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Subject: Re: Is SSDF list level is now badly inflated?!

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 15:30:32 09/28/99

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On September 28, 1999 at 16:24:32, Gunnar Andersson wrote:

>On September 28, 1999 at 09:38:30, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>
>>
>>
>>I don't think this is the issue.  Here are some problems that have to be
>>overcome:
>>
>>1.  no "evaluation" can pick a good book move without a deep search to go
>>with it.  Why?  Because humans can't pick good book moves in most positions
>>without a lot of prior searching (done by others) to guide them.  Hence the
>>plethora of books like MCO, ECO, BCO, etc...
>
>My mistake - I referred to the program learning opening deviations using deep
>searches for alternative moves to the ones actually played in the database. For
>this to work out, the evaluation function must
>(a) be pretty good, or otherwise a huge search depth is needed
>(b) have a global interpretation, i.e. be comparable between game stages
>

that is doable, although I probably trust a human's "deep analysis" over a
computer's, because of the difference in depth.  IE I don't think there is a
computer in the world that can play decently at correspondence type time
controls yet...  maybe one day..



>The simple scheme "find best deviation for all database positions, then negamax
>entire game tree including deviations" gives extremely good results in the
>domain of Othello, considerably stronger than the other opening book schemes
>proposed.
>

without a doubt...  but then don't forget how narrow othello is compared to
chess in the opening...


>
>>
>>2.  frequency of play is not a good guideline in many cases, because a recent
>>refutation gets swamped by all the times it was played successfully in the
>>past.
>
>Indeed. Strong humans analyze enough games for this to be less of a factor, I
>suppose.

if they know you do this, it is just another source of trouble, as they will
look for very popular lines with a new 'bust'.. :)




>
>>
>>3.  opening theory has many outright mistakes that are waiting to get found.
>>At the highest levels of play, opening preparation is hugely important.  As of
>>now, computers are not good at doing this.
>
>Automatically searching for tactical refutations seems possible. A potential
>danger would of course be that the program doesn't understand the positional
>compensation the side with less material can have.
>
>/ Gunnar


that is always the issue... ie in gambit openings for example...



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