arXiv:2411.14085cs.LG2024-11

让智能体主动远离过去经验以高效探索新行为。

Exploration by Running Away from the Past

  • 通过最大化当前与过往行为分布的差异来驱动探索。
  • 在迷宫和机器人操控任务中显著提升探索效率。
  • 适合需要持续探索的新环境或复杂动作学习场景。

高效探索是强化学习的核心挑战。本文从信息论角度出发,将探索建模为最大化状态访问分布的香农熵问题,通过最大化代表智能体过去行为与当前行为分布之间的序列差异来实现。直观上,该方法鼓励智能体采取与过往经验不同的新行为,因此命名为RAMP(Running Away from the Past)。我们比较了使用KL散度与Wasserstein距离量化行为变化的效果,指出前者在某些任务中可能导致不良探索行为。实验表明,通过主动远离过去经验,该方法能有效探索迷宫,并在机器人操控与运动任务中生成多样化行为。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

The ability to explore efficiently and effectively is a central challenge of reinforcement learning. In this work, we consider exploration through the lens of information theory. Specifically, we cast exploration as a problem of maximizing the Shannon entropy of the state occupation measure. This is done by maximizing a sequence of divergences between distributions representing an agent's past behavior and its current behavior. Intuitively, this encourages the agent to explore new behaviors that are distinct from past behaviors. Hence, we call our method RAMP, for ``$\textbf{R}$unning $\textbf{A}$way fro$\textbf{m}$ the $\textbf{P}$ast.'' A fundamental question of this method is the quantification of the distribution change over time. We consider both the Kullback-Leibler divergence and the Wasserstein distance to quantify divergence between successive state occupation measures, and explain why the former might lead to undesirable exploratory behaviors in some tasks. We demonstrate that by encouraging the agent to explore by actively distancing itself from past experiences, it can effectively explore mazes and a wide range of behaviors on robotic manipulation and locomotion tasks.

强化学习探索策略信息论

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