The Brazilian Othello of Machado de Assis

[Machado de Assis and psychiatry: a chapter in the relations between art and clinical practice in Brazil].

Madness, its place in society, and the tenuous boundaries separating it from reason became a constant concern in Machado deAssis' literary production as of 1880, when a shift can be observed in his work. Clinical studies exploring the relations between art and madness have mentioned this writer countless times. The article offers an overview of Brazilian psychiatry's perception of the arts, art...

Machado de Assis's epilepsy.

Machado de Assis (1839-1908) is considered the most important Brazilian writer and a great universal literary figure. Little is know about his medical, personal and family history. He hid his "disease" as much as possible. Machado referred to "strange things" having happened to him in his childhood. He described seizures as "nervous phenomena", "absenses", "my illness". Laet observed a seizure ...

Machado de Assis's own writings about his epilepsy: a brief clinical note.

Machado de Assis's own writings about his epilepsy are here given. They come from his correspondence with his friend Mario de Alencar during the last 8 months of Machado de Assis's life. These are the only places where Machado de Assis dealt clearly with his epilepsy during his entire life.

The Evolution of Strong Othello

Machine Learning of Othello Heuristics

The machine learning algorithm of [3] is applied to the problem of learning which heuristics to apply when playing the board game Othello. The problem is large, for there are 46,875 heuristics considered. The results are respectable; the Learner is able to beat a practiced human player approximately fifty percent of the time. Suggestions for improvement are included.