Is ‘Divide and Conquer Algorithm’ a human instinct?

Last Friday I was with my son at a restaurant, I was browsing the menu, when I thought I will give my son a quick problem, and see how far he reaches in solving it. The menu had 5 pages, each page had about 20 items.

I asked my son if he could find the ‘cheapest’ and the ‘costliest’ items in the entire menu.

My son is 6 years old, and does some very basic mathematics at the school, such as arranging numbers in ascending and descending orders, simple single-digit additions and subtractions, etc.

I was amazed to find that, my son quickly found the cheapest item on page #1, then the cheapest item on page #2, chose the lesser of two ( MIN(page#1,page#2) ), and then recursively did that for pages 3, 4 and 5. And gave me the cheapest item on the menu (Rs. 6). He then did the same for costliest item, he found the costliest item on page #1, then the costliest item on page #2, chose the higher of two ( MAX(page#1,page#2) ), and gave the answer (Rs. 95). [We were at a Udipi restaurant, so things are not that costly here.]

I never taught him the ‘divide and conquer algorithm’, in fact I have never taught him any algorithm.

Is ‘Divide and Conquer Algorithm’ a human instinct? Does it come without learning?

Thoughts?

algoGod update: Extending the submission date to December 14th 2007

November 14 2007: Here is an update on the algoGod contest.

First, we are extending the submission date to December 14th 2007.

We started the contest 4 weeks ago, and got an overwhelming response with 299 contestants registering for the event and actively solving the problem. Many contestants requested that the submission date be extended, so we have extended the last date.

Also, we would like to inform you that we are hiring machine learning experts who can work at Komli for making a world-class ad-optimization engine. If you are interested – check out our web page at http://www.komli.com/careers under ‘Machine Learning Expert’. We introduced a FAQ for algoGod, it is on the following web page: http://www.komli.com/algogod/faq.php If you do have any questions, please don’t hesitate sending it to algogod@komli.com.

algoGod: Be Crowned the World's Greatest Algorithms Expert!

Komli today launched the “algoGod contest” for machine learning, math, genetics, and algorithm experts.

http://www.komli.com/algogod/

Contest winner to receive Rs. 2,00,000

Start date: October 15th 2007.
Entries must be submitted on or before November 14th 2007.
Results will be declared on December 31st 2007.

Have you ever wondered if you are the best algorithms expert on the planet? Have you ever thought, "I know I can beat everyone, just let me prove it?" Well Komli's algoGod contest is for you, it's your chance to show the world how smart you really are!

The algoGod contest seeks to crown one expert as the 'Algorithms God'. How are we going to do this? Well, the proof is in the pudding! We want every contestant to solve a common problem, and whoever is best will receive the algoGod prize!

A little more background:

Komli lives in the world of online advertising, and online advertising is rife with opportunity with complex algorithms based on cutting edge topics such as machine learning, data mining, graph theory, etc. Online advertising is growing at a very fast pace, and the number of variables affecting the performance of an online ad has been growing at an even faster pace. Komli is devising methods for maximizing the yield of online advertising using advanced statistical machine learning methods over large-scale systems. This is a very interesting and complex algorithm problem.

Komli is currently using a set of algorithms for maximizing the yield of online ads, collectively called 'Yin-Yang'. There are a lot of interesting alternative approaches to Yin-Yang that have yet to be tried. Komli is interested in determining if any of these alternative approaches can beat Yin-Yang by making better predictions.

Komli will provide participants with anonymous ad impression data and a prediction accuracy bar that is 50% better than what Yin-Yang can do on the same training data set. Participants' solutions will be judged by 'Time complexity' and 'Space complexity' criteria. The participant whose solution works best will receive Rs. 2,00,000, bragging rights and an opportunity to work with Komli. Of course, participants have to share their method and code with Komli. Eager participants can signup for the contest by filling the form on the left. Also, please let us know of any questions at algogod@komli.com.