In my hypothetcial algorithm, of course mutation would still take place.
But my current instace of the web page is at a point where it's wasting a lot of time on unfit 'mutts' and it seems like I could get to a "best rhinoboat" and "best assdragger" solution faster if it would stop wasting time exploring the mediocre blend.
Yeah, most effective genetic algorithms take a hybrid approach where they only do more dramatic mutations for some of the population, and then optimize the rest with a regular fitness function and small variations. The goal with these systems is to have several different but effective breeds emerge.
I didn't dig into this implementation, but it seems like it doesn't carry many (more than one?) individuals between cycles.
But my current instace of the web page is at a point where it's wasting a lot of time on unfit 'mutts' and it seems like I could get to a "best rhinoboat" and "best assdragger" solution faster if it would stop wasting time exploring the mediocre blend.