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Subject: Re: revolution in computer chess

Author: Dann Corbit

Date: 09:16:33 01/04/06

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On January 04, 2006 at 06:14:05, Uri Blass wrote:

>On January 04, 2006 at 04:33:37, Dann Corbit wrote:
>
>>On January 03, 2006 at 14:40:01, Tord Romstad wrote:
>>
>>>On January 03, 2006 at 13:22:57, Andreas Guettinger wrote:
>>>
>>>>On January 03, 2006 at 12:28:09, Robert Allgeuer wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>It is possible that Sergei introduced the name "history pruning", but the
>>>>>>technique itself is very old; certainly much older than SmarThink.  I no
>>>>>>longer remember where or when I heard about it for the first time, but it was
>>>>>>definitely not in this millennium.
>>>>>
>>>>>It would be really interesting where this technique came from, given that it is
>>>>>now in wide-spread use. Maybe a forum member knows...
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Two papers were it was introduced (1989), probably found on Dann corbits FTP.
>>>
>>>As Stuart points out, these papers are about history-based move ordering,
>>>which is not the same thing at all.
>>>
>>>I don't think there are any papers to be found.  History pruning/late move
>>>reductions must rather be considered as a part of the "oral tradition", and
>>>the origins seem to be lost in antiquity.  Perhaps Bob or some other veterans
>>>can tell us more.
>>
>>I would be interested in pruning data for difference based pruning.
>>
>>For instance, if some move is the root node, and has a centipawn evaluation of
>>100 centipawns, then when a move fails low or has a hash table value of the
>>appropriate depth at -100 centipawns, can we reduce the depth of search?  How
>>about 200 centipawns difference? 1000 centipawns?  It is true, we will just have
>>a bound, but if it is an upper bound and it is 200 centipawns below the pv node,
>>can we reduce the depth of search by 1/2 ply?  How about by 1 ply?
>>
>>The idea is sort of like null move, except that we scale reductions according to
>>how bad the move looks.  We could have an additional parameter for maximum
>>reduction (e.g if we are supposed to look 12 plies deep, we will look at least 7
>>plies deep even if we lose a queen and a rook).  I think that this would play
>>more like most people.  We tend to look harder at moves that look promising and
>>not so hard at moves that look bad.
>
>Same for computers because of null move pruning.
>
>If you are queen and rook down you usually threats nothing.

The thing that seems strange to me about null move pruning is the all or nothing
effect.  Losing a pawn is worse than doing nothing.  So is losing a queen.  But
losing a queen is a lot worse.  Yet both moves would get the same reduction.



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