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Subject: Re: Kuhn - relevence to computer chess -

Author: Mogens Larsen

Date: 17:06:41 11/08/00

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On November 08, 2000 at 18:28:29, Andrew Williams wrote:

>To summarise: if you want to place yourself in the august company of Kuhn's
>scientific revolutionaries you first have to define what your "new paradigm"
>is. You could start by distinguishing clearly between the characteristics
>of an old-paradigm program and a new-paradigm program.

Sorry for snipping all that sensible text, it was a joy to read. As far as I'm
concerned most of the rhetoric essentially boils down to the above paragraph. If
there's no determination of the characteristics of the old frame of reference
and the new then categorization makes no sense whatsoever. We are only left with
unsubstantiated opinions, allogations and lack of understanding as several
recent threads have proved IMHO.

The benefits of clear definitions are the identification of changes. Then you
can start quibbling about the nature of these changes and if they are valid, ie.
if they improve the areas they claim to improve or not. Another possibility
would to identify the general framework, eg. can the changes be reached by
applying new principles to the old framework? Do we have to abandon certain
ideas that are no longer compatible with the parameters of the new approach? Do
we have to start anew? These are the interesting questions IMO.

According to the "new paradigm" supporters the difference is too large for
natural "evolution" from old to new without abrupt change or introduction of the
elusive knowledge "crane". However, no chess program in existance support that
kind of conclusion. So I think that building a bridge with objective knowledge
and information is better than creating a divide with arrogant, unsubstantiated
opinions on both sides.

The interesting part of understanding improvement must be to apply scrutiny and
analysis to the various parts of the entire framework, whether it be the old or
the new. This is pure speculation on my part as I'm not a programmer and
fortunately I have no ambitions in that regard. The approach seem interesting to
me, but maybe the art of pointing fingers at each other is the preferred
approach by the programmers guild?

Mogens.



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