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Subject: Re: Thanks Terry and Richard!

Author: Chessfun

Date: 08:32:05 04/15/04

Go up one level in this thread


On April 15, 2004 at 10:30:19, Stephen Ham wrote:

>On April 14, 2004 at 20:46:20, Sam Lloyd wrote:
>
>>On April 14, 2004 at 11:12:08, Stephen Ham wrote:
>>
>>>Hi Terry,
>>>
>>>I agree with you and am glad that 13 a3! interests you as well.
>>>
>>>As you know, I'm a correspondnece chess player with a technical style of play
>>>(tactics aren't my strength - especially against machines!). So I've had fun
>>>testing engines to see if any of them will select my purely human moves. So far,
>>>there's been very little acceptance of my positional/technical move tests by the
>>>engines. The closest correlation seems to be with Rebel 12. In one of my tests,
>>>it was the only engine to select the move that I played. When I fed my move into
>>>the other engines that didn't select my move, their evaluations eventually rose
>>>to a favorable figure. So it's clear that engines in general won't find the
>>>"positional" moves that I think are best. But when forced to play the move, they
>>>eventually learn to like the resulting positions, although the evaluation may
>>>not be as high as the original PV for that engine.
>>>
>>>So I think it would be fun for you and other engine experts to test 13 a3! to
>>>see if any engine selects it. Since the justifications behind 13 a3! are deep
>>>(they certainly are for humans), you may need to allow 24-hours or so for the
>>>test.
>>>
>>>Thanks again for mentioning this game, Terry. It is indseed rich in test
>>>positions, both tactically and of a positional/technical nature. I'll try to
>>>Rebel 12 on this position and will report what it selects.
>>>
>>>Stephen
>>>
>>Rebel 12 finds 13. a3 instantly, and stays with it.
>>
>>Hiarcs 9 takes a little longer, but as I suspected found 13. a3 and stays with
>>it as well.
>>
>>My hardware is prehistoric by todays standards. P-III 500 128MB RAM with 64MB
>>for HTs.
>>
>>Hiarcs 9 - McCracken,T
>>[D]r1bq1rk1/3nbppp/2n1p3/2ppP3/pp3B1P/3P1NP1/PPP2PB1/R2QRNK1 w - - 0 1
>>
>>Analysis by Hiarcs 9:
>>
>>13.Qd2 a3
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 1/2   00:00:00
>>13.Qd2 Bb7 14.c3
>>  ³  (-0.63)   Depth: 2/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 2/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 2/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 3/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 4/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 5/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 6/6   00:00:00
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 7/8   00:00:00  1kN
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 8/8   00:00:00  1kN
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra8 17.Bb2 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.44)   Depth: 9/12   00:00:00  4kN
>>13.h5 f6 14.exf6 Rxf6 15.Qe2 a3 16.b3 Nb6 17.Ne5 Nxe5 18.Bxe5
>>  ³  (-0.43)   Depth: 10/26   00:00:58  2162kN
>>13.h5 a3 14.bxa3 Rxa3 15.h6 g6 16.Bc1 Ra5 17.Bb2 Bg5 18.Nxg5 Qxg5 19.c4
>>  ³  (-0.56)   Depth: 11/27   00:02:24  5363kN
>>13.a3 Bb7
>>  ³  (-0.55)   Depth: 11/27   00:03:13  7211kN
>>13.a3 bxa3 14.bxa3 Ba6 15.h5 c4 16.h6 g5 17.Nxg5 Bxg5 18.Qg4 Ncxe5 19.Qxg5+
>>  ³  (-0.46)   Depth: 11/28   00:04:38  10347kN
>>13.a3 bxa3 14.bxa3 Rb8 15.c4 Nb6 16.Ne3 Na5 17.Rb1 Nb3 18.Nd2 dxc4 19.Ndxc4 Ba6
>>  ³  (-0.32)   Depth: 12/30   00:12:30  28289kN
>>13.a3 bxa3 14.bxa3 Re8 15.c4 Nb6 16.Ne3 Rb8 17.Rb1
>>  ³  (-0.29)   Depth: 13/37   00:37:12  83484kN
>>
>>(McCracken, None 14.04.2004)
>>
>>Terry
>
>Thanks, Terry and Richard, for running those tests. I confess that I'm amazed by
>the results. Both you, with Rebel and Hiarcs, and Richard's Baron found 13 a3. I
>must admit that if I had to bet money, I would have bet against any engine,
>other than possibly Rebel, in finding 13 a3. And I would have bet that Rebel
>would require overnight analysis to find it. Again, the results are astounding.
>
>What's interesting too is that these engines, while finding the best move,
>probably don't comprehend the position very well, since they all seem to give a
>very slight edge to Black. Instead, most humans, especially after seeing the
>motifs in the Fischer game and similar motifs in the Closed Sicilian, would
>favor White with a clear advantage.
>
>Perhaps this is yet another example of engines finding the correct move, but
>their evaluations are wrong. I see this with Shredder all the time.

Then it should be no surprise to you that Shredder 8 also finds the move:

XP 2600+ 64 Mb

New game
r1bq1rk1/3nbppp/2n1p3/2ppP3/pp3B1P/3P1NP1/PPP2PB1/R2QRNK1 w - - 0 1

Analysis by Shredder 8:
1.a3 Bb7 2.axb4 cxb4 3.d4 a3 4.Ra2 Ba6 5.Qd2 Qb6
  ³  (-0.36)   Depth: 9/24   00:00:00  200kN
1.a3 Qb6 2.axb4 cxb4 3.Be3 Qa5 4.d4 Ba6 5.Bg5 Rac8 6.c4 bxc3 7.Bxe7 Nxe7 8.Rxa4
  ³  (-0.33)   Depth: 10/27   00:00:01  504kN
1.a3 Bb7 2.axb4 cxb4 3.h5 a3 4.h6 axb2 5.Rxa8 Qxa8 6.hxg7 Kxg7
  ³  (-0.28)   Depth: 11/29   00:00:05  1530kN
1.a3 bxa3 2.bxa3 Rb8 3.c4 Rb3 4.N3d2 Rxd3 5.Qxa4 Bb7 6.cxd5 Qa8 7.Qxa8
  ³  (-0.28)   Depth: 12/32   00:00:09  2895kN
1.a3 Qb6 2.h5 h6 3.c4 Qa5 4.cxd5 exd5 5.e6 b3 6.exd7 Qc3 7.bxc3
  ³  (-0.27)   Depth: 13/34   00:00:19  6142kN
1.a3 Bb7 2.h5 h6 3.c3 Qa5 4.cxb4 Qb6 5.bxc5 Bxc5 6.Qc2 Rac8 7.Rac1 Qb5
  =  (-0.24)   Depth: 14/34   00:00:38  11793kN
1.a3 Qb6 2.Qd2 f6 3.exf6 Bxf6 4.c3 e5 5.Be3 d4 6.Bg5 Bb7 7.Bxf6 Rxf6 8.axb4 dxc3
9.bxc5
  ³  (-0.28)   Depth: 15/37   00:01:12  20540kN
1.a3 Qb6 2.Ne3 Ba6 3.axb4 Qxb4 4.Rb1 Rfb8 5.Qc1 Qa5 6.c4 Nb4 7.Qd2 Qc7 8.cxd5
exd5
  =  (-0.24)   Depth: 16/39   00:02:54  51981kN

Sarah.




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