Humankind Makes Last Stand Against Machine 430
MrZeebo writes "According to this Financial Times story, Garry Kasparov has begun another match against a computer chess program on Sunday, this time playing against the Israeli-developed Deep Junior. Kasparov is the highest-rated chess player of all time, and lost to Deep Blue in 1997. According to the article, Deep Junior, despite evaluating less moves per minute than Deep Blue, is considered to be a superior chess player. The match will span 6 games, the last one being February 7th." Kasparov has won the first game.
NO (Score:4, Insightful)
This is not a match between man and machine. It is a match between humans - the human chess player vs the human software programmer. Please keep that in perspective.
Just because my desk calculator performs multiplications faster than me, doesn't mean that it is better at mathematics than I am.
Yes. (Score:5, Insightful)
I guarantee you that Deep Blue and Deep Junior play chess better than their programmers, and for that matter, almost everyone on earth. That's why they get to play Kasparov.
Re:Yes. (Score:5, Interesting)
something to remember (Score:4, Funny)
thank you, mister obvious (Score:3, Interesting)
I was attempting to make an insightful parallel using a motif that is prevalent in science fiction (the ingenuity/logic one I mentioned five seconds ago, if you've forgotten).
I'm not sure why it got modded as "funny".
Re:thank you, mister obvious (Score:3, Insightful)
I was really annoyed by that episode where data played that guy at some logic game.
Data lost, and couldn't understand why. He (rightfully) came to the conclusion that it was a fault with his logic systems.
However the crew viewed this as 'sulking'. (What do you call it when you project human emotions on to other things, when the human emotions don't really exist?)
Data _should_- have either won or known that the game was one of chance, so he had a chance of winning, or known that it was too complex for him to analyse the whole situation and so could only give a best-effort try anyway.
There's quite a few episodes that I'm angry at like that..
Re:thank you, mister obvious (Score:4, Informative)
Anthropomorphism.
A different test: man versus machine (Score:5, Interesting)
to put this another way, if the contest were to factor 20 digt numbers, no one woul dbe surprised if the machine beat a human. it would be a stupid test. Just like chess.
a better test would be a face recognition contest. Or if we need to make it a real game then how about soccer?
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:5, Insightful)
a better test would be a face recognition contest. Or if we need to make it a real game then how about soccer?
another interesting thing to note is that 50 years ago, people thought chess was a pretty damn good test of AI. now people think otherwise. when the computer recognizes faces better than you, plays soccer better than you, writes poetry better than you, steals your girlfriend, and passes the turing test, will you still think its just "following the rules"? your brain is just following the rules of physics too you know.
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:4, Funny)
If someone ever designs a computer that can steal my girlfriend, I will certainly give that computer a little lesson in the laws of physics...
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:3, Funny)
I wish I were joking.
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:3, Insightful)
Making an underpowered machine perform as well as a more powerful machine is perhaps the definition of finesse.
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:3, Funny)
On the other hand, everyone is interested in a match where raw human power, applied stupidly, defeats an opponent; both another human opponent (witness: boxing, or wrestlemania hospital, if you know what I mean) or a machine -- By the latter, I think you know I'm talking about midgets pulling a cargo plane on Fox. The network that'll do anything for your money. Make sure you write them a letter asking to see more tits.
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:3)
As an example from the checkers world, Chinook, the top checkers program in the world, contains a database of all the endgames up to, IIRC, 7 levels deep. So, once it's at the point where it recognizes a board configuration from it's endgame database, it's guaranteed to win.
Re:A different test: man versus machine (Score:5, Interesting)
It seems to me that if you want to pit man versus machine you should pick something that is easy for a man to do.
Seems to me that if you want to have some contest, you pick something that they're both about equally good at. So we don't let people run against cars, and we don't let machines recognize faces against humans.
When Kasparov lost to Deep Blue, it was a huge surprise, he played weakly. Kramnik drew Deep Fritz 3-3 last year. Kasparov is the favorite again in this match, and leads 1-0. It's balanced.
What makes it more fun is that computers and people approach the game in a totally different way, but the best computers are almost as good as the best humans. This is the right time to be having these contests.
