Bibliographic record
Abstract
TD(λ) is a core algorithm of modern reinforcement learning. Its appeal comes from its equivalence to a clear and conceptually simple forward view, and the fact that it can be implemented online in an inexpensive manner. However, the equivalence between TD(λ) and the forward view is exact only for the off-line version of the algorithm (in which updates are made only at the end of each episode). In the online version of TD(λ) (in which updates are made at each step, which generally performs better and is always used in applications) the match to the forward view is only approximate. In a sense this is unavoidable for the conventional forward view, as it itself presumes that the estimates are unchanging during an episode. In this paper we introduce a new forward view that takes into account the possibility of changing estimates and a new variant of TD(λ) that exactlyachieves it. Our algorithm uses a new form of eligibility trace similar to but different from conventional accumulating and replacing traces. The overall computational complexity is the same as TD(λ), even when using function approximation. In our empirical comparisons, our algorithm outperformed TD(λ) in all of its variations. It seems, by adhering more truly to the original goal of TD(λ)--matching an intuitively clear forward view even in the online case--that we have found a new algorithm that simply improves on classical TD(λ).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.009 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.011 | 0.003 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".