Author: Stephen Ham
Date: 13:20:39 12/06/02
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On December 06, 2002 at 13:07:32, Gian-Carlo Pascutto wrote: >On December 06, 2002 at 12:56:18, Stephen Ham wrote: > >>This was interesting, although the question is vague. For example, I don't use >>any chess engines to analyse during my games; I find my own moves. However, I >>use Nimzo 7.32 to blunder check to ensure I'm not hanging material >>(unknowingly!) before posting the move. > >So if you find out that you did, you alter your move. This is effectively >using Nimzo for analysis during the game. IMHO saying you find your own >moves is hypocrisy. > >The poll is largely based by the popularity of the engine, not it's >qualities. You won't pick ... as your favorite analysis engine if you >never owned it. > >-- Dear Gian-Carlo, You may indeed be correct...I might be a hypocrite. I inittially struggled with the morality of blunder checking. To date, blunder checking hasn't found any blunder and so I haven't altered any of my moves. Still, it's inevitable that it will happen. Yes, when it does happen, I will then change my move. Still, I see that act as being different than a person who uses a chess-engine to assist them with their analyses. That person seems to be somewhat dependent upon the computer with every move. Instead, every move I play is mine and I may actually only "need" the computer to alter my move once in several thousand moves. My point, although it's admitedly a weak one, is that the influence of a chess engine upon my CC games is minimal. Still, it's influence does exist - I admit that. What do I get in exchange for blunder checking? It's peace of mind. I do my chess analysis late at night after my wife and kids go to bed. That means I'm often tired and probably not in a mentally ideal situation. So when I send my own move, after first blunder checking for a couple minutes to ensure that I won't immediately lose material that I didn't know about, I can then then sleep at night. I now know that my last move, if it was a blunder, wasn't a material losing blunder caused by my own fatigue. This enables me to enjoy CC again. I no longer have to worry about ruining a fine position that I've worked so hard to create, through some hideous oversight. On a side note, Gian-Carlo, I have no moral problem with those who do indeed use their computers to assist them with every move. It's not for me (where's the fun in that?), but I don't have any moral issues with my opponents doing that. In fact, I believe that many of them do. Many of us play CC in order to try to play "perfect" chess, hence I can understand when the computer is used as a tool toward this goal. Instead, the only computer use that I condemn and pity is when the human is merely a "postman." Then he's 100% dependent upon the machine for move generation, thus rendering the human a passive lackey for the machine. I suspect that most "postmen" don't advance very far in CC, partly because the machines are still not 100% reliable in CC, and also because it must be depressing to the human to play in such a joyless fashion. All the best, Stephen
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