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Comment by squigs25 | Hacker News Reader

I think human brains are probably wired for speed over accuracy too. This might have a lot of potential in machine learning and eventually AI, where information processing speed is often more important than accuracy.

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If you believe in evolution and natural selection, then your functionality is just fast and accurate enough to keep you from dying before mating. That's as good as the optimization gets, except by random accident.

My genes are more likely to be passed on for multiple generations if I survive long enough to mate AND care for my children. If thy die at age five, my mating did nothing.

True, but his point still stands - if you believe in evolution and natural selection, your brain is designed for "good enough fast enough" rather than "truly correct" reasoning.

>then your functionality is just fast and accurate enough to keep you from dying before mating

Approximately. And locally.

I believe that the theory of evolution by sexual selection is far more important. Same guy, a refinement on his original theory. In that case optimization can take many different forms. Parents arraigning marriages of children or reverence for grandmothers. Or for that matter, the old boy's explanation of peacock feathers.

If you find this topic interesting, Robert Nozick's "Invariances: The Structure of the Objective World" explores how this fact should affect epistemology and ethics.

It's a tough book but it's worth your time.

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