Training Ernest 7

This video demonstrates that Ernest develops different behaviors depending on the experience he has during his youth. Here, we have two instances of Ernest: Ernest 1 (brown) is initially kept in the small loop and released on step 290. Ernest 2 (bleu) is confronted to the complex environment right from his birth.

Ernest 1 develops more sophisticated behaviors than Ernest 2 because he is trained to touch both of its sides when he faces a wall. Consequently, after being released, he has a more exploratory behavior than Ernest 2.

Ernest 2 learns to preferably turn to the right when he faces a wall. Consequently, he tends to keep spinning in limited areas of the environment. Ernest 2's learning is limited by the fact that the environment is initially too complex for him to notice sophisticated sequences that involve touching to both sides.

The importance of training is an interesting property of Ernest because it accounts for theories of developmental learning.


(Demo implemented with Ernest r296 and Vacuum r203)