The exploration-exploitation trade-off dilemma, or exploration-exploitation problem, affects many important domains. Indeed, it's not only restricted to the RL context, but applies to everyday life. The idea behind this dilemma is to establish whether it is better to take the optimal solution that is known so far, or if it's worth trying something new. Let's say you are buying a new book. You could either choose a title from your favorite author, or buy a book of the same genre that Amazon is suggesting to you. In the first case, you are confident about what you're getting, but by selecting the second option, you don't know what to expect. However, in the latter case, you could be incredibly pleased, and end up reading a very good book that is indeed better than the one written by your favorite author.
This conflict between...