Author: Peter McKenzie
Date: 16:31:50 05/08/02
Go up one level in this thread
On May 08, 2002 at 04:27:43, Amir Ban wrote: >On May 07, 2002 at 14:17:51, Uri Blass wrote: > >>On May 07, 2002 at 07:44:16, Amir Ban wrote: >> >>>On May 06, 2002 at 18:06:47, Christophe Theron wrote: >>> >>>>On May 06, 2002 at 15:34:01, Amir Ban wrote: >>>> >>>>>On May 05, 2002 at 19:58:09, Christophe Theron wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>>"Knowledge" in the sense of positional evaluation (that's what most people think >>>>>>about when they talk about knowledge) makes for 10% of the strength of a chess >>>>>>program. >>>>>> >>>>>>Chess is 90% about tactics (which is a concept close to "search"). >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>>Before strongly disagreeing (as I guess I will), what does this mean ? >>>>> >>>>>If I freeze my search engine and work only to improve the evaluation, how much >>>>>do you expect the total strength to improve ? Is it limited ? >>>> >>>> >>>>I expect the strength of your engine to improve, but not much in regard to the >>>>energy invested. Because you are going to focus your efforts on an area that >>>>does not have the biggest potential in strength. >>>> >>>>On the other hand people will love it more and more because it will have a much >>>>better playing style. >>>> >>>>People can forgive gross tactical blunders, but not slight positional mistakes. >>>>Go figure... >>>> >>>>Here I'm talking about current top engines of today, naturally. >>>> >>>>Building a chess engine with a broken evaluation to demonstrate that a better >>>>evaluation could improve it tremendously is not in the spirit of my idea. >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>>I understand that you are saying that it will change the style but overall >>>>>strength will not be much changed. >>>> >>>> >>>>I do not know exactly how far we will be able to go with the 10% I attribute to >>>>positional evaluation. >>>> >>>>I'm not saying it counts for nothing and that overall strength will not benefit >>>>from research in this area. >>>> >>>>I believe that the positional evaluation is the part of a chess program >>>>responsible for only 10% of the strength, and that the rest is done by the >>>>search. >>>> >>>>I believe that the positional evaluation is responsible for most of what people >>>>perceive as the "playing style". >>>> >>>>Now you can strongly disagree, I do not have the absolute truth. >>>> >>> >>>Ok. I think this is wrong. Anyway I'm working for a long time under the >>>assumption that it's the evaluation rather than the search that needs work. >>> >>>The search engine of Junior7 is basically the same as Junior6. >>> >>>Junior5 was the last engine where I did extensive work on the search. Since then >>>in terms of effort it was at least 80% evaluation, no more than 20% search. >>> >>>Amir >> >>I wonder how much of it is testing to find the right weights in your evaluation >>and how much of it is adding new evaluation functions. >> > >Hard to say because they belong to completely different mental processes. New >elements are part of a creative process, which is not something that can be >regulated. Adusting and testing is more routine and automatic. There's no reason >why they can't take place at the same time. > > >>I find that in the endgame there is knowledge in the evaluation that Junior does >>not have when part of the top programs and even part of the amaturs have it. >> >>Here is one example: >> >>Junior7 does not know that the following position is a draw >> > >Junior doesn't know about billions of positions that they are draws. I wish I >could reduce the number by just 20%. This particular case doesn't seem very >important. Strange as it may seem, but in my experience this ending comes up quite frequently. Of course frequently is a relative term, but I have seen it a number of times while watching programs play on ICC. One time, I was discussing this particular ending with Peter Kappler and bang, it occurred in a game one of us was observing!! Peter > >Amir > > >>[D]k7/8/8/8/p7/P7/PK3B2/8 w - - 0 1 >> >>Uri
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