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Subject: Re: Checkers: Las Vegas and Chinook

Author: Ingo Althofer

Date: 01:14:08 09/10/02

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Hello Martin,


>>... my main philosophy: To have done a thing first is worth more than
>>to repeat it in improved or refined ways.
>
>i think the misunderstanding is that when i say "nemesis' title is worth more
>than chinook's" i mean that nemesis plays checkers better, not that nemesis
>achieved more than chinook did.

Thanks for this clarification.

And with my limited background knowledge in Checkers I also believe that Nemesis
of today is probably better than the Chinook from 1996 or 1997. Of course,
"better" is a problematic term in the drawish world of Checkers. What I mean is
that I would happily accept the following bet, assuming a 100-game match between
Chinook and Nemesis:
I get 10,000 Euro when Nemesis achieves an overall win.
I lose 10,000 Euro when Chinook achieves an overall win.
Nothing is paid in case of an overall draw.


By the way, when I were Jonathan Schaeffer I would not put new energy in some
updating of Chinook (there are other more important tasks and challenges) but
simply allow a match between Nemesis-2002 and Chinook-1997, without any
modernization of Chinook... Just to see what progress has been made during the
years.

But, of course Jonathan and me are persons of rather different temper.


>e.g. i generated the 8-piece db myself, it is
>smaller than the chinook db, the access code is faster, and unlike the chinook
>db, it was correct on the first attempt. i know that their db building
>achievement is *much* bigger - without reading their paper, i could never have
>done it at all. but this does not change the fact that my db is better.

Db-building was only one part of the achievement of Schaeffer's group. What also
counts for Jonathan are his management qualities: he organized the whole
project, for (a small) instance he toured to get computer sponsoring. Successful
management is part of good science.

Ingo.



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