Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 10:46:20 07/15/02
Go up one level in this thread
On July 15, 2002 at 13:37:23, Russell Reagan wrote: >On July 15, 2002 at 10:59:59, Gian-Carlo Pascutto wrote: > >>I am objecting to the claim that what played in Maastricht was not >>the best (= strongest, unless your name is Mig) version. IMHO this >>is insulting to the people who played Fritz, err, Quest. > >You can only speak for yourself Gian-Carlo. If you played Quest and you are >insulted by the claim that they didn't put their best forward, fine. Chessbase, >having a financial interest in all of this, is going to do whatever is in the >best interest to them financially in the long term. If that means not "showing >your hand" at the world championship in hopes of gaining any advantage in the >Kramnik match, it wouldn't suprise me if the WCCC Quest wasn't the strongest >Fritz. > >Personally, I don't think it would have any bearing on the outcome of the >Kramnik match, but Chessbase might not want to take that chance. If that is >important to them, then why is it so unreasonable to even consider the >possibility that it *MIGHT* have happened? > >The bottom line is that until someone who knows _FOR SURE_ speaks on this, >neither you or I or anyone else's opinion means anything. What is wrong with Mig >saying, "This is what I think..."? Why do you find the need to take exception >with everything he says just because IF he is right it would mean that someone's >games against Quest weren't as meaningful? I don't see the logic in that >thinking. That's like Amir Ban feeling insulted because he has to play Sjeng >just because he happens to think it's no match for Junior (I have no idea what >Amir thinks about Sjeng, it's just an example, don't get all bent out of shape >about it). Why would you feel insulted because you played (maybe!) a weaker >version of Fritz? My thinking is that if your intention is to do as well as >possible in the event that you would feel thankful that you were given the >opportunity to play a slightly weaker opponent. I guess some people just like to >take offense with anything that anyone says and take the negative view of >things. > >In short, I think you're acting like a child. You seem to be throwing a fit >about something that you don't know to be true or false. You sound like a >whining GM who is demanding his opponent move his king into a mate in 1 because >his opponent sneezed and accidentally touched his king. That isn't the intention >of the "touch rule" in chess, and you seem to be complaining about something >equally ridiculous, especially considering the fact that you don't know whether >Quest was the "best Fritz" or not. The programmer himself already has said that the reason for the name change is purely marketing. Personally, I believe that they played the games with the very best, whatever that was. I suspect that the preparations for Kramnik are mostly book cooking. For instance, Kramnik has less than a thousand games played in his lifetime. You can divide those into the distinct moves that he has ever played and do the following: Analyze every position at ten minutes or so to look for holes or traps that he might fall into. For his favorite openings (perhaps the top ten) analyze the major trace routes at one hour per position. With data like that, I feel sure that they can sneak a victory or two. A world championship will look just as good on their box as a victory over Kramnik. Can you seriously believe that they will play with a detuned version of their engine? I believe that the probability of that is zero. That's only because there is no such thing as a negative probability. They certainly did not give out copies of the binary. I think that they have risked nothing at all by playing their best version. In short, I think what we see is typical marketing. I do not blame ChessBase for it either, as though it were out of the ordinary. Each an every chess company will do exactly the same thing in the same shoes.
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