Author: Rolf Tueschen
Date: 03:31:34 02/19/03
Go up one level in this thread
On February 18, 2003 at 21:34:44, Robert Hyatt wrote: >On February 18, 2003 at 18:16:10, Rolf Tueschen wrote: > >>I have made a white paper for a simple question: what is your opinion about >>Crafty against humans in tournatment mode? I had a littler dispute with >>Matthew... I said you never claimed GM status for either Crafty or other >>commercials. Then Matthew said Crafty drew to some unknown (to me!) GM. Does >>that mean you now say that also Crafty "is" GM in long tournament mode? >> >> > >First, a clarification. I have _never_ said that Crafty is a GM-level >player at tournament time controls, namely 40 moves in 2 hours. I believe >it is clearly a super-GM at blitz (game in 5 minutes). In fact, it is >most likely a "ultimate-GM" if the time control is really game in 5 minutes, >period. First of all thanks. Amir might respond for the superiority of DJ. Then I want to make a little experiment. Challenge and Refutation: (1) Take GM Roman in a 6 game Blitz with 5' for the game and give Roman 1 million US$$ in advance cash. If he wins it's all his money. A draw or loss and he will have to give back the whole money. I bet that Roman will win that against any Crafty available. Period. :) (2) We are making too many wild guessings without exact analyses. In general people have little experience in psychological experimental design. Again, that was very clear - for me at least - in 1997 already. The factor 'human' is out of sight when you chess programmers do your work. That is why Amir could make his incredible statements. If already a machine is inpredictable in its behavior [parallelism etc.] then human beings could never be out-calculated. In the final moment they still could decide for the other option. - I say that you have lots of data about humans playing comps but in general you know zero about the human players' motivation. We simply have too little data. So I prefer the theory that super GM still are stronger than machines also at Blitz. > >Second, I've come to modify my "GM level" a bit. I now suspect that in >tournaments/matches that span multiple days, that most computer programs can >play at a modest GM level. Not because they are positional GM players most >of the time, and not because they are tactically superior to most GM players, >but because of their consistency and stamina. They don't get tired and will >play the last game of a consecutive 100 game match just as well as they play >the first, perhaps even better when you factor in "book learning." Humans >can't do that, as they get tired. > >So we have yet another "superiority" that the machines hold over us. Better >memory than most (most but maybe not all). No fatigue. No distractability. >Not subject to illnesses/bad days/etc. Perhaps those things _do_ make up for >the positional/tactical shortcomings programs exhibit. Objection! For the reasons given above you simply can't say that. We have too little data. Kasparov and the couple of other GM who drew comps in show events are not data enough. If you buy this fatigue story then you are a very prominent victim of the propaganda spread around the event in NY. You know how Kasparov is. Of course he seeks easy excuses for his blunders. And of course Amir tells us that he has not seen a single blunder in the games. But this is all propaganda. > > > > > > >>BTW - your report about such long distance marathon by Roman is what I said. >>These guys don't need millions to get into fighting mode. Chess itself is >>intersting enough. And yes, you are right, I do also know how the stamina topic >>appeared in NY... >> >>Rolf Tueschen > > >I have told this story before, but it is worthwhile to repeat. > >Roman used to take a lot of abuse on the chess servers (ICC in particular) as >there are always the "morons" that want to aggravate when they can't play with >a GM. As a result, he tried many different anonymous handles, but his rating >would rise to the top of ICC, and he would be "uncovered." > >In talking on the phone one morning, I suggested that he think about losing >games to low-rated players from time to time to suppress his rating and avoid >discovery. He thought about it and said he was going to try. He was playing >a FM friend of mine (one that I used to play a lot on ICC) and he made an >intentional blunder dropping a rook. And he was looking to lose a big chunk >of rating points. But as I watched, he started playing like a GM again, and >built up an interesting attack, traded into a won endgame, and won. I asked >"what in the hell were you thinking?" He chuckled (another phone call) and >said "after intentionally dropping the rook for a pawn, I sort of got into >the game and starting playing to see if I could make up for being a rook down." > >The point was that it is _hard_ for these guys to lose intentionally, although >I have no idea how hard it would be if there was a million dollars or two that >losing might make available to them next year... > >Some of them will play as best they can, whether it is blitz, standard, for >first place or skittles on a chess server. But then of course, some won't... Yes, we know those. They who have got 1 million to attend the show. But I have a third chapter for you. I want to analyse the situation you told us about Roman and this game against a FM. Without knowing the game I give you a different interpretation of the story. Too often in CC we forget about real chess. CC people have their own logic and reasoning. But the secret of chess is the concreteness of each single position. Roman gave away a rook intentiously. But then as a chess player he looked upon the board position and then he must have seen something "new" or "interesting" or "extraordinary". NOT in the actual position but far ahead in his mind, before his inner eyes - his eidetics. It might have been not absolutely clear. His chances to get some chances might have been small but then his opponent was only a FM. And Roman, we must remember once was very close to candidate level for the Wch. His knowledge is still there, perhaps even higher today. My point is that Roman was not provoked by the loss of the rook as such but by something concrete "in the situation". You know, also a GM could not invent something out of nothing. Although he could try, because a FM is miles away from his strength. BTW this is also the point why I always propose to wait that GM will begin to work out a real comp strategy. Until now they never did that. The few little tricks to mate are nothing against a real comp related strategy. We have too little data. So we can only wait. The rest is propaganda. You asked Roman a lot of questions but I doubt that you had the hypotheses in mind to explorate him. And he like Picasso can't describe 1000 factors with two words. So all that is still open to research! I can only invite the many students who read us here. I want to end this message with a general remark. Open thinking is very important. We should always think about possible factors we might have overseen. And when we have the human factor (the expression is already a joke because then we have not one but endless many factors) it's always indicated to be extremely careful before we believe in the final truth of our hypotheses. It's also important to talk about it because one individual alone might be a genius but it's impossible to have all factors in mind. It would be good if we could take such show events as inspiration for our research but not as inhibitions to do further research! Rolf Tueschen
This page took 0 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.