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clamboy



Posts: 299
Joined: May 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 13 2016,17:31   

Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Sep. 13 2016,14:19)
Question: where is the code for Mung's pseudo-weasel?

Dr. Elsberry - I have been searching TSZ with no avail for several minutes, but someone else will probably find the code. Here is my remembering of what Mung did: Mung wrote a Ruby program that initialized "METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL" as a target, wrote a random string of the target length, randomly cycled through characters at the first place in this string until it hit upon "M", proceeded onto the second character with the same approach for "E", and continued through the entire string until the target was finally acquired.

I hope I am not misrepresenting Mung's so-called GA. While I could probably work out a brute force equivalent in Java, I will not pretend to having attained anywhere near the hacking-fu of Mung. Such prowess!

  
Alan Fox



Posts: 1556
Joined: Aug. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 13 2016,17:45   

Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Sep. 13 2016,09:19)
Question: where is the code for Mung's pseudo-weasel?

here

  
Woodbine



Posts: 1218
Joined: June 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,04:54   

Does it latch?

Pseudo-latch?

  
midwifetoad



Posts: 4003
Joined: Mar. 2008

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,07:23   

It latches the first character an moves on to the next.

--------------
Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

  
NoName



Posts: 2729
Joined: Mar. 2013

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,08:13   

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 14 2016,08:23)
It latches the first character an moves on to the next.

It's hard to imagine a stupider way to implement this -- even were one not trying to simulate some form of evolution.

Two tangential but interesting approaches can be found in Markov generators.  One builds the pattern dictionary from words found in 'training' texts and then outputs based on random selection of words associated with the search word or phrase.
See The Doom That Came to Puppet for a fun example of this approach.  The generator was trained on a selection of H.P. Lovecraft works and the documentation for the Puppet software/devOps configuration tool.

Another approach builds the pattern dictionary on the pattern of letters found in a text, for a given pattern size, then regenerates text based on the pattern being searched for.  So for a pattern of size 4 'the dog bit the girl' builds a dictionary with 'the ' followed by 'd', 'he d' followed by 'o', ..., then 'the ' gets a 'g' as another entry, etc.  Pick a random key out of the dictionary, randomly select one of the associated characters, shift the search to the last 3 characters of the previous search followed by the newly selected character, repeat until you've got enough output.   For longer input texts (basically required to get anything "interesting"), the output resembles, but does not mirror, the input, with interesting sensitivity to pattern size -- 4 or 5 seems to work best.  
Years ago I generated an 'alternate world' version of Thick as A Brick (Jethro Tull) using the letter pattern approach.
What's particularly interesting about this approach is that authorial style is mirrored better than the specific origin text.  Some of that is down to rules like 'q is always followed by u' but much of it is purely style, authorial convention if you will.

  
midwifetoad



Posts: 4003
Joined: Mar. 2008

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,10:09   

Mung's whole shtick is take a definition and reduce it to absurdity.

--------------
Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

  
k.e..



Posts: 5432
Joined: May 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,10:29   

Quote (NoName @ Sep. 14 2016,16:13)
Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 14 2016,08:23)
It latches the first character an moves on to the next.

It's hard to imagine a stupider way to implement this -- even were one not trying to simulate some form of evolution.

...

Mung fails on so many levels but his biggest failure is truly a complete lack of imagination coupled with no talent whatsoever.

--------------
"I get a strong breeze from my monitor every time k.e. puts on his clown DaveTard suit" dogdidit
"ID is deader than Lenny Flanks granmaws dildo batteries" Erasmus
"I'm busy studying scientist level science papers" Galloping Gary Gaulin

  
Woodbine



Posts: 1218
Joined: June 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,10:59   

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 14 2016,13:23)
It latches the first character an moves on to the next.

Methinks it is like a WOPR.





Edited by stevestory on Sep. 14 2016,12:23

  
k.e..



Posts: 5432
Joined: May 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,11:33   

Oh FFS Woodbine lower the bar a bit will yah! Hahahahaha

--------------
"I get a strong breeze from my monitor every time k.e. puts on his clown DaveTard suit" dogdidit
"ID is deader than Lenny Flanks granmaws dildo batteries" Erasmus
"I'm busy studying scientist level science papers" Galloping Gary Gaulin

  
Henry J



Posts: 5786
Joined: Mar. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,11:55   

But did he get that license number?

