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Subject: Re: Meaningless Underpromotions

Author: Dave Gomboc

Date: 17:40:18 08/11/99

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On August 11, 1999 at 20:26:32, Ratko V Tomic wrote:

> > But speaking scientifically, what is high
> > value about something that is completely forged?
>
>For example, it is not so unusual that a graduate student
>forges data. That doesn't invalidate scientific work of
>his advisor, or the theory which the data confirmed.

It sure doesn't substantiate it.  I am actually surprised that you would say
that it isn't so unusual for a graduate student to forge data.

>There are performance i results pressures, real experiments
>require eliminating lots of spurious effects which mask the
>one person is looking for, and some people just can't resist
>the shortcuts. Who actually faked Pioneer project results
>(if that actually happened), I don't know, it could have
>been any programmer on the project.

It is well-documented, even see the ICCA Journal.

>Or it could have been even Botvinnik. After all, Mendel
>had faked results for his genetic inheritance experiments
>to get better agreement with his theory (which turned out
>to be a correct theory, it's just that in practice it was
>harder to confirm than he had patience for). To get funding
>scientists often exaggerate importance and sometimes even
>fake the results, or hand-pick data which fit better, not
>because they doubt their theory but because they cannot
>produce sufficently flashy results in a given time and
>given resources to attract the funding.

It was Botwinnik.  He did it for ~30 years.

>In case of Botvinnik's chess programming ideas, I think
>the main value is that he had condensed, through the years
>of in depth introspection, the algorithms of his own chess
>thinking. Given his caliber as a player, his general
>intellect and the years he put in his efforts of
>analysing and reporting his own mental algorithms, his
>"core dump," as it were, is worth much more than what
>someone tells psychologist in an interview, or what
>a much weaker player can glimpse at in his own mind.
>
>I think that once somene manages to capture fully
>those mental algorithms in a program (which his
>programmers with their modest resources and/or capabilities
>have failed to do), this program will be so much ahead
>of the rest of chess programs and human players, it
>will be comical to watch them try playing against it.

If someone managed to fully capture their mental process and imbue a computer
with it, computer chess would not be high on the list of interesting research.

Dave



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