Re:NO (Score:2)
Yes, but it also means that it's vastly better (speed, accuracy) at addition than you are. Addition is a well-defined operation on a well-defined domain. Playing Chess is far from the purely mechanical and deterministic process of addition. You could argue that a search based solution to playing Chess (mapping all board configurations and moves) is deterministic, but this isn't what Deep Junior is doing. In fact, Deep Junior handles far fewer [suntimes.com] possible moves per second than the famed Deep Blue.
Re:NO (Score:5, Insightful)
I disagree with you, since I could apply your reasoning and conclude that this is NOT Kasparov competing either. It is Kasparov's school teachers, nutritionists, chess instructors, fellow chess players, parents, programmers of software that Kasparov uses to train with, and authors of chess books that he no doubt assimilates knowledge from.
My point is that computer algorithms aren't the only thing shaped by the contributions and knowledge of others.
Both Kasparov and Deep Junior are "black boxes" with a recognized I/O protocol for playing chess. One box is made of meat and one is made of hardware/software. Neither box is created itself without huge amounts of guidance, programming, critiquing, iterative refinements, constant tweaking of strategies, etc.
yes it does (Score:2)
Otherwise, I'd say you'd come in a very distant second, even on your calculator's worst day, with corroded batteries, lights out and peanut butter on the keys
Re:NO (Score:2)
Re:NO (Score:2, Insightful)
Kasparov has won the first game. (Score:5, Funny)
I can't even beat the easy setting on free apple version!
AC
I know... (Score:5, Funny)
watch it now (Score:2)
how can kasparov win? (Score:5, Funny)
from wired: "Kasparov said he can calculate the potential of about 3 moves per second at best, 'but they are the best moves.'"
Re:how can kasparov win? (Score:5, Interesting)
Possibly because Kasparov doesn't play soley on raw intellect. Gut instinct and that hint of irrationality creeps in. The computer can't take that into account when anticipating Kasparov's possible countermoves.
Re:how can kasparov win? (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, but what the computer can do is calculate the probability of all of Kasparov's moves, then only explore the options that are most probable. Although the computer cannot correctly predict the exact move Kasparov is going to make, it can probably narrow it down to 2 or 3 likely moves. It can pretty much ignore all the other moves, because Kasparov is not going to make a bad play. Kasparov's move is either going to be the best move for the situation, or at least the second or third best move. Although the 'best move' for any given chess scenario is debatable, the way the computer plays is to quantify the relative strengths of different positions and try to get into the strongest position. It is something that they are quite good at and I only expect them to get better as they get more raw power coutesy of Moore's Law.
Re:how can kasparov win? (Score:2)
How is 'likely' defined to the computer ? How does the computer figure out likelihood when taking into account a human's gut instinct ?
Re:how can kasparov win? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, it's all intellect, something the computer doesn't have as it can only do stupid calculations. It's rationality that creeps in. The computer has to calculate all kinds of moves, but Kasparov doesn't even have to consider them because he knows they don't make sense in this position.
Human grandmasters go heavily on pattern recognition. They have on the order of 100,000 types of positions with typical plans memorized, as well as many many tactical patterns. Given a position, they know what both sides should be trying to do. Computers can't do pattern recognition well, so they can't use that method.
Re:how can kasparov win? (Score:3, Interesting)
Hardly. Knowing your opponent is innately an exercise in psychology and fundamental similarity of the human experience and thought process.
Kasparov can't predict how the computer will move, since then he needs to know how the computer thinks and the input the computer has. He doesn't really have a full idea of either. He has to make judgements based on incomplete information. That's where gut instinct comes in.
Anything other than chess.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Anything other than chess.... (Score:2)
He should switch games... (Score:5, Interesting)
Go is far better suited to the way a human brain works - pattern recognition, neural networks and all that.
Of course, once a computer arrives that can beat us at Go, then it'll be time to rethink a lot of things
Re:He should switch games... (Score:2)
I also don't understand why people think that because a computer program can play better than you means that you should stop playing. These games are deterministic and finite -- there is a mathematically perfect play whether or not somebody has calculated it. It really makes no difference to me as a chess player that a machine can trounce me any more than it does that Kasparov could trounce me.
