Author: Bob Durrett
Date: 10:24:18 12/02/02
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On December 02, 2002 at 12:00:13, Art Basham wrote: >Thanks...Very interesting! > >Maybe the problem is.. >every time a chess engine wins a game, >the programer thinks it is a "brilliant win"...etc...:=) > >Also, maybe "planning" was a poor word to use here... > >I rather think of it as "seeing" into the future, >and then, making it happen...:-) Predicting the future??? Hmmm. Well, as far as I know, no human has been able to do that with any degree of certainty. Perhaps you mean predicting the opponent's moves, after several intervening moves. Two people who play often together may be able to more or less accurately predict each others moves and plans, based on past history and knowledge of the other's style, preferences, etceteras, but not with absolute certainty. It does seem feasible to make predictions in terms of probabilities, in a manner similar to the way weather people predict the weather. A chess engine does work indirectly with probabilities, it seems to me. Generally, the engines ASSUME that the opponent will play the very best moves most of the time, assuming a very low probability of error. It remains a conceptually "simple" matter to find the lines where both the chess engine and it's opponent will play the best moves. Then these lines are deemed, by the chess engine, as being "most probable." [Since current chess programmers are all "win oriented" any way, this makes them happiest. : ) ] Incidentally, although off-topic, I should point out that this assumption is NOT valid for amateur human chess players. It is much more appropriate, IMHO, to anticipate "amateur errors & misunderstandings" in amateur chess than to assume perfect play. A true software emulator of human chess would have to take into account the imperfections of human chess, including the significant probabilities of human errors in the game. > >Maybe someday the computers will do just that! Who knows! As chess engines and computers get better, they will be able to increase the ply depth [for "best moves" lines] to much greater depths. This may require advancements in the methods for computer identification of "best moves" lines, although orders of magnitude increases in computer speed may be enough. I look for economical computers with many processors someday. Chess engine programming may become so difficult by that time that amateur programming will die out? : ) If trees of very long "best moves" lines can be produced, then the chess engines will SEEM to have their own magic crystal balls, seeing into the future. Of course, this will all fail when the humans do not play perfect chess. Predicting human chess performance may be difficult, especially if the humans are not World Champions. Note that I talk about "best moves" lines rather than "critical lines," since someone here, awhile back, corrected me by asserting that they are not the same thing, especially in the opening. Bob D. > >Art <snip>
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