Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 18:36:47 11/08/00
Go up one level in this thread
On November 08, 2000 at 17:47:43, Joe Besogn wrote: >On November 08, 2000 at 15:59:32, Bruce Moreland wrote: > >>On November 08, 2000 at 11:02:54, Joe Besogn wrote: >> >>> >>> >>>Kuhn concluded early that the conventional textbooks on the history of science >>>were simply wrong, not so much about facts as about processes and sequences. No >>>science primarily develops in steady, small increments - tiny accruals of fact. >>>Science develops in revolutionary spasms, with periods of consolidation between. >>>Both before and after revolutionary changes, any given discipline has >>>overarching theories, some models, favorite metaphors, systems of symbolization. >>>These ways of thinking - Kuhn called them together paradigms - not only define >>>the discipline but can be used to explain most of the phenomena in which the >>>discipline is interested, as did Ptolemaic astronomy or the phlogiston theory. >>> >>>Most "normal science" is not engaged in radical innovations, lonely and heroic >>>explorations of the unknown. Most normal scientists work with the puzzles for >>>which the contemporary paradigm is applicable. Those puzzles for which the >>>paradigm does not apply are typically ignored or even denied to exist. But >>>sometimes these anomalies of explanation cannot be denied, either for pressing >>>general reasons (in which case several people are apt to create a new paradigm >>>almost simultaneously) or because some atypical scientist finds the climate >>>right for the acceptance of his ideas. Then a new paradigm is created, a new >>>system of thought, which explains more phenomena more parsimoniously and >>>elegantly. Often, Kuhn tells us, there ensues a battle between the >>>conservatives, the adherents to the old paradigm, and devotees of the new ways >>>of thinking. When one side or the other wins, they can return to their more >>>peaceful puzzle laboratories. >>> >>>A new paradigm amounts to seeing the theoretical structure of a scientific >>>discipline in some new and useful way. The effect, if innovation takes hold, is >>>revolutionary. If the revolution is a large one, the effector or effectors are >>>often dubbed geniuses, and previous geniuses become denigrated. >> >>Someone else claims that we can't talk about paradigm shifts in our field, >>essentially because it's not an important field. >> >>I don't know a lot about paradigms, and I haven't read Kuhn's book. In college, >>my libertarian roommate Jerry read it, and that was good enough for me. That >>guy preferred Art Garfunkel to Paul Simon, avoid avoid avoid. >> >>New paradigms would tend to get adopted quickly in computer chess, since it is >>usually easy to provide evidence that something works. Particularly strong >>evidence would be a program that wins. >> >>There have been a couple of times where people jumped on a specific bandwagon. >>People didn't know that full-wdith search could make a strong program until >>Slate and Atkins did it, and after that point it became typical to write >>full-width programs. >> >>There was another shift when Donninger published the null-move article. Prior >>to that, null move was underappreciated, and after that it became the norm. > >At first thought, it seems it is for the revolutionaries to _prove_ a paradigm. >The onus in this case being on you. > >I try you on Kuhn's requirements, and will answer a response tomorrow, since it >is late here: > >normal-science before null move you describe as what? > >what exemplars from normal science time became anomolies? Were they important? > >what was the crisis in normal-science? > >what anomoly was then solved by the null-move technology? > >how were chess revolutionarily programs different afterwards? > >did anyone resist the null-move? politically? > >can you say that null-move was more than just "puzzling" (kuhn's phrase) within >the normal-science? > >Personally, I think it was great idea that required a real leap of thought, so >I'm open to the idea ... I don't believe it required any great leap of faith. The Kaissa team mentioned the null-move hypothesis in the 1970's.. they apparently used it in their program, although I am pretty sure there was no R=2/R=3 thinking that far back. I used null-move for threat detection in the middle 1970's, but that was _all_ I used it for back then. I believe that even Berliner used a form of null-move threat detection in "patsoc". THis was just one of those ideas that slowly evolved. Beal wrote the first article on it I remember reading. Then Chrilly's ICCA paper came later. Then the results of programs like Fritz using R=2 and later even using R=3 became common. That is a _classic_ definition of evolution. _not_ "revolution". The idea took at least 15 years of development from the first mention of it that I am aware of, until it became pretty common-place. > >I ask because there are of course developments evolutionarily. Kuhn claims these >as puzzling in normal-science. The revolutionary changes, he says, take place as >a result of crisis in normal-science. Presumably Kuhn sees paradigm shifts as >being at the top end of grey scale of change, where the scale is gradual, but >with a catastrophic over-the-edge-flip in some central region. > > >The other quick thought, is that Kuhn talks of pre-science, where developers are >working independently, without too much communication. The first paradigm arises >from this. Some of the items you describe sound like this pre-science period. > > > >> >>Other programs have had success with techniques that weren't thought to be >>useful, for instance self-teaching. This hasn't started a wave of self-learning >>programs yet, but there have been some interesting articles and some interesting >>attempts. >> >>We will probably see more interest in speculative evaluation since Christophe's >>speculative program has been a success. >> >>All the programs that I know of now are built on a brute-force framework, with >>selective extension and selective pruning. If anyone can make a strong program >>that doesn't use these mechanisms, that will cause the most major shift we've >>seen so far. >> >>bruce
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.