A Monte-Carlo AIXI approximation

  • Authors:
  • Joel Veness;Kee Siong Ng;Marcus Hutter;William Uther;David Silver

  • Affiliations:
  • University of New South Wales and National ICT Australia;The Australian National University;The Australian National University and National ICT Australia;National ICT Australia and University of New South Wales;Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  • Venue:
  • Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research
  • Year:
  • 2011

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Abstract

This paper introduces a principled approach for the design of a scalable general reinforcement learning agent. Our approach is based on a direct approximation of AIXI, a Bayesian optimality notion for general reinforcement learning agents. Previously, it has been unclear whether the theory of AIXI could motivate the design of practical algorithms. We answer this hitherto open question in the affirmative, by providing the first computationally feasible approximation to the AIXI agent. To develop our approximation, we introduce a new Monte-Carlo Tree Search algorithm along with an agent-specific extension to the Context Tree Weighting algorithm. Empirically, we present a set of encouraging results on a variety of stochastic and partially observable domains. We conclude by proposing a number of directions for future research.