Author: Charles Roberson
Date: 12:35:18 01/30/03
Many times masters claim a program is lost and then the program pulls through
just in time. The masters claim that they relaxed and did not play correctly
to pull off the win. I've seen this happen many times. My program has beaten
masters, an SM and one GM occasionally. I believe that certain "lost
positions" are just beyond the current understanding of chess.
Humans have evolved their chess skill over time to a considerable degree.
I think the human level of chess understanding is approaching a
quantum jump. Computers are pushing the GM's to reassess their chess.
Dr. Max Euwe wrote a book published in 1966 and republished in english
in 1968. The title is "The Development of Chess Style". In this book, Euwe
argues that each human learns in the same progression has humanity has
learned. Also, he delineates the stages of development thus showing the
quantum jumps in human chess understanding. I believe that computers are
pushing humans to learn more. Too many times computers "get lucky".
The book delineates these stages:
1) The days of Grecko 1600?-1634? -- elaborate piece excursions.
2) The discovery of pawns -- Philidor,1726 - 1795
3) Long live the combination -- Anderssen, 1818 - 1879
4) Combination for Strategic ends -- Morphy, 1837 - 1884
5) Positional play -- Steinitz, 1836 -- 1900
6) Technique and Routine -- The Virtuosi, 1900 - 1914.
Here he discusses Capablanca and others of the period
7) The independent thinkers -- 1919 - 1940
8) New thirst for battle -- the russian school: 1945 to Present day
(1966).
There was the time of the Karpov-Kasparov matches where most GM's would
say that the play was vastly ahead of their own. But before that, there
was Fischer. He would dissapper from chess and study. Then he would come
back stronger than before. In fact, during the world championship
qualifiers -- Fischer shut out his first match opponent. The russian
government took away the man's master title, because no GM can shut out
another thus he must not be a GM. Fischer went on to shut out his next
opponent as well. The russians gave their man his GM title back.
So, there have been several improvements in human chess understanding over
time and there have been atleast two quantum jumps since the 1960's. I
beleive we are about to see another. This time the driver is a the
unconventional play of computers.
Charles
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