Genetic Football is a thing. Wow.
As a thing, it is part of a bigger thing.
That bigger thing seems to be this: given enough cheap compute power, the time taken to perform zillions of iterations can be made largely irrelevant.
Start stupid. Just aim to be fractionally less stupid the next time round, and iterations will do the rest.
The weirdest thing about all of this for me is that if/when iterated algorithmic things start showing smarts, we will know the causal factors that lead to the increased smartness, but not the rationale for any individual incidence of smart-ness.
As a thing, that is part of a bigger thing.
That bigger thing is that these useful-but-unprovable things will be put to use in areas where humankind as previously expected the presence of explanation. You know, rules, reasoning, all that stuff.
As a thing, that is part of a bigger thing.
That bigger thing is that in many areas of human endeavor it is either impossible to get explanations - (i.e. experts who know what to do, but cannot explain why in terms of rules.), or the explanations need to be taken with a pinch of post-hoc-ergo-propter-hoc salt, or a pinch or retroactive goal-setting salt.
As a thing, that is part of a bigger thing.
When the machines come, and start doing clever things but cannot explain why....
...they will be just like us.