Author: Pekka Karjalainen
Date: 01:10:07 06/27/01
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On June 27, 2001 at 00:33:26, derrick gatewood wrote: >ok, I made some general statements about AI and chess and how they have been >closely related... this is the response I get back. I was wondering what you >guys think about this. If you can rip its reasoning apart, please do. I would >like a little support when I do it =) > It looks like he is arguing that the approach used for chess will not work in other domains. And it will not produce "real AI", whatever that is. I think he is, broadly speaking, correct. Whatever that game Starcraft is, it probably is not amenable to the same techniques that computer chess is. There are a whole bunch of games that are much harder for computers than chess is. Nothing special about that. It is easy to debate in the following form: To have real AI we need X. ... Ten years pass and we have X! ... But, I can understand how computers do X. It is so simple. Obviously, to have real AI we need computers to do Y. And so on. Flexible definitions are always an advantage in a debate. Though a dubious one, of course. > >"Umm.. Lets see. Chess programs and AI. > >Of course what follows is an Opinion, but here goes anway.. > >What exactly *is* intellegence? > >According to Websters: > >Main Entry: in·tel·li·gence >Pronunciation: in-'te-l&-j&n(t)s >Function: noun >Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French, from Latin intelligentia, from >intelligent-, intelligens intelligent >Date: 14th century >1 a (1) : the ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying >situations. > >To learn or understand.... > >Chess programs do neither. What chess programs do is heuristic search of various >board configurations using a Minumum and Maximum approach. Each board >configuration had a heuristic value associtated with it saying how good or bad >it is for a certain side. All a chess program does is search this database for >the next move that has the best score for it and the worst score for the >opponet. Its only slightly more complex then a sequal query searching for your >friend Joe's phone number. If it is only "slighly" more complex like he says, ask him to write a chess program :) > >It does not learn or understrand, hence its not intellegent although its >commonly called AI. Real AI doesnt exist and were no where near making it. When >you can tell a computer an Aesops fable and it can give you the moral of the >story, then you will have an AI, not any sooner. And if we have such a computer one day, then this person will probably turn tail and say that that is not "real AI" after all. After all, it can't do something else which *really* requires intelligence. And off he is, quoting a dictionary again :) > >Big blue didnt beat that russian chess player (I forget his name), a team of >people beat him, the IBM chess programming team. Chess has been distiled to a >mathimatcal abstraction and it still takes super computers forever to find the >best solution. > >Something as abstract as Starcraft, for instance, is VASTLY more complex then >chess. To compare the size of the problem would be like comparing a grain of >sand to the sun (chess being the grain of sand). Even that might not be big >enough. In chess there are only a few units, and they all interact with other >units in the same fashion, if they can move into a spot cointaining another >unit, the other unit is destroyed. Not only are there far more units in >starcraft then in chess, but there are far, far more board positions and each >unit can interact with other units in differnt manners. IE: Hydrolisk vs a ling >is differnt then a Hydrolisk vs a ling in a dark swarm. So, he is saying that Starcraft is really complex in a computational sense. All that means that we cannot use the same approach of AB-searching with enhancements to play it like chess. Some other approach might work better, though. > >Now games like EQ and AO make Starcraft look like a tinker toy. Again the world >is MUCH bigger then in Starcraft and the units are much more complex and the >enviroment is much much more complex. > >Whats the point? Its not gonna happen until we get something like HAL, and HAL >isnt even on the drawing board. Give it up. " I think he is right here. What we do not have is an AI like HAL and it is not on the drawing board either. A lot of interesting things are, though, which might eventually help in bringing about HAL. Might make that Starcraft Grandmaster strength player on the side too :-) Pekka K.
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