Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 14:26:09 07/20/98
Go up one level in this thread
On July 16, 1998 at 01:03:45, Don Dailey wrote: >>>The only interesting question to me is how close is Fritz playing >>>to weak grandmaster chess? (or IS Fritz playing GM chess?) >>>WE cannot reasonably argue about whether Fritz could do it, any >>>player can, we would have to get into statistical analysis of what >>>it's chances are based on how many tournaments it played in a year. >>>And then the argument gets more ambiguous than it already is. That >>>seems to be what we do best though. Endlessly arguing points that >>>cannot be resolved using as ambiguous a language as possible and >>>never defining any terms. >>> >>>Bob posted to me that he was not exaggerating in his belief that >>>micro's were not even close to weak GM strength. Maybe we could >>>take a look at the Aegon games and do a performance rating against >>>all the Grandmasters. Perhaps only the top micro's should be >>>considered in this formula since I believe there is a huge spread >>>among micros. Is this data on the web? We could consider this >>>an upper bound on the strength of top Micro's as of 1 year ago. >>>I say upper bound because the games were not played at long time >>>controls. >>> >>>After we did this then we could have a big argument about how much >>>difference the time control makes. >>> >>>- Don >> >> >>someone did this last year. If you "cherry pick" you will always have a >>couple of "GM" programs. But if you take all the reasonable programs and >>average their TPR's, the result is quite different. And probably much more >>accurate. IE I've had the following results in the past year: Crafty played >>in a game/30 tournament with 4 computers and 4 GM's (Crafty, ferret, two >>others). All the computers finished above the highest-finishing GM. Crafty >>played IGM Walter Browne 4 games at 5/14 (5 minutes +14 seconds increment) >>and it won 3 and lost 1. Unfortunately, I know how it plays, and what it knows, >>and I saw it win one nicely played endgame, saw it tactically out-wizard Walter >>twice, and saw him anti-computer it once and roll it up into a small wad. >> >>Ergo I've had plenty of results good enough to suggest that Crafty is a GM, >>and I could make that claim. But I *know* it isn't. I know *many* of the >>things it can't do... >> >>A GM is something that most here don't understand, but the best word to describe >>them is "balanced". They have no obvious weaknesses, they are strong >>tactically, positionally, know their openings, know their endings well, and so >>forth. Computers have too many holes at present... but they are getting >>better. > >We keep beating around the bush. We both seem happy to give very >strong opinions on where they are at without actually giving an >estimated ELO rating of the TOP micro. So I'll start with a lower >bound and you give me an upper bound. From there we will see how >far off we are from each other and whether it's enough to argue >about. I will continue to argue as long as it remains civil and >you are willing (and if you really disagree by as much as it sounds >like you do.) > >In my humble opinion, the strongest micro is within 100 rating >points of the weak grandmaster level so I'll say that it's no >weaker than 2400 ELO rating points. That makes it easy, because that is my upper bound. So we have no further negotiation here. :) > >Here is a conversation between Crafty and Cilkchess I overheard >the other day: > >Cilkchess: I got beat by a human the other day. > >Crafty: What? How did it happen? > >Cilkchess: It was one of those damn pattern recognition things > again, I have to give it to them, sometimes that works > in their favor. It's such an ugly way to play the game > but it really throws me off. Maybe that pattern > recoginition thing makes them better? > >Crafty: The only thing that matters is that we see so more than > they ever will, *MUCH* more. They have so many holes > in their game it's completely ridiculous. > >Cilkchess: I think they do ok. You are underestimating their > strengths. > >Crafty: What strengths? They have no strengths that really matter. > >Cilkchess: What about pattern recognition which gives them a > powerful selective search? > >Crafty: That's not important. It will never make up for the fact > that we have bigger books that we never forget, we search > orders of magnitude more nodes that they do, we *NEVER* > make careless mistakes or get tired. Humans do *ALL* of > these things. They have so many holes in their game > you can drive a Mack truck through. The other day I > chewed one up into tiny pieces and spit him back out. > >Cilkchess: But they have a unique way of integrating search with > knowledge that we don't seem to have. Also they seem to > be able to reason things out without using a search. > What about that? > >Crafty: So they have a couple unimportant minor advantages. They > have too many weakness that we can exploit. I've seen > and played a lot of games between humans and BELIEVE ME, I > can tell you from experience that they are constantly > getting hammered by oversights, surprise moves (to them) > and time pressure. Until they learn to overcome these > things they will *NEVER* be as good as us. > > >From Crafty's point of view, we are the ones with weaknesses, >not them. It can see it's own strengths but does not really know >that much about OUR strengths and in fact doesn't consider them >to be very important. > >What I'm saying is that computers can still overtake us without >being better in every single way. This is already the case with >me personally. I am not very strong as a chess player and have >never been over 2000 USCF, but I can still see my program make >errors that I would not make. It's getting much rarer now but >it still happens. And yet I am forced to concede that my >program is much better than I am. > > And I have the same problem. But I don't get beaten because I get killed positionally, I get beat due to tactical mistakes. That's not nearly so common at the GM-level, although they do make them. But, when they play computers, they are also good enough to create positions where they are not likely to make tactical mistakes, because the computer's position doesn't offer any tactical chances (Anand vs Fritz, game 1, reference, where fritz had absolutely no chance whatsoever.) If Anand mixes it up with Fritz, he's going to lose some. But if he chooses to play into positions where tactics don't mean much, he's not going to have to think much at all. That's the point here. If I was good enough to steer games away from the wild tactical slugfests, I'd be willing to play any micro for money, and go home rich. Because I know more than any I have seen. But if it turns wild, then they have a huge advantage. But at the GM level, the GM's are quite good enough to simply not allow the micro advantage to become an issue. And if you take out tactics, you take out 90% of what a program is good at. Leaving very little hope against a good GM (or even good IM) player. >- Don
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