  
Acartia_Bogart



Posts: 2927
Joined: Sep. 2014

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,14:43   

Quote (k.e.. @ Sep. 14 2016,11:33)
Oh FFS Woodbine lower the bar a bit will yah! Hahahahaha

Damn you Woodbine. My lobbying efforts for PoTW have now been for nought.

  
stevestory



Posts: 13407
Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,14:54   

You've gotta up your game!

:p

   
Acartia_Bogart



Posts: 2927
Joined: Sep. 2014

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,16:38   

Quote (stevestory @ Sep. 14 2016,14:54)
You've gotta up your game!

:p

But I can't beat that.

  
Richardthughes



Posts: 11178
Joined: Jan. 2006

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 14 2016,17:33   

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 14 2016,10:09)
Mung's whole shtick is take a definition and reduce it to absurdity.

He is toothache incarnate. No, wait, hemorrhoids.

--------------
"Richardthughes, you magnificent bastard, I stand in awe of you..." : Arden Chatfield
"You magnificent bastard! " : Louis
"ATBC poster child", "I have to agree with Rich.." : DaveTard
"I bow to your superior skills" : deadman_932
"...it was Richardthughes making me lie in bed.." : Kristine

  
Wesley R. Elsberry



Posts: 4991
Joined: May 2002

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 15 2016,05:34   

Quote (Alan Fox @ Sep. 13 2016,17:45)
   
Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ Sep. 13 2016,09:19)
Question: where is the code for Mung's pseudo-weasel?

here

Thanks. I've added line numbering here:

Code Sample

[01] TARGET_PHRASE = "METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL"
[02] TARGET = TARGET_PHRASE.chars
[03] TARGET_LENGTH = TARGET.length
[04] CHAR_SET = TARGET.uniq
[05]
[06] def make_baby
[07]   Array.new(TARGET_LENGTH).map {CHAR_SET.sample}
[08] end
[09]
[10] def mutate weasel, trait
[11]   weasel[trait] = CHAR_SET.sample
[12] end
[13]
[14] baby_weasel = make_baby
[15]
[16] mutations = 0
[17] TARGET_LENGTH.times do |i|
[18]   while baby_weasel[i] != TARGET[i]
[19]     mutate(baby_weasel, i)
[20]     mutations += 1
[21]     puts baby_weasel.join
[22]   end
[23] end
[24] puts "And it only required #{mutations} mutations!"


I'm not a Ruby coder, but RubyInstaller gets me the executable...

I'll limit myself to the first oddity for the moment.

Line 4 sets up the pool of characters that are possible results of mutation. Choice of this pool is also the choice of the problem space. Mung's choice here is to limit this to the unique set of characters in a given target phrase. Let's say that we were to use instead a target phrase of "111111111111111111111111111". Mung's code then outputs "And it only required 0 mutations!". Limiting the pool of available characters makes this version incommensurate with "weasel" programs that properly set up their problem space as a complete set of alphabetic characters plus space.

--------------
"You can't teach an old dogma new tricks." - Dorothy Parker

    
midwifetoad



Posts: 4003
Joined: Mar. 2008

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 15 2016,06:41   

The most charitable interpretation of mung's efforts is that he is pointing out the loopholes in definitions.

A childish activity, in my opinion.

Discussion can be perceived as war, or as an attempt to reach a meeting of minds. Some folks choose war.

--------------
Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

  
KevinB



Posts: 525
Joined: April 2013

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 16 2016,09:47   

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 15 2016,06:41)
The most charitable interpretation of mung's efforts is that he is pointing out the loopholes in definitions.

You'd need as much charity as would buy the pastor of a mega-church a new private jet!

Mung's "pseudo-weasel" is not "pointing out the loopholes", it's trying to batter a hole in the castle wall with a siege engine.

The main loop (from line [17]) shows just how irrelevant Mung's program is. Rather than generating randomly mutated batches of strings, the program is merely iterating along the characters of the result string, running through a random stream of characters until a match occurs.

