking, decision making, creativity as the dual process of searching and selection. It’s a very interesting book. (I’m reading an older edition and am not yet finished, so I don’t know how well he makes the case in total, or how he may have modified his ideas for later editions. But what I have read so far is fascinating.)
So… to return to my unanswered questions:
Is exhaustive search a “selection process”? What about random search?
If yes, is there any search strategy that is not a “selection process”? (If no, then what is it?) Otherwise, “selection process” is just a rather useless synonym for “search”, and the cited thesis just says you can’t find an optimum unless you actually look for it.
If no, that defeats the cited thesis—that optimisation only results from selection processes—since exhaustive search optimises functions fine.
It’s a prediction—an empirical claim, not a definition.
The post talks about “selection processes” without saying what that term actually means. If you think for a moment about what that term means, the claim seems likely to either be wrong, or trivially true.
I took “selection processes” to mean “natural selection”.
That is probably not what it means. There are various definitions of selection—e.g. see Hull 1988 for one example:
Selection: ‘a process in which the differential extinction and proliferation of interaction causes the differential perpetuation of the replicators that produced them’.