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Subject: Re: Conspiracy numbers.

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 06:41:48 07/21/99

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On July 21, 1999 at 01:59:17, Vincent Diepeveen wrote:

>On July 21, 1999 at 01:22:41, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On July 20, 1999 at 18:10:59, José de Jesús García Ruvalcaba wrote:
>>
>>>	Could somebody please explain in simple (but accurate) words the essentials of
>>>conspiracy numbers search?
>>>	I know I can read the research papers from the Zugzwang team, but first I need
>>>something less dense.
>>>José.
>>
>>
>>The basic idea is to detect deep forcing lines.  The idea is this.  If you
>>reach a position P in the tree, and from that position you search a set of
>>moves leading to new positions...  how many of those successor moves actually
>>affect the current score?
>>
>>IE if the score is a result of only one move, then we consider this a forcing
>>position where there is no real chance to vary...  The term 'conspiracy' comes
>>from the idea of "how many positions below this position have to 'conspire'
>>together to change the score at this position?"  If changing the score of one
>>move changes this position, it is forcing.  If changing the score of many moves
>>doesn't affect this one, it is a 'quiet' position...
>>
>>There are other details, but that is the gist of why it might be useful...
>>Because at every node where the conspiracy number is low (only a few scores
>>have to change to change this position) we can search deeper since this is a
>>forcing position.  In positions where it takes a lot of changes below this
>>node to change the score at this node, we don't extend because it is not a
>>forcing position.
>>
>>When you think about it, it is a form of singular extension, a form of check
>>extension, a form of one-reply extension, etc...
>
>Not at all. It sees more than that. It sees variations very
>*little* possibilities, which SE never would detect.


"It is a form of" does not mean "it is identical to".  CNS will definitely
extend a move that SE would extend.  It can also extend lines SE would not
extend, _if_ you can afford the slow-down.



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