It is not deniable that I am a fan of evolutionary-inspired methods. Although one may show that all those metaphores are just metaphores and not the best mathematically possible thing to do, they are still beautiful. And I think the most important point in doing science is enjoying its beauty. Anyway, it is just an opinion.
I wrote all these thing to invite you to read this post of Genetic Argonaut. The post is about the history of evolutionary strategy. You may enjoy reading it like I did.