Weighted Sums of Random Kitchen Sinks: Replacing minimization with randomization in learning

Randomized neural networks are immortalized in this AI Koan: In the days when Sussman was a novice, Minsky once came to him as he sat hacking at the PDP-6. Why is the net wired randomly?'' Sussman replied,I do not want it to have any preconceptions of how to play.'' Minsky then shut his eyes. Why do you close your eyes?''