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Subject: Re: Dead Wrong!

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 19:27:45 07/21/00

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On July 21, 2000 at 19:16:41, Ed Schröder wrote:

>On July 21, 2000 at 15:29:26, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>If you don't mind I only answer those points not earlier discussed
>(enough) to avoid ending up in endless circles.
>
>
>>>2) DB is no brute force program (as you always have claimed). Quote
>>>from the IBM site:
>>>
>>>    "Instead of attempting to conduct an exhaustive "brute force"
>>>    search into every possible position, Deep Blue selectively
>>>    chooses distinct paths to follow, eliminating irrelevant searches
>>>    in the process."
>>>
>>>I always said this after I had seen the log-files. It beats me how you
>>>always have claimed the opposite on such a crucial matter presenting
>>>yourself as the spokesman of Hsu even saying things on behalf of Hsu
>>>and now being wrong on this crucial matter?
>>
>>Sorry, but you are wrong and are interpreting that wrong.  DB uses _no_
>>forward pruning of any kind, this _direct_ from the DB team.  The above is
>>referring to their search _extensions_ that probe many lines way more deeply
>>than others.  If you want to call extensions a form of selective search, that
>>is ok.  It doesn't meet the definition used in AI literature of course, where
>>it means taking a list of moves and discarding some without searching them at
>>all.
>
>The quoted text describes DB as a selective program, no brute force. I
>don't see how you can explain it otherwise. The text is crystal clear.
>
>

Why don't you simplyh ask Hsu, or are you afraid you will get an answer
you don't want?  DB was _always_ brute force.  Every document written about
DB said this.  The paragraph you are quoting is talking about "selective
search extensions" which was one of the real innovations from the Deep Thought
development (singular extensions, later used by Lang, Kittinger, Moreland,
Hyatt, who knows who else).

You _know_ they were basically in the same mold as the rest of us.  This has
_never_ been in doubt.

If you do doubt it, just ask the horse's mouth, since you don't want to believe
me.



>
>>This _was_ deep thought.  It was doing about 2M nodes per second in 1995,
>>according to Hsu.
>
>Then Hsu is wrong or the IBM site.
>
>Quote from the IBM site:
>
>    "Deep Thought acquires 18
>     additional customized chess
>     processors and emerges as
>     Deep Thought II. It now is
>     running on an IBM/6000 and
>     can search six to seven million
>     chess positions per second.


That was correct.  But as I said (after a conversation with Hsu) it _never_
really ran at that speed.  The few times they tried to use all the hardware,
things didn't work out very well (this was mainly used during the Fredkin
stage II matches, where they physically shipped the machine (a single Sun
workstation + the VME cards) to remote locations.

Hsu has said point blank, the most recent version of DT was searching about
2M nodes per second.  I take him at his word, since he built the thing...




>
>6 to 7 million NPS. This in the year 1991 so 4 years before the Hong Kong
>event. So according to Hsu and/or IBM in 1995 the machine dropped from 7 to
>2 million NPS?? One might expect the opposite, a faster machine after
>4 years but not a slower one. Something ain't right with these numbers.


Simply email Hsu...  it was his box.  He can tell you what you want to
know...


>
>
>>Fine.  Again, Hsu is a liar.  If that is what you want to think.  Here is
>>an excerpt from him that might help:
>>
>>===============================================================================
>>Web-based DB Jr uses a single card, a random opening book (including
>>fairly bad lines) and one second per move (a quarter of which is used
>>in downloading the evaluation function, and the search extensions are
>>more or less off due to the very short time).  It probably plays at around
>>2200, which is usually sufficient to play against players in random marketing
>>events.  Repetition detection is also turned off (The web-based program
>>is stateless).  The playing strength of "DB Jr." spans a quite wide range,
>>depending on the setup.  The top level, which we used for analysis and
>>in-house training against Grandmasters, is likely in the top 10 of the
>>world.
>>================================================================================
>
>I said the contradiction is in the private emails so you can't know.
>
>Ed


No, but I believe from the above, which is also private email, there is
absolutely no confusion in what "web DB Jr" was.  It is _very_ clear, and
not open to misinterpretation, wouldn't you say??

It was thrown together at the request of marketing guys. And "thrown together"
is a pretty accurate description.  He says "2200".  In another email he said
"2200 might have been optimistic"...



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