Universal Approximation using Incremental Constructive Feedforward Networks with Random Hidden Nodes

According to conventional neural network theories, single-hidden-layer feedforward networks (SLFNs) with additive or radial basis function (RBF) hidden nodes are universal approximators when all the parameters of the networks are allowed adjustable. However, as observed in most neural network implementations, tuning all the parameters of the networks may cause learning complicated and inefficient, and it may be difficult to train networks with nondifferential activation functions such as threshold networks. Unlike conventional neural network theories, this paper proves in an incremental constructive method that in order to let SLFNs work as universal approximators, one may simply randomly choose hidden nodes…