The DeepMind use simulated environments to test how a "reinforcement learning" is able to complete tasks to receive rewards. You know when you've done something wrong, like putting a glass too close to the edge of the table, only to accidentally knock it off the table a moment later. Over time, you realize the mistake even before disaster strikes. Likewise, you know over years when you made the wrong choice, like choosing to become a manager at Best Buy rather than a pro-ball player, the latter of which would have made you so much more fulfilled. That second problem, how a sense of consequence develops over long stretches, is the subject of recent work by Google's DeepMind unit.