(In fact, a physical implementation of Mung's program in hardware exists, in the form of the IBM 1130 computer and its 1132 line printer. The printer would interrupt as each character on the print wheels came into position, and the processor would scan the print line and populate a bit map to cause the appropriate hammers to fire.)

Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

  
midwifetoad



Posts: 4003
Joined: Mar. 2008

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 16 2016,13:00   

As far as I can tell, mung is just tired of being pwned by keiths and is trying to poke holes in keiths definition of weasel.

Really childish stuff, i think, but i also think any extended exchange with mung is childish.

--------------
Any version of ID consistent with all the evidence is indistinguishable from evolution.

  
Henry J



Posts: 5786
Joined: Mar. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 16 2016,23:35   

Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

  
k.e..



Posts: 5432
Joined: May 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,06:39   

Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 17 2016,07:35)
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Since mung is such a stinker he should be referred to as dung.

--------------
"I get a strong breeze from my monitor every time k.e. puts on his clown DaveTard suit" dogdidit
"ID is deader than Lenny Flanks granmaws dildo batteries" Erasmus
"I'm busy studying scientist level science papers" Galloping Gary Gaulin

  
Texas Teach



Posts: 2084
Joined: April 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,08:17   

Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 16 2016,23:35)
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Apparently the current view has them as separate families. The older I get, the more the taxonomists change everything I used to know.

--------------
"Creationists think everything Genesis says is true. I don't even think Phil Collins is a good drummer." --J. Carr

"I suspect that the English grammar books where you live are outdated" --G. Gaulin

  
k.e..



Posts: 5432
Joined: May 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,08:36   

Quote (Texas Teach @ Sep. 17 2016,16:17)
Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 16 2016,23:35)
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Apparently the current view has them as separate families. The older I get, the more the taxonomists change everything I used to know.

You need an uberdermist.

--------------
"I get a strong breeze from my monitor every time k.e. puts on his clown DaveTard suit" dogdidit
"ID is deader than Lenny Flanks granmaws dildo batteries" Erasmus
"I'm busy studying scientist level science papers" Galloping Gary Gaulin

  
Henry J



Posts: 5786
Joined: Mar. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,10:47   

Quote (Texas Teach @ Sep. 17 2016,07:17)
Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 16 2016,23:35)
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Apparently the current view has them as separate families. The older I get, the more the taxonomists change everything I used to know.

Oh, like when they arbitrarily decided that fungi should be a separate kingdom rather than a subset of plants? And that just because their DNA, cells, and method of digestion have a closer resemblance to animal than to plant.

  
Texas Teach



Posts: 2084
Joined: April 2007

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,11:33   

Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 17 2016,10:47)
Quote (Texas Teach @ Sep. 17 2016,07:17)
Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 16 2016,23:35)
 
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Apparently the current view has them as separate families. The older I get, the more the taxonomists change everything I used to know.

Oh, like when they arbitrarily decided that fungi should be a separate kingdom rather than a subset of plants? And that just because their DNA, cells, and method of digestion have a closer resemblance to animal than to plant.

This is what happens when you let your system of knowledge be guided by evidence.

--------------
"Creationists think everything Genesis says is true. I don't even think Phil Collins is a good drummer." --J. Carr

"I suspect that the English grammar books where you live are outdated" --G. Gaulin

  
KevinB



Posts: 525
Joined: April 2013

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 17 2016,15:19   

Quote (Texas Teach @ Sep. 17 2016,08:17)
Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 16 2016,23:35)
 
Quote (KevinB @ Sep. 16 2016,08:47)
Mung's program is not a Weasel (nor indeed any sort of mustelid.) I think it smells like a mephitid.

A mephitid is a mustelid.

(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

Apparently the current view has them as separate families. The older I get, the more the taxonomists change everything I used to know.

I undertook rigorous research on the subject before posting.

(Actually, I checked on Wikipedia.)  :p

  
Soapy Sam



Posts: 659
Joined: Jan. 2012

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 18 2016,04:00   

Quote (Henry J @ Sep. 17 2016,05:35)


(i.e., weasels and skunks are part of the same family.)

