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A comment on Sleep helps to repair damaged DNA in neurons, scientists find. Parent comment

Re:Sleep helps to repair damaged DNA in neurons, scientists ... by nitwit005 on Tuesday March 05, 2019 @02:56PM (#19313653)
Evolution is essentially an optimization algorithm, and like many such algorithms, it can get stuck in localized maximums.

Suppose there exists a far better brain design, but all the brain designs that are part way between the current design and that design are far worse. Any mutation that steps toward the better design will be selected against.

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Re:Sleep helps to repair damaged DNA in neurons, scientists ... by AstralStorm on Wednesday March 06, 2019 @02:58PM (#19322166)
Genetic algorithms esp. punctuated equilibrium ones can and will skip over local minima. It might take very specific environmental conditions (fitness function) though, so is not quite guaranteed.
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