Computer Chess Club Archives


Search

Terms

Messages

Subject: Re: Comet A.96 - Wcrafty15.20 20 games blitz match

Author: Nouveau

Date: 01:37:38 10/21/98

Go up one level in this thread



On October 20, 1998 at 12:13:16, Dann Corbit wrote:

>On October 20, 1998 at 10:37:36, Nouveau wrote:
>>On October 20, 1998 at 01:36:22, Jouni Uski wrote:
>>
>>>Here's result for 20 games match with 60/5 time limit (under Winboard):
>>>
>>>Comet    0.5 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0.5 0 0.5 1 0.5 0 1 0   = 8
>>>Wcrafty  0.5 1 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0.5 1 0.5 0 0.5 1 0 1   = 12
>>>
>>>So they are very close to each other in playing strength.
>>>
>>>Jouni
>>
>>12-8 is very close ??????????
>>
>>When can we say : Crafty is better than Comet ? 18-2 ?
>>
>>I don't understand these statistical stuff : I can't imagine a 12-8 result in a
>>match between 2 GM with a conclusion like "They are very close in playing
>>stregth".
>>
>>Why do we need hundreds, maybe thousands of games between computers to evaluate
>>relative strength, when few dozens are more than needed for human GMs ?
>Any strong conclusion from a single match is faulty.  It could be that Comet is
>500 points above Crafty, or 500 points below (although both of these are
>statistically very unlikely, really, very little has been demonstrated at this
>point from a single set of games).

Just imagine : the match between Kasparov and Chirov takes place and the result
is : Kasparov-Chirov = 12-8.
Maybe Kasparov is 500 points above Chirov or 500 points below...Show me any
chess magazine that would print such an affirmation.
I know, those chess journalists don't have a clue on science and stats ;o)

> The international chess bodies like FIDE
>have definitely got it right in the way that they perform evaluations using the
>ELO method.  Also, in requiring a long period of excellent results to become a
>GM.

Can someone make the math for this : a player has a 2600 level but no rating,
how many games against a 2500 opposition does he need to reach 2600 ?

>  I think, in general, statistics is not a strong point of chess programmers.
> Surely there are some who are experts, but I see a lot of very strange
>statements.
>
>In any scientific community, an experiment [read "match"] must be repeatable
>before any sort of conclusion can be reached. (Does anyone remember the name
>'Pons'?)

That's true if we consider that chess is science...has the "community" a strong
agreement on this ?

Jeff



This page took 0 seconds to execute

Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700

Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.