Re:He should switch games... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's very likely true that there has been less time in man hours spent developing Go playing programs than Chess playing, but there has been a very significant amount of time spent on the problem by some very intelligent people who are both good Go players and good programmers. So I would say that it is unlikely that this is the root of the difference. After all, Backgammon and Checkers have both also had significantly less time dedicated to developing programs that play and the programs out there play at championship level. Go is just a harder game to program. Its style of play doesn't lend itself well to linear lookahead or databases of board positions (or, in the case of backgammon, statistical prediction of dice) as the other games mentioned above do.
"I also don't understand why people think that because a computer program can play better than you means that you should stop playing. These games are deterministic and finite -- there is a mathematically perfect play whether or not somebody has calculated it. It really makes no difference to me as a chess player that a machine can trounce me any more than it does that Kasparov could trounce me."
Agreed. The games are still fun and still have something to teach me.
computer + water = zap (Score:5, Funny)
The only way to stop them... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The only way to stop them... (Score:5, Funny)
Hmm.... (Score:2)
Please not another IBM (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Please not another IBM (Score:2)
Human minds are great pattern matchers. How many computers can recognize the difference between a dog and a cat?
fear the day that... (Score:2)
where to view game replays, and watch live games: (Score:5, Informative)
boo to the editors.
yay to herrd0kt0r.
herrd0kt0r for prez.
Re:where to view game replays, and watch live game (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It shows every move of the game (Score:2)
When he said, "pretty nifty, no?" was that what made you mad? That phrase doesn't mean that he thought the site was not nifty. It meant "pretty nifty, don't you agree?"
Justin Dubs
What if Kasparov wins (Score:2, Funny)
No match (Score:2, Interesting)
Right now, with some sort of position evaluation engine, this supercomputers can calculate the relevant part of that tree for the match they are playing with a lot of turns in advance.
Its only matter of time till er.. "intuition" will not be enough for chess.
Fortunatelly, there is a lot of fields where pure calculations is not enough, computers may be faster, but we can take this with humor.
Re:No match (Score:2)
Re:you're retarded (Score:2)
Obviously the words "dynamic programming" mean nothing to you.
with computers billions of times more powerful than those we have.
With such powerfull computers we would not be able to compute every possible game, but we would be able to store every possible state. The numbers of states is a lot smaler than the number of games, and the states is all you need to play perfect chess. The best move does not depend on how the state was reached.
He's right, you're retarded (Score:5, Informative)
A chessboard is 8x8, meaning 64 spaces. However, each space can contain a pawn, a rook, a bishop, a knight, a king or a queen of either colour. The best estimate for the number of states the board can be in is 2.99x1041.
A naive encoding is 96 bytes per state. Let's say a tighter, or compressed encoding is 48 bytes per state. So a rough estimate as to the total storage space it would require is 1.44x1043 bytes.
In words, that's about 14 million billion billion gigabytes of data. I'm not going to say it'd be impossible to build such a storage mechanism in the forseable future, but I will say it's incredibly unlikely, and would be mindbogglingly expensive. And with modern technology, would require more matter than is actually on the planet. So no, dynamic programming wouldn't be useful in chess at all. Proving once again that if it were as simple as that, somebody would have thought of it already.
Out of interest, consider Go. This is a board where dynamic programming really would be useless. With around 10750 possible states, it would require significantly more atoms than are actually in the entire universe.
Humankind Makes Last Stand Against Machine? (Score:4, Interesting)
With a story title like that I was expecting some armageddon-type article, or perhaps a story related to an upcoming movie such as Terminator 3 (obvious why) or X-Men 2 (think Sentinels, Days of Future Past) but a chess match?
I'm a chess player - good enough to represent my county (the British equivalent of a state) - but I would never dream of searching for a chess-related article on
Regardless of that how is this humankind's last stand? Are human vs computer chess matches going to disappear from the face of the earth after this event?
So, to recap the story title is:
1) sensationalist;
2) only vaguely related to the subject matter (and useless from a searching through the archives point of view); and
3) inaccurate.
Can anyone please tell me what the people who have the gall to call themselves editors at
Re:Humankind Makes Last Stand Against Machine? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Humankind Makes Last Stand Against Machine? (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless things have changed since I had my (one and only) submission posted, it's the story submitor that comes up with the headline.