But not part of the same baramin, which I believe trumps molecular taxonomy. (quote mine: I Believe Trump)

--------------
SoapySam is a pathetic asswiper. Joe G

BTW, when you make little jabs like “I thought basic logic was one thing UDers could handle,” you come off looking especially silly when you turn out to be wrong. - Barry Arrington

  
Lethean



Posts: 292
Joined: Jan. 2014

(Permalink) Posted: Sep. 20 2016,19:04   

I know jack all about programming, I'm not even a biologist, but I've always been pretty good at visualizing concepts and being fairly able to differentiate and also relate between a model or map and the landscape itself. In Mung's latest Weasel thread it's apparent he's trying not to see the bigger picture and he completely misses how it's related to the very demonstrable reality we all live in. Which to be honest if one were trying to "get it" it should be pretty evident and light bulb would come on.

In a post with a number of queries, petrushka asks...

       
Quote
Is there any conceptual problem with replacing a static target with a moving target?


Mung responds...

       
Quote
No. Does that help or hinder when trying to demonstrate the power of cumulative selection? Perhaps a moving target Weasel will be next up, now that I finally have the hang of this Weasel programming.


keiths tries once again to clear up Mung's confusion that while Weasel has a target, cumulative selection does not require one. Or in relation to reality perhaps it's not a hard target but a fluid one, as in survival in an ever changing environment.

       
Quote
This is just Mungish confusion. Weasel has a target, and so its fitness function rewards proximity to that target. That does not mean that cumulative selection requires a target, as is obvious to those of us who actually understand the concept. The target and the proximity-rewarding fitness function are characteristics of Weasel, not of cumulative selection generally.

Another example was your challenge regarding what would happen if we changed Weasel’s target phrase in the middle of a run. Biological evolution operates in changing fitness landscapes, so if you could somehow show that cumulative selection was thwarted by such changes, you could argue that it’s insufficient as a selective mechanism for biological evolution.

But as anyone who understands Weasel could predict, it simply starts tracking toward the new target
, and I even provided a feature in my Weasel that allows you to experiment with this. Your weird single-character latching program, by contrast, can’t handle changes to the target phrase, because any characters it has already latched are latched for good.

Since the target gambit failed, you are now dicking around with weird fitness functions that are designed to impede convergence while still (you hope) qualifying as instances of cumulative selection. As Joe and I have pointed out, that tactic also fails.


A bit earlier in the thread Keiths tries to explain the logic problem Mung is having.

       
Quote
What is the point of these asinine fitness functions? Well, Mung is engaged in abject definition lawyering, hoping that he can find some scheme that technically qualifies as “cumulative selection” but nevertheless fails to locate the target in a reasonable time. In this case he is trying to find a fitness function that satisfies the criterion “rewards proximity to the target” while still causing the program to fail.

What he is too dim to realize is that his entire project is predicated on a simple logic error. No one has claimed that cumulative selection always succeeds. So even if schemes using those idiotic fitness functions actually did qualify as “cumulative selection”, their failure to find the target wouldn’t show what Mung wants it to show.

If were smarter, he would have realized that you don’t need to concoct Mungish fitness functions in order to cause cumulative selection to fail. You can do it via much simpler interventions, like setting the mutation rate to an extremely small value.

The problem (for Mung) is stark and obvious: the fact that cumulative selection can fail in some cases does not mean that it fails in all, and it doesn’t mean that Weasel fails to demonstrate the power of cumulative selection.
*

(the asterisk is a note that Joe F. pointed out the same thing)


This kills the creature/population. /s

Rumraket introduces a relevant and related concept when he responds to a question from colewd (smoothness of landscape)

       
Quote
Obviously if you’re selecting towards the same phrase with a smooth hill to climb, the chance of convergence is one hundred percent. Interestingly, this is why convergence happens in nature. You’ll note how both fish and dolphins have that typical hydrodynamic torpedo-like shape with a pointy nose and long slim body. That’s an example of convergence and there’s a perfectly good, sensible explanation for it through natural selection.


Mung perks up at the sight of something to fling a turd at and responds.

       
Quote
Is that all that’s required to demonstrate the power of cumulative selection? A simple hill-climbing algorithm?

