Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 07:35:47 08/16/01
Go up one level in this thread
On August 16, 2001 at 07:55:23, Oliver Roese wrote:
>On August 15, 2001 at 00:08:26, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On August 13, 2001 at 14:56:32, Oliver Roese wrote:
>>
>>>On August 12, 2001 at 12:26:09, Bruce Moreland wrote:
>>>
>>>>On August 11, 2001 at 11:26:31, Oliver Roese wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On August 09, 2001 at 12:06:45, José de Jesús García Ruvalcaba wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>On August 09, 2001 at 05:25:37, Graham Laight wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Here's the link:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1480000/1480365.stm
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Seems the brain magnetic resonance scanning confirms what we've all suspected -
>>>>>>>that GMs tend to use their memory, wheras weak players have to do it by
>>>>>>>calculation (the chess computer method).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>The number of patterns a GM is said to be familiar with seems to have
>>>>>>>mysteriously risen from 50,000 ("Chess Skill In Man And Machine") to 100,000 -
>>>>>>>any idea how that happened, anyone?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>-g
>>>>>>
>>>>>>It is not clear to me what a "pattern" is, as long as it is not clearly defined
>>>>>>the number of patterns can be any number you want.
>>>>>>José.
>>>>>
>>>>>Good point.
>>>>>Those patterns probably exists just as dreams of some (bad?) scientists.
>>>>>Nevertheless if there is something out there who knows how to identify and
>>>>>count these patterns, please tell us about them.
>>>>>
>>>>>Oliver
>>>>
>>>>I don't know anything about this cognitive stuff, but here is an example of a
>>>>pattern.
>>>>
>>>>If you are watching a human play chess, and the human (white) has a bishop on
>>>>a4, the human will very rarely play b3, even if black has no b-pawn to trap the
>>>>bishop.
>>>>
>>>>This is true all the way up the a-file. If the bishop is on a6, the human isn't
>>>>going to play b5.
>>>>
>>>>When people say "pattern" they are thinking about sexy attack patterns on the
>>>>king-side, but there are plenty of little things they strive for or avoid
>>>>elsewhere.
>>>>
>>>>bruce
>>>
>>>Sure, i know what you are talking about.
>>>This is that could be coined as "first-order"-terms (from dr hyatt), in analogy
>>>to multidimensional taylorseries.
>>>But i personally dont think that these kind of information is stored
>>>explicitely, as the name suggests it.
>>>Since that would be trillions of patterns to handle.
>>>For example i might dont play b3, since i feel/think that
>>>this leaves the bishop in bad shape. This is something different
>>>than to match a pattern.
>>>In a relational database i have no difficulties to count the rows
>>>with a simple statement.
>>>But the human mind is surely not a relational database.
>>>So why do some scientists continue to count pattern??
>>>How do they do that?
>>>Thats my point.
>>>
>>>Oliver
>>
>>
>>Humans definitely store chess patterns. De Groot proved it quite nicely with
>>a test he ran. If you haven't read the book, and want to hear about the test,
>>let me know and I will post an explanation here. But it was definitely
>>conclusive that 'patterns' are used in playing chess.
>>
>Would be nice.
>
>>one simple idea is the pattern of your area code. It is far easier to
>>remember your own 3-digit area code (or your 5 digit zip-code) than it is
>>to remember a random 3 digit or 5 digit number. Because it is a familiar
>>pattern of digits...
>
>Familiar patterns are easier to recall.
>Ok, but i wonder what does that say in favor of the stored-as-patterns-theory?
>
>Oliver
One of De Groot's experiments dealt with recognizing patterns, in a hidden way.
He picked two groups of people. One group knew little about chess. The other
group were GrandMasters and IM players.
He set up some totally random positions that had nothing to do with real games,
ie both kings in check, pawns on impossible squares, etc. He would let one
person at a time look at the position for a few seconds, then ask them to go
to another board and recreate the exact position. everyone was able to
accurately recall the locations of roughly 7 of the pieces, whether the person
was a GM or novice.
He then set up some normal positions reached during real games. And he repeated
the test. Novice still got roughly 7 pieces right. GMs got almost everything
right. Occasionally they would get two pieces on different squares, but the
"theme" was still there. IE knight pinned on the king by a bishop at either a3
or b4, so the GM would mislocate the bishop. It was obvious that the GM was
using "patterns" to categorize parts of the board.
BTW, 7 +/- 2 is a well-known estimate for short-term memory in a human. We
can generally recall 5-9 distinctly different pieces of data. The thing is,
what is a piece? For 7 random digits, it might be 7 digits are 7 pieces of
data. But if the first 3 are your phone area code, you might recall more of
the digits as that 3-digit "chunk" takes a single "block" of STM.
Cute stuff...
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