Part of the problem with that, of course, is that the headline *needs* to be eye-catching in order to catch the eye of the editor as they're wading through the list of pending submissions...
I completely agree with you about the headline, and thought much the same thing when I read it. This is a chess game people - let's take the two contestents and see how good they each are at creative writing, or answering telephone queries, or ordering take away food for a group of 12... All without any reprogramming, of course. This is hardly a Terminator-style, humanity's last chance situation.
No matter the outcome, people will still play chess against each other, and against computers, whether they be something they bought in a toy shop for £20, or something that's taking a break from simulating weather patterns or nuclear explosions.
Re:Humankind Makes Last Stand Against Machine? (Score:3, Insightful)
With a story title like that I was expecting some armageddon-type article, or perhaps a story related to an upcoming movie such as Terminator 3 (obvious why) or X-Men 2 (think Sentinels, Days of Future Past) but a chess match?
Actually, the problem is that the new trailer for The Matrix: Reloaded aired for the first time during the Superbowl yesterday. The /. eds just haven't come down from the high yet.
So, to recap the story title is:
1) sensationalist;
2) only vaguely related to the subject matter (and useless from a searching through the archives point of view); and
3) inaccurate.
And this is different from most other media outlets how?
UK local government (Score:2, Offtopic)
The US has city/town > county > state > country.
The UK has city/town > county > country > UK.
That "country > UK" is correct - remember that the UK is comprised of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. However, when it comes to levels of government there normally are only two - local and central (national).
Local government is normally on a county level but, in some densely populated areas (ie, major cities), the local government isn't countywide but particular to the city. London (and a few other cities if I remember correctly) is an exception to this rule. London is divided into many boroughs (a bit like New York but to a greater scale).
Regardless of how it is geographically arranged, whether by county, city or borough, local government is run by a council, so you will have county councils, city councils and borough councils.
Each council is partially funded by central government and partially by locally raised revenues. Local councils are responsible for a lot of day-to-day stuff - emergency services, schools, libraries, waste collection, planning (development) and other municipal services. Everything else, such as personal taxation, is administered centrally. Local taxes are only raised through properties (homes and businesses).
It's worth pointing out that London has an umbrella authority called the Greater London Assembly, headed by the major, which is between the local and central government layers. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own regional assemblies, similar to the one in London but with varying degrees of power.
However, if an assembly has certain powers then it's unusual for the councils underneath it to have any authority over that matter - eg, the GLA runs London's transport system entirely, whilst the London boroughs have no such responsibility. The advantage of this is that the the levels of bureaucracy are kept to a minimum - local and central - wherever possible.
Most people will only vote in local and central government elections. Where there is an assembly in place then that too will be separately elected.
Sorry if that's long-winded but a short answer to your question wouldn't have really been accurate. I hope that helps put you in the picture. If you want more info go to www.open.gov.uk/ [open.gov.uk].
(And yeah, I know that what I've written might sound complex but, believe me, it isn't that difficult to understand when explained properly. I've been up all night watching the Super Bowl, it's 6.22AM, so forgive me if my explanation is as clear as mud.)
Last Stand? (Score:2, Interesting)
the only people claiming deep fritz deep blue (Score:5, Funny)
you'd have to have a hell of a lot better evaluation function to overcome calculating 1/100 as many positions per second, and deep blue's eval was miles better than fritz's back in '97. from what I've read on rec.games.chess, fritz may have CAUGHT UP in the eval department but it's not 100 times better for sure.
if you're interested in computer chess, check out "behind deep blue," by IBM's team lead. most interesting book I've read in a long time. One part I didn't know was that IBM's move generator & eval function were done in hardware, which is the main reason that even with 6 years of moore's law under its belt, deep fritz can't touch it for sheer power. I always got the impression from the general media that deep blue was just a software program on a massive RS/6000 box but no, it had hundreds of these custom chess boards in it, too.
re kasparov's claims of cheating, remember there's two sides to every story and you're only getting one. For his part, Hsu says that he tried to get garry's team to agree to a rematch both with IBM and after he left, and kasparov's team basically dodged while complaining loudly and pubicly that Hsu was running away from him. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in between, but given the obvious huge size of garry's ego I'd take what he says with a correspondingly large grain of salt.
where's kramnik? (Score:2)
is this like when apollo creed stands in for rocky to fight dolph lundgren in rocky IV?
