Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 15:15:34 01/20/00
Go up one level in this thread
On January 20, 2000 at 08:34:21, Graham Laight wrote: >Suppose that IBM could not get DB to work, so they decided to put a humming >black box in the Equitable building, and transmit the moves in from outside. The >moves would have been chosen by a team of IMs working with other chess >computers. > >Would the match referees have picked this up? > >As I understand it, there was only 1 referee, and he couldn't have been >everywhere all the time. Was there even a referee in the IBM team room? > >Let me state for the record that I do not believe that, in reality, IBM cheated. > >-g > >On January 18, 2000 at 21:51:54, Dann Corbit wrote: > >>Let's suppose the worst. IBM decided to cheat. Now, folks like Anand and >>Karpov are not going to risk a lifetime ban by doing something illegal. So it >>would pretty much have to be a lower-eschelon player. [Well, they could have >>crammed RJF into that box, but he would have been deathly afraid of a sinister >>plot, I'm afraid -- so I think we can rule that out also]. >> >>So what are we left with? How do you cheat against the world's best player (by >>a landslide?)??? >> >>You have some lower level GM who can be tempted and yet will *never* spill the >>beans (hmm -- it seems it would take millions to do that, but what if he put the >>money in a Swiss bank account and decided to write a book... Sounds a bit risky >>doesn't it) >> >>In short the cheater theories are idiotic. It does not work. Even if you could >>somehow pull it off, you would be sneaking in some high school track star to run >>against Michael Johnson. And then taking the ENORMOUS risk that for the rest of >>his life, he would keep his mouth shut. >> >>It's ludicrous. Insanely, bizarre. I can't imagine how such a foolish >>expression can even escape the lips of any intelligent, thinking person. >> >>But forget all that, and suppose that you somehow manage to have a very clever >>human (maybe we get a 2600GM who hates GK's intestines) to participate. The >>human says "Rxb2" and the computer says "a4." Whom do you believe? The GM >>can't outplay Kasparov -- we already know that. >> >>I will admit that having a super-GM in cahoots with Deep Blue *would* make a >>stronger pair -- if you had a few months to form a workable system and a few >>hundred games. But the risk is so enormous that only a great fool would believe >>an image conscious company like IBM would try a foolhardy thing like that. >> >>In short, I lose respect for any person who says they believe in that hokey >>"conspiracy" theory. First, the 'setup' was designed to prevent this. The SP was actually in a room in the hotel. No outside links of any kind (yes, there could have been a hidden RF link of course, for the conspiracy freaks). Second, there was a member of the neutral group (Ken Thompson was one) that was available at all times. Finally, access to the floor with the computer, or where the terminal was across from Kasparov, was severely limited and controlled, with an ID required to get close at all. But as has been mentioned, if there is a will, there is a way...
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