Wouldn’t it be amazing if nature consisted of smooth hills with targets at the top and a function to direct the genomes of living organisms to the tops of those hills?


petrushka adds ...

       
Quote
What would be really amazing is if you could demonstrate that people like Larry Moran or Jerry Coyne or even Dawkins have ever suggested that nature has smooth, easy to climb hills.


Mung flings again.

       
Quote
We have the Dawkins Weasel program which is designed to produce the result it does. It would probably fail to find the target phrase in far more scenarios than those in which it successfully finds the target phrase. Assume for the sake of argument that cumulative selection is still in operation in those scenarios. How would we know?

Or should we just declare that it is so and go home.


One wonders, did Mung just (fail to) relate and discover the reason for the extinction of 99+% of species that ever lived on the planet because they could not reach or maintain their position on the moving target of surviving in the environment? Who knew that the power of cumulative of selection or the combination of mutation + selection as related to a genomic pool has limits and is a cruel and harsh mistress?

I suppose if one is too intently focused on proving the map just doesn't work one might not realize it's connection, it's limits, and it's usefulness in understanding the real world.

(Apologies if I'm a bit off here or not explaining myself well. I have issues with that as it is and I'm a bit overtired. I'm just fascinated by watching people try as had as they can to go "nuh-uh" or intentionally try very hard to not understand. Go Tard.)

Edit: Yay! An edit button thingy! If it wasn't due to reaching 100 posts, my thanks to whoever flipped the bit.

--------------
"So I'm a pretty unusual guy and it's not stupidity that has gotten me where I am. It's brilliance."

"My brain is one of the very few independent thinking brains that you've ever met. And that's a thing of wonder to you and since you don't understand it you criticize it."


~Dave Hawkins~

  
Lethean



Posts: 292
Joined: Jan. 2014

(Permalink) Posted: Oct. 12 2016,14:27   

Over on the "Thread to discuss the 2nd presidential debate" thread ...

Quote
phoodoo October 10, 2016 at 2:31 pm

Kantian Naturalist,

But its not even possible to compare the worst things you can say about Hillary, with the worst things you can say about Trump.

If Hillary is a corporate shill, certainly trump is EVEN MORE of a big business shill. There is pretty much nothing Hillary is worse at than Trump, and I don’t particularly like her.


Quote
phoodoo October 11, 2016 at 1:12 am

newton,

I am not sure there is such a thing as a red state in this election. Imagine if Trump loses every single state. Wouldn’t that be a great thing for the Republican party going forward?


Quote
phoodoo October 11, 2016 at 3:56 am

Neil Rickert,

Of course it is exactly what I am saying.

It will teach them that their strategy of intolerance, and burn the country down to suit their own narrow interests of nationalistic cowardice is ultimately going to cause their own destruction more than anyone else’s.


Who is this reasonable person and what have they done with phoodoo ?

--------------
"So I'm a pretty unusual guy and it's not stupidity that has gotten me where I am. It's brilliance."

"My brain is one of the very few independent thinking brains that you've ever met. And that's a thing of wonder to you and since you don't understand it you criticize it."


~Dave Hawkins~

  
stevestory



Posts: 13407
Joined: Oct. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Nov. 21 2016,19:45   

Quote
Problem is fine tuning, if it’s true, can’t be evidence of design, because if all the laws of nature are so restrictive that if they were any different nothing else would exist (matter, planets, life…) then a hypothetical creator couldn’t have designed a matter or life permitting universe any other way. He would have no say as to how the laws work, so those laws must exist independent of the creator. The fine tuning argument renders god a mere handyman with a blueprint to build universes.
linky

   
Henry J



Posts: 5786
Joined: Mar. 2005

(Permalink) Posted: Nov. 21 2016,21:18   

Quote (stevestory @ Nov. 21 2016,18:45)
Quote
Problem is fine tuning, if it’s true, can’t be evidence of design, because if all the laws of nature are so restrictive that if they were any different nothing else would exist (matter, planets, life…) then a hypothetical creator couldn’t have designed a matter or life permitting universe any other way. He would have no say as to how the laws work, so those laws must exist independent of the creator. The fine tuning argument renders god a mere handyman with a blueprint to build universes.
linky

:lol: :D

  
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