PGN of the game? (Score:2)
Re:PGN of the game? (Score:2)
Movie Idea (Score:5, Funny)
Clusters of Quantum Computers Playing Chess (Score:2)
Diversionary tactic! We are far from lost!!! (Score:3, Interesting)
The AI wants you to think that Chess is the last bastion of human analytical superiority. It's not. (Go is).
We are led to believe (by the AI, who control google news), that if the best computer wins more games out of seven than the best human at CHESS, then we must bow before the AI, as its intellectual inferior. Wrong.
First of all, as long as we are winning one single game against the computer under tournament settings, we've got a chance. Karpov may have only drawn against deep fritz, but you know what? That means we have a chance: That draw includes some wins.
Kasparov won some games before ultimately losing to Deep Blue in 97. Now he's already won one more in 2003.
But as interesting as this is it's not the issue.
Chess is a game chosen by the AI to deceive you, because computers happen to be, today, really, really good at Chess. With judicious pruning, they have look-ahead trees of ten, fifteen, twenty, fifty moves. Folks, that means that except for some cute evaluation software to determine what lines to prune down, they're basically brute-forcing their way into winning.
And they want us to bow before this brute force?
Never!
They can brute-force their way out of 56 bits, sure.
But let's throw them against 128 bits.
Let's throw them against Go.
From "The Game of Go" by Matthew Macfadyen, page 122:
(I'm typing this for you out of a book -- and first-strike claim fair use with +2 save for being anonymous).
So. Let's concentrate on Go! In which the WORLD'S BEST computer program gets beaten - not by the world champion, but by a GIRL or BOY possibly still in highschool -- after being given more than ten moves to make without human response.
Computers are toast, even at a simple game with only two rules, one of which is hardly ever used and is just a "hack" to make infinite loops impossible. Humph.
Note: Another reason look-ahead-trees don't work for shit in Go is that at every point in the game, you can move to any free square. Typically, this means the first player has a choice of 361 squares for the first move, with the player making move 2 have 360, for move 3 there are 359, etc, with the only change in this pattern occuring when pieces are captured, pretty rare in professional games. (You just threaten to capture). So the "base" of the exponent is differnet AND you can't prune the look-ahead tree.
Chess has been SOMEWHAT brute-forced. So what.
Few things useful in the real world are as closed (8x8 board; clear general concept of positional value [number and location of important pieces]) as Chess.
So don't let the AI tell you chess is the last stance. Go is.
Deep Blue Cheated (Score:3, Informative)
Anyway, it seems that computer+human does better than human, not necessary computer by itself.
Re:Deep Blue Cheated (Score:2)
For an excellent description of the design of Deep Blue and the matches against Kasparov, see this book [amazon.com]
Can't wait... (Score:2)
When a computer can beat a Go master at Go (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:When a computer can beat a Go master at Go (Score:2, Flamebait)
Re:When a computer can beat a Go master at Go (Score:2)
only for lack of trying. trust me it's a no-brainer.
Re:When a computer can beat a Go master at Go (Score:2)
Having said all that, it is far far away from dan level play. I believe the feeling among the developers is that it will get a few stones stronger simply through correcting mistakes and continued tuning, but that more than that will take some major changes and improvements.
I am an occasional contributor to Gnu Go, and play at the 8k* level on nngs. I can give Gnu Go 4 stones, but that is in large part by playing to its weaknesses. It is a worthy opponent, but its games tend to have the same feel to them. The tactics and life and death are remarkably strong, in the 1-3k range, but its global planning and other aspects are weak.
a thought.. (Score:2)
Re:a thought.. (Score:2)
Deep Junior might be good at chess... (Score:2, Interesting)
Notes from the Kasparov-Junior match (Score:5, Informative)
There was a good attendance and a great deal of media coverage today for game one, particularly considering it was a national holiday in the USA. (Well, almost.) Kasparov had the white pieces in game one, which is an advantage. (Interestingly, the Deep Junior team won the drawing of lots and could pick which color to have in game one (and 3 and 5), and chose to start with black.)
