Welcome
Welcome to the Computational Intelligence (CI) group website of the Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam. Through this website we offer information about our activities; above are links to the various sections.
Computational Intelligence is a fairly new name covering a fairly new field [1]. Enclosed in the name computational intelligence is a `message', according to scientific folklore it is chosen to indicate the link to and the difference with artificial intelligence. While some techniques within computational intelligence are often counted as artificial intelligence techniques (e.g., genetic algorithms, or neural networks) there is a clear difference between these techniques and traditional, logic based artificial intelligence techniques. In general, typical artificial intelligence techniques are top-to-bottom, where the structure of models, solutions, etc. is imposed from above. Computational intelligence techniques are generally bottom-up, where order and structure emerges from an unstructured beginning.
The areas covered by the term computational intelligence are also known under the name soft computing. Again, according to scientific folklore, this name was chosen to indicate the difference between soft computing and operations research, also known as hard computing. The two areas are connected by the problem domains they are applied in, but while operations research algorithms usually come with crisp (and strict) conditions on the scope of applicability and proven guarantees for a solution (or even an optimal solution), soft computing puts no conditions on the problem but also provides no guarantees for success, a deficiency which is compensated by the robustness of the methods.
[1] B.G.W. Craenen, A.E. Eiben; Computational Intelligence; Encyclopedia of Life Support Sciences, EOLSS; EOLSS Co. Ltd.