Thanks for your insightful comment, Joe. I agree. But priorities between fundamental goals may have to be built in. Even if there are just two goals, (1) to learn as much as possible about card games, and (2) to prefer winning over losing, card expert programs will differ in their behavior according to which of those has the higher priority. If (1) has the higher priority, then a program will choose to play against a stronger expert if it learns more from losing to a strong opponent than winning over a weak opponent. If (2) has the higher priority, then it may choose to play against weaker players but not learn as much. We humans have the same problem of setting priorities between goals. The question remains (at least for me): Must the relative priority between those two goals be built in, or can it be acquired from experience? In human terms, are the relative strengths of curiosity and competitiveness in an individual innate or acquired?