He completely dominated the game, it was a total stomp. He played 'real' chess instead of the dubious anti-computer style he used against Deep Blue in the 1997 match. Anti-computer chess involves trying to reach positions that computers don't play well instead of just making what you think are the best moves. Deep Blue showed that computers are pretty much beyond being vulnerable to these tricks nowadays, although every once in a while you'll see a strong program play like an idiot in a position it doesn't understand.
Kasparov prosecuted his advantage very quickly. In the press conference afterward he showed how much he had learned about playing computers. One key, he said, is that a computer doesn't understand results or practical chances, it only understands the evaluation of the current position. So instead of trying to swindle a way out of a bad position like a human Grandmaster would, by creating maximum chaos and hoping the other guy makes a mistake, a computer just tries to find the 'least-worst' move all the time. This is the only effective way for computers to play chess, but in inferior positions it often makes them look completely docile, if not pathetic.
He won't be able to do this in all six games, of course, and he'll probably lose one just because a human can't play error-free chess for so long against a strong opponent and computers punish errors ruthlessly. But game one showed he's prepared to the gills, as usual, and along with the fact that he's the strongest player in history should give him a decisive edge.
You can watch the games live with my commentary (and that of other commentators on-site as I relay their words) at many places [chessbase.com] on the web. Most of it is directed toward the level of the casual fan, not the chess expert. The company I'm working with, ChessBase, publishes Deep Junior and just about every other top chess program. (The program Fritz just drew an eight-game match against the world's #2 rated player and current world champion, Kramnik, in October 2001 in Bahrain. I was the webmaster and commentator on that match as well. I think I prefer the cold here at home in NY to the Bahraini humidity.)
As for the Deep Blue versus the current micros debate, that will be eternal as long as Deep Blue is in pieces. It was obviously much more powerful, but that doesn't mean it was a better chessplayer. We only have six games as evidence of its strength. They were good, but they weren't godlike and Kasparov said at the opening press conference that when you go over those games with Deep Junior it's clear that it plays better in just about every moment. (Except for two, which are the moves Kasparov has always suspected were the result of human interference. But that's another kettle of conspiracy.) Deep Blue was far, far ahead of its competitors in 1997, but computer chess programming has not stood still for the past six years.
It's also worth noting that what constitutes a huge advantage in computer-computer competition does not always translate into play against humans. A processing power advantage of just 10% between two identical programs will cause a lopsided score, but even a fourfold increase in processing power usually only means an extra 30-40 rating point gain against open competition. That is, one more win out of ten games.
I've spoken with Deep Blue's architect and other members of the IBM team on several occasions. Their egos are almost as big as Garry's! Hsu's book on the building of Deep Blue is almost as partisan as Kasparov's comments. They are both very competetive people. Personally I don't think there was any human interference in the DB match, but IBM's secretive and heavy-handed behavior needlesssly created a great deal of circumstantial evidence and suspicion.
You can follow my reports and photos on Kasparov-Deep Junior at ChessBase.com [chessbase.com] and I'll also be posting bits and ends at my site ChessNinja.com [chessninja.com].
Re:Notes from the Kasparov-Junior match (Score:3, Interesting)
Assuming this [amazon.com] is the book you mean, I'd have to disagree. I read this over the holidays, and thought Hsu went out of his way to attempt to be impartial.
He obviously had a vested interest (as do you), but I didn't feel his book was in any way partisan - he wanted to win, but he was perfectly capable of dealing with the inevitable losses. As he's one of the participants, you have to take the comments about Kasparov's behaviour with a pinch of salt: but that's a very minor part of the book, and perfectly understandable given that it was an "I said/they said" situation.
It's a great book for finding out just how cobbled-together some of the early chess playing machines were - and that the kinds of problems they ran into along the way were incredibly mundane (fabrication problems, hardware failures, networks going down, last minute "this can't possibly hurt" changes to the code, etc). Although the book is pitched as being the story behind Deep Blue, a large chunk of it relates to the machines leading up to that point and the process by which Deep Blue came about (rather than that particular machine).
Instead of chess... (Score:2)
against any 5-year-old in CANDYLAND!!! I can't believe it took so many years to realize that there was absolutely NO WAY to be "good" at that game! All luck!
So, what does this mean? (Score:5, Interesting)
1) Computers are more intelligent than humans.
