Problem Characteristics

Heuristic search is a very general method applicable to a large class of problems. It contain verity of techniques and which is particularly effective for a small class of problems. But before, any kind of method choosing for problem solving, we need to analyse the problem with some Key Domains. And that key domains are the problem characteristics.

1. Is the problem decomposable?
2. Can solution steps be ignored or undone?
3. Is the problem’s universe predictable?
4. Is good solution absolute or relative?
5. Is the desired solution a state of the world or a path to a state?
6. What is the role of knowledge?
7. Does the tasks require interaction with a person/human ?

–> Analyse Tower of Hanoi problem with respect to seven problem characteristics.

the Tower of Hanoi problem

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Problem characteristic    |     Satisfied     |     Reason

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1) Is the problem decomposable?     |     No     |     Single solution, not decomposable.

2) Can solution steps be ignored or undone?     |     Yes     |    We can ignore some state.

3) Is the problem’s universe predictable?          |     Yes     |     We can predict about the solution.

4) Is good solution absolute or relative?          |     absolute     |     Absolute solution : once you get one solution you do need to bother about other possible solution. Relative Solution : once you get one solution you have to find another possible solution to check which solution is best(i.e low cost). By considering this…

5) Is the desired solution a state of the world or a path to a state?          |     Path     |     For natural language understanding, some of the words have different interpretations. therefore sentence may cause ambiguity. To solve the problem we need to find interpretation only , the workings are not necessary (i.e path to solution is not necessary).

Ultimately,

a state of the world = analyse the words and based on that word find the appropriate solution.

a path to a state = you have perfect rules for problem, no need to worry about logic of words.

So In tower of Hanoi winning we are follow the particular steps/path, we don’t need to analysing the state

6) What is the role of knowledge?           |     Need Knowledge     |     lot of knowledge helps to constrain the search for a solution.

7) Does the tasks require interaction with a person/human ?          |     No     |     Conversational In which  there is intermediate communication between a person and the computer, either to provide additional assistance to the computer or to provide additional information to the user, or both. In tower of Hanoi additional assistance is not required.

Bibliography :

Artificial Intelligence,Third Edition by Elaine Rich, Kevin Knight, Shivshankar B. Nair.

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