HollandFest 09

I was unaware of this event, but the Illigal Blogging guys have brought to my attention the pointer to HollandFest 09. It's an event to celebrate the contributions professor John Holland has made to evolutionary computation, genetic algorithms, complex systems in general and emergence.

Professor David Goldberg has uploaded his presentation at HollandFest 09. It's about the further development of genetic algorithms from the late 1980s until nowadays, remembering some important lessons the lecturer has learnt along the time, giving emphasis to three ones he learnt from his former advisor. He is microblogging about it on Twitter.

So this year already begun so special to evolutionary computation. It's not only Darwin's 200th anniversary; nor 150 years since the publication of his seminal book; nor 45 years from the day two Germans students set up the experimentum crucis that would open one of the branches of evolutionary computation -- Ingo Rechenberg will celebrate his 75th anniversary in this year too!); nor the 20 years since the publication of Goldberg's book about genetic algorithms. But it's also on celebrating John Holland's 80th anniversary and all his contributions to the field he has helped to build.