FOGA Round Table

1
FOGA Round Table

• Did we learn anything?

UNAM, Mexico 11/01/07
2
Genetic diversity

• Real biological systems change through much
  richer mechanisms than we use in EC
• Can they be useful for us?
• In what areas? Combinatorial optimization?
• Should we try and model these? How?
• Why are they there in biology? This could
  indicate where to use them in EC.
• Are they of interest in Genetics? How do they
  think they may be modeled?

3
Modularity

• There is complex cooperativity at all scales in
  living systems
• This is not apparently present (not possibly
  present?) in EC or in Genetics.
• Is it of any use in EC? Where? Combinatorial
  optimization?
• How does one model so that it emerges without
  putting it in by hand? (epistasis induces
  correlation by hand).

4
Representations

• Why are representations (geno-pheno map) so
  exceedingly complex in biology?
• Even the most GA-like systems in biology (RNA
  world) have complicated maps
• Do we need them? (Neutrality etc.)
• If so, in what areas? Combinatorial optimization?
• How does Genetics deal with it?

5
Mathematical modeling

• Mathematical Modeling in EC and Genetics seems to
  be very similar (obviously?)
• How to promote more transfer of knowledge?
• Both combinatorial optimization GA with a
  fixed fitness function(al)
• How to do real calculations (numbers)? (Finite
  populations)
• Why are the analogs of practitioners in
  genetics happier with theory than their EC
  colleagues?
• Fitness what is it good for?
• Is it a barrier to real evolution as opposed to
  breeding

6
Where to go?

• Just forget about its biological origins?
• E.g. Evolutionary strategies for combinatorial
  optimization?
• Take them more seriously and take a more modern
  point of view?
• What problems/areas need more biology?
• Both? How much of each?
• Supply/demand