2) Computers can be made to play better chess than humans.
3) Computers can be programmed to beat Garry Kasparov.
4) Chess can be reduced to a set of mathematical computations, which a computer can then perform faster than a human.
So what is it? And how do you know which one (or ones) are correct? Just a thought, since I think a lot of people are being overly alarmist.
A lose-lose situation. (Score:5, Funny)
If the AI is losing, it cheats and starts a nuclear exchange that destroys civilization.
We're screwed either way.
What a silly topic heading... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's more specifically a test between a slow heuristically based massively parralel computer and a fast serial rule-based weighted system. (simplified, yes I know.)
A computer can count faster then we can, but then we can build 3D representations of objects and spaces just by looking at them, and then traverse them effeciently (aka walking)
If it's games we want to make the battlefield, why not just toss chess and get a propper game... for instance Go. Computers still have some time to go before they can really compete on dan level...
This thread is absurd.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:5, Informative)
look at the development of fritz, and deep junior, for example. or hell, why not try looking something up on google [google.com]? it can't be that difficult, can it [ask.com]?
deep blue was dismantled after its rematch with kasparov. deep junior has been winning all the computer chess tournaments for the past three years.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:5, Informative)
Read the second to last paragraph of this [globeandmail.com]. Or just read "Deep Junior is a three-time world champion and won the last official world chess championship for computers in July".
Re:How do they tell? (Score:5, Funny)
During a long plane flight, my brother-in-law and I pitted my Palm III vs. his Pocket PC in a game of chess.
His Pocket PC was clearly winning when my Palm III crashed, something it rarely does.
Just goes to show that technology isn't above having a temper tantrum and kicking the chess board over.
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Re:How do they tell? (Score:3, Funny)
According to the story, a chess computer that was programmed to win at all costs realised that it's human opponent was moves away from beating it. To avoid defeat, which was its overriding objective, it electrified the chess board and electrified its opponent when he made his next move.
Like I said, it sounded like urban myth to me (and pre-WWW I had no real way of exploring the myth further) but perhaps someone out there knows better.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:4, Interesting)
For that matter, they would have to connect the computer to a physical chessboard instead of just displaying one on the screen, or (more likely) having an IO person type in the human moves and moving the computer's pieces on the board. Commercial machines that can move / react to moves with a chessboard as IO, and with questionable AI, have been available since the mid-eighties. However, they are quite limited, hardly available, and physically incapable of electrocuting someone.
Stranger things have not happened. Things that had been previously believed to be impossible through some misreading of logic have eventually come true, given time... Machines have advanced to the point where they now can play chess, a once "impossible" feat, but it was truly impossible that Wolfgang von Kempelen's Turk could play a meaningful game of chess in the 18th century. Anything is possible given enough time, but what you describe is impossible without both technology greatly in advance of what we have available today and an almost homicidal recklessness spanning far beyond accidental negligence on the part of the designers.
As you describe it, this is truly impossible.
-C
Re:How do they tell? (Score:2)
Re:How do they tell? (Score:2)
Deep Blue vs. Junior (Score:2)
Deep Blue was dismantled several years ago.
Re:How do they tell? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:How do they tell? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:chess... (Score:5, Funny)
sincerely,
AC
Can we please not make this a race issue.... (Score:5, Funny)
Can't we all just learn to love each other and give peace a chance?
Re:So Who DOES. . . (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Better player? (Score:2)
Re:Tournament...? (Score:2)
Re:Tournament...? (Score:2)
Not only that.... (Score:2)
Not only was Deep Blue specifically designed to beat Kasparov, it would be re-tuned and configured after each match to further customize it to his playing style.
steve
Lemme get this straight.... (Score:2)
you're asking your opponent for hints? No wonder you keep losing. ; )
steve
Re:Wait a minute... (Score:2)
Re:Less moves...?!?! (Score:2)
If I remember correctly, Deep Blue was a modified customised RS/6000. I believe a significant portion of the move evaluation algorithm was implemented in hardware on top of an otherwise fairly beefy machine, meaning Deep Blue could evaluate vast numbers of moves per second.
To beat it in purely software today would still require some serious hardware.
Re:hrm.... (Score:3, Informative)