On the Relationship Between Formal and Heuristic Components in Problem Solving

The field of heuristic computer programming, which in the past decade has undergone extensive development, has come up against the difficulty of formalizing problem- solving methods peculiar to human beings. From this difficulty has arisen the problem of the relationship between heuristics (methods of heuristic search) and algorithms. In characterizing existing heuristic programs, their formulators have noted that there exists no sharp boundary between heuristics and algorithms (10). Differences that are recognized in this area result merely from the scope of the class of problems for which a program is constructed and the attendant features of the programs, such as the criteria of choice of attributes, systematization, selectivity, etc., rather than from the fundamental structure of heuristics and algorithms or their form of expression (10)

Class (philosophy) · Field (mathematics) · Heuristic · Heuristics · Mathematical optimization · Programming language · Scope (computer science) · AI-based Problem Solving and Planning · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Mathematics · Theoretical Computer Science