Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: Fritz5 disaster !

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 12:08:47 03/04/98

Go up one level in this thread


On March 04, 1998 at 11:04:30, Ed Schröder wrote:

>>Posted by Robert Hyatt on March 04, 1998 at 08:34:58:
>
>>>Perhaps I don't like to be called stupid?
>>>Of course you never did...
>>>Pfffff....
>
>>>- Ed Schroder -
>
>>Then perhaps "stubborn" instead?
>
>Much better but wrong again :)
>
>
>>I recall several responses to people asking you "why no book
>>learning?"  And I notice that nothing has changed about learning
>>in the last few years.
>
>Then you have noticed wrong.
>Your information about Rebel is out dated.
>
>
>>And I notice that it took me about one night to write Crafty's
>>learning code.  And perhaps another 3-4 nights spread over a year
>>to refine it...
>
>Sure, because you are not stupid :)
>

Let me explain a revolutionary concept to you:

  writing a stupid piece of code, does *not* mean that the person that
  wrote it is stupid...

examples:  (from my code)

1.  I didn't have book learning for 1.5 years of Crafty, plus 20+ years
in Blitz/Cray Blitz.  I simply chose to not tackle it.  Not doing so was
stupid, in hindsight, but I wasn't then (nor now) what anyone would call
a "stupid person."

2.  In the NPS game last year, I had some silly mistakes in the
evaluation
that favored that passed center pawn over king safety.  Again, stupid
programming.

Bottom line:

  You chose to not do book learning until (apparently) Rebel 9 (Yes I
know about the memory-resident tricks in rebel 8 but that's a SSDF
trick,
not something that helps normal book play from what you have said in the
past.)  That was a stupid mistake I'm sure you'd agree.  But there's no
implication that *you* are stupid.  I've probably made far more stupid
mistakes than you have in programming issues, no doubt, because I have
written several million lines of code over the past 30 years.  But
again,
I would not call myself stupid...



>
>>Tis far easier to take evasive action by fixing a serious problem than
>>it
>>is to (a) come up with a passive solution that requires manual/automatic
>>elimination of doubles or (b) grumbling about the way the testing is
>>done.
>
>Ahem, we will see when Crafty appears in the SSDF list.


it may lose every game.  But it won't lose the same game twice to the
same opponent on the same machine, *ever*.



>
>
>>As far as the NPS thing, we both know how that was likely going to turn
>>out had 10 games been played...  That hasn't changed at all...
>
>I was referring to the word stupid. If you call me stupid then it is
>allowed to pester in return. Be sportive...

as I said, I did not call you stupid, nor did I mean to imply such.
We can both be smart as Albert Einstein and still make stupid
programming
decisions from time to time?


>
>
>>As far as being called "stupid" I don't believe that was directed at
>>you.
>
>As predicted...


again, see above...

>
>
>>Several programs fit that description, from Rebel
>
>Again?
>
>Not many people will call Rebel a stupid program.

I'd call *any* program stupid that will let me beat it, and then let
me play the same moves again tomorrow and beat it again.  Check your
definition of "civilized man" -- who learns from his mistakes.  I've
had a stupid program in that regard for nearly 30 years.  No More.  I
may have a stupid program in other regards, still...  of course...

But every program has some really stupid weaknesses.  Check out your
king safety against kingside attacks to see what I mean...  Doesn't mean
you don't have offsetting strengths, of course.  First game I played vs
Rebel 9 on a server showed this problem.  Rebel seemed to not notice
that
Crafty had two bishops on the queenside with open lines to the kingside,
and played g4-g5 and ended up attacking itself.  On balance, Crafty has
done similar or even worse things, of course.  But a "smart" program
doesn't "self-immolate"...  usually...  I haven't seen but maybe one
"smart" program to date....



>
>Hope you are in the minority dear colleague... :)
>
>- Ed -
>
>
>>to fritz 4 and before
>>to Genius (earlier versions, don't know about 5), CM versions (don't
>>know
>>about the most recent) and so forth.  And based on (a) the known problem
>>with books and (b) the minimal effort needed to get learning
>>operational;
>>then (c) there was no good reason for everyone not to be "learning" at
>>least a couple of years ago.



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.