Glossary

A

Abuse
Random or excessive pain.
Abort
Halting the execution of a plan before all steps are complete due to observed divergence from simulated results.
Action
A physical, chemical, electrical, or mood change.
Adulthood
The period of time in a beast’s existence after sufficient behavior tuning.
Automaton
A creature that lacks the ability to learn.

B

Beast
A creature that can form habits.
Behavior
A quality of a thing where a set of conditions produces an action. A cause and effect relation for a particular medium.
Behavior: Conditions -> Thing -> Action
Behavior Damage
Harmful behaviors as a result of insufficient or anomalous experience.
Behavioral Logic
A method of choosing an action.
Behavior Table
A group of situations and associated actions.
Belief
An prediction of how a particular action will cause a situation to change.
Benefit
Something that increases a goal's chance of success. (Antonym: harm.)
Benefit Threshold
Making a decision as soon as a predetermined benefit is evaluated.
Blurry Action Parameter
A sloppy aspect of a behavior meant to be tuned from experience.
Brain
A working implementation of behavioral logic.

C

Childhood
The initial time in a beast’s existence before experience has tuned highly variable behavior.
Consciousness
The ability for a creature to evaluate imaginary situations.
Creature
A thing that exhibits intelligent behavior.

D

Decision
Stopping the thinking process after a time or benefit threshold is reached to act on the best idea.
Depression
A overall decrease in the likelihood that a beast will choose any action.

E

Eccentric
Possessing idiosyncratic behavior.
Estimate
To convert an environmental property into information using one or more weakly correlated phenomena.
Evaluation
To estimate the effect on the odds of success of a goal.
Execute
Perform steps of a plan in order.
Experience
An instance of a behavior and its resulting feelings.

F

Feeling
Information from subjective sensors.

G

Game
A situation that approximates those expected in adulthood, but with no (or much lower) risk of harm.
Goal
The ultimate purpose of a creature’s existence.
Webstser (1913) Goal 2. The final purpose or aim; the end to which a design tends…
Guess
An idea that is more than a slight variation on what is known to have worked in the past.
Gut Reaction
When a simulational learner chooses to not think and act according to habit.

H

Harm
Something that that decreases a goal's chance of success. (Antonym: beneficial.)
Habit
A behavior tuned from experience.

I

Idea
A proposed action to be used in a simulation.
Idiosyncrasy
A harmful habit formed by insufficient and/or anomalous experiences.
Imagination
A situation that does not represent the current environment.
Imitation
Generating an idea from an observation of another creature.
Indecision
A error in thinking where the threshold to make a decision can never be met.
Information
Measurements and estimations of a creature's environment converted to a format useable by its brain.
Instinct
An intelligent behavior acquired from an external programmer.
Intelligent Behavior
Behavior that is chosen from more than one option. (Antonym: non-intelligent behavior.)
Intelligence
Choosing actions to accomplish a goal.

J

K

L

Learn
To increase the benefit (or reduce harm) of behaviors.

M

Measure
To convert an environmental property into information using a strongly correlated phenomenon.
Mood
A persistent effect on a behavior table.

N

Non-intelligent Behavior
Behavior with no choice of actions.
Novelty
A propensity to choose previously unattempted actions.
Neglect
An inadequate amount of experience during childhood.

O

Opinion
A feeling associated with a situation from past experience.

P

Programmer
A source of learning external to a creature.
Pleasure
A feeling indicating benefit.
Pain
A feeling indicating harm.
Play
Participation in a game.
Plan
A sequence of actions produced from a chain of simulations.
Prediction
The consequent situation in a creature's beliefs that correspond to a particular situation and action.
Premature Conclusion
An error in thinking where the decision threshold is too low resulting in less beneficial actions than could easily be chosen.

Q

R

S

Scenario
A combination of a situation and an idea.
Science
Increasing understanding.
Sensor
A mechanism for measuring the environment.
Simulation
Finding the consequent situation of a scenario using beliefs.
Simulational Learning
Acquiring behaviors using a model of the environment.
Situation
A group of time related information.
Slop
Variability in behavior.
Spoiling
Random or excessive feelings of pleasure leading to eccentric behavior.
Step
One action in a plan.
Subjective Sensor
A sensor that evaluates behavior.

T

Training
The process of evaluating sloppy behaviors by trial and error, then tuning their blurry action parameters to increase benefit.
Tune
To decrease the randomness of blurry action parameter in behavior toward beneficial parameters.
Thinking
The process of creating thoughts to reach a decision.
Thought
Imagining feelings predicted by a scenario.
Time Threshold
When a decision is made after a predetermined amount of time.

U

Urgency
An estimate of the amount of time before a decision is needed.
Understanding
The accuracy (its predictions compared to reality) and efficiency of beliefs.

WXYZ

Wild
Highly random behavior due to neglect.