Author: Roger
Date: 19:16:43 12/19/99
Go up one level in this thread
I think it's a sad state indeed when our posts devolve to arguments about epistemology. But...so be it: ;) The dualistic fictions that you speak of, be it black versus white, good versus evil, Thorsten versus Roger (Attention: Humor!), are indeed fictions, in that they are simplifications of the world and not the world per se. Nevertheless, those fictions serve a valuable heuristic purpose, because in simplifying the world, they make thought itself possible. The goal, of course, is to remember that they are fictions, and not be led into absurd distortions by mistaking, you might say, the letter of the law for its spirit, that is, to confuse symbol and reality. To the extent that someone can do this, they possess good judgment. You must also remember that not all fictions are created equal. The fictions that our minds invent are invented for a reason...because they possess what philosophers of science have referred to as SURPLUS MEANING. Far from merely describing "reality," to use such a crude term, at the level of appearances, they go beyond mere inductive summaries and serve a genuinely explanatory purpose. Your position, Thorsten, IS INVALIDATED BY YOUR OWN EPISTEMOLOGY, for in excluding CCC in toto from your tournament, you embraced an EXTREME POSITION compatible only with the dichotomous, black versus white, epistemologies you so thoroughly eschew. Your assertion that you are posting the results elsewhere reeks of RATIONALIZATION, since we are supposed to believe that posting elsewhere was your golden mean all along, rather than an argument invented in response to my own recommendation, that you simply post the results without CSTAL. CCC would thereby have results from the tournament, but no CSTAL results! That, sir, is called a compromise, and that, by definition, is the middle ground between extremes. You say you are no fan of test suites, and that you like to post complete games, but that people complain they are exceptions. They do complain. Yet, you miss the FACT that a test suite consists of positions draw from A GREAT MANY GAMES, and that the move recommended by CSTAL need not be winning in order to be attractive and exciting. Who is going to piss on your posts when you can show so many examples of attractive chess? I'm sure you could present a hundred or more. If you would just sample from all aspects of the game, the overall score on the suite would be an index of the attractiveness of a program's play. You say CSTAL does brilliancies all the time. Perhaps so, but it also blunders, as all programs do, and someone must separate the wheat from the chaff. You are excellently qualified, since you know the program better than anyone. Other positions could be added to the suite where CSTAL does not chose the attractive move (as good as CSTAL is, it's not PERFECT). That would also require human judgment. Since you and Chris are the primary authors of this approach, again, you are the best ones to identify such positions. Roger On December 19, 1999 at 20:09:22, Thorsten Czub wrote: >On December 19, 1999 at 14:53:50, Roger wrote: > >>No need to overreact, Thorsten. ;) > >>I wasn't suggesting that you go from one extreme to the other. Between the >>extreme of not posting ANY tournament results, and between the extreme of >>posting ALL tournament results, lies a middle ground of posting SOME of the >>tournament results, those not including CSTAL!!! > >maybe you have registered that i am posting in at least 2 or three places. >so you have your "golden" middle ground. > >>So much for dualistic thinking. ;) You have been snared on your own words here. >>Now that you recognize the middle ground between these two evil dualistic >>extremes, feel free to post the tournament results without CSTAL. ;) ;) > >yo don't get it, he ? >evil is something that is not on someones t-shirt, and others have a halo >over their heads. >these 2 words do only exist in your dualistic mind. >you prject them into the world. as you do it with almost any other >dualistic word pair. this is because thinking with the left brain part/halve >works this way. thinking with the other side works different. >it is also logically, but the logic is not aristotelic, is not >following the mechanistic-cartsianic rules. it is following another logic. > > >>I don't think CSTAL actually NEEDS a database of old positions to be a good >>chess program. As I said, I own the DOS and Windows versions, and I like them. I >>accept the proposition that it plays attractive chess. > >>What I was advocating was a test suite that would SHOW OFF THE GENIUS OF THE >>PROGRAM. Obviously, what makes CSTAL brilliant is that it chooses different >>moves than other programs. Otherwise, it'd be just another bean counter. In your >>experience with the program, you have seen it pull off some really incredible >>stuff. > >what i do is when is see thing like this, i am posting them. >the result is that a bunch of idiots claim that i am making propaganda, >that i am only posting wins. >they do not undrestand that i am posting something that shows different >behaviour of a chess-program. >i do not collect these positions. because cstal produces them. >it is not dead. it is alive and can do this anywhere, against any opponent. >even shredder as we have seen. >so WHY collecting them ? for the idiots who piss on my posts because they >believe i am posting the things of idle reasons ? >no - > > >> I was just suggesting that such exemplars of "attractive chess" could be >>formed into a test suite that operationalizes what humans expect attractive >>chess should be. Given your experience with CSTAL, this should not be difficult. > >no. but i am no fan of test-suites. i like chess-games, complete games. >but whenever you post an example, people claim it is an exception !! >its the same with politicians. whenever somebody finds out a politician >was corrupt and has taken money, all the others cry: its an exception. > >although it is the function of a politician to take money and to betray >the people and to be corrupt. >they believe the sense of a politician is to be for THEM. >but in fact the politician has only one target: to make money for himself, >to get power for himself. to be idle and the greatest for himself. >we have e.g. in the moment an example of this in germany. it shows >that one of the longest cancellors in germany, helmut kohl, >has many many years (and even before his government time in the flick-scandal) >be corrupt, with dark-money for his party, taking money from all kind >of industrials. > >as if this would be an exception. thats how capitalism is working in general. >(see bill gates). > >but people are stupid. they believe a person would do a job for idealistic >reason, although he claims to be a good capitalist. but a good capitalist >has only one target, to make enough money for himself, to get the most >power for himself, to be the strongest and the only monopolist controlling >anything. >see chessbase or microsoft or scientology. >their target is clear. >you can see the same targets anywhere in capitalism. >but the people really believe these companies would have an idealistic >target. >so they voted for kohl. unrecognizing that he has taken money, and made >anything brilliant for the ones who gave him the money. >he was a salesman. politician was only the name of those, who believed >in him as a politician. those claimed that he is an exception now. >but they are wrong. it is a function of politics, like it is a function >of capitalism to produce monopols, corruption and methods. >when you see children kill their teachers with guns, than it is not >evil, it is a result of the society, of the capitalistic system. >it is in fact a function of the system. >as long as you don't understand that the evil is only a result >of the system you choose, that is exploiting people to give the >power and money to a few corrupt people (e.g. cancellor Helmut Kohl), >you will claim: it is an exception. > >its too easy to call the murderers or the corrupt people evil afterwards. >when in fact the system is creating those honneckers, kohls and gates >or ron hubbards. >a society that gives weapons to children, and shows them bloody >movies with 100 dead people per hour in any arnold schwarzenegger >or mad max or whatever movie, will produce children who kill their >teachers and the other kids in the class. >its is not the evil in ONE person, as it is not the brilliance in ONE >game of cstal. therefore i do not believe producing a test-suite >is a method of helping computerchess. >in my opinion the only method is to do what other call impossible to do. >and chris has done so. in his limited way of course. but he has done. > > >>Roger > >sorry. maybe we don't get a harmony in this millennium. we can do later. >2001...
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