Cultural algorithms: concepts and experiments

Evolutionary computation is a generic name given to the resolution of computational problems that are planned and implemented based on models of the evolutionary process. Most of the evolutionary algorithms that have been proposed follow biological paradigms and the concepts of natural selection, mutation and reproduction. There are, however, other paradigms which may be adopted in the creation of evolutionary algorithms. Several problems involving unstructured environments may be addressed from the point of view of cultural paradigms, which offer plenty of categories of models where one does not know all possible solutions to a problem - a very common situation in real life. This work applies the computational properties of cultural technology to the solution of a specific problem, adapted from the robotics literature. A test environment denoted the "Cultural Algorithms Simulator" was developed to allow anyone to learn more about the rather unconventional characteristics of a cultural technology.