Author: Martin
Date: 06:03:33 02/18/00
Go up one level in this thread
On February 18, 2000 at 08:12:12, Robert Hyatt wrote: >On February 18, 2000 at 03:56:03, Mig wrote: > >> >>> >>> Personally I think they have tremendous public appeal. Man against machine .... >>> Remember Deep Blue and all the publicity and public interest that was >>> generated. I think the Sponsors/GM's are overlooking a big opportunity to cash >>> in by not playing against comps. But they have to have the courage to play. >>> The truth is time is running out on the select human GM club. They should belly >>> up to the bar while it is still open because closing time is getting closer >>> every day. >> >>What many people fail to understand is that many GMs actively dislike playing >>public games, even exhibition games, against computers. There are many different >>reasons and few stem from simply not wanting to lose. They lose to other humans >>all the time. One is that they don't enjoy the games nearly as much because the >>entire psychological element is gone. The exciting competitive drive is >>practically irrelevant, you just don't get as juiced up to play a machine. > > >I don't buy that. Log on to ICC and do a "search crafty <GM of your choice>". >If they don't like to play public games vs computers, what are all those games >against almost every active GM that are played on ICC in front of huge crowds? >Often 10-20-30 games at one sitting? With guys like Kamsky carrying on a >running kibitz session while playing? > >I agree they like the psychological aspects. But they play silicon _all_ the >time and so seem quite happy to do without that aspect of the game... > No, I think this argument doesn't go deep enough... The games you mention here are a sort of test-games, they don't "count". There's certainly a whole bunch of reasons why the (super) GMs don't like to play computers in RL tournaments. The main one has already been mentioned: they're afraid to lose reputation whch is on the stack when playing a "serious" game. It's interesting that now the participants of the Rebel-GM challenge are only "2nd class" GMs. Or do you think Mr Adams, Mr Piket, Mr Leko etc have even just *thought* about participating? They have seen what happened to Anand, got the impression that the very commercial treatment of the event had an unfair/unrespectful taste (unthinkable among top human players) and decided "no, thanks, I don't need that". Okay, Miss Polgar has played Fritz recently but there are a lot of GMs who are sure that she wouldn't be invited to big tourneys, if she wasn't a woman. They only don't say it aloud 'cos nobody can afford to become the bad guy. Except Kasparov. Read the recent interview with him at the KC site and you'll understand what her reputation among the top players is. (Nota Bene: Yes, I find some of his comments quite arrogant too but that's another story). Besides, players like Kasparov, Topalov, Kramnik, Anand don't like to play human 2500 tourneys either. If they win everybody shrugs and says "so what". They even cannot win many elo points. If they lose however, it's a big deal and they lose many points. The latter doesn't play a role in human-comp events but the mechanisms are very similar. You see what happens here. There are so many emotions involved. On the one hand this makes such events so attractive to the public, no doubt. But on the other there's always the danger to fall into bad ways, to get dragged through the mud - *outside* the chess board. So the fear to get involved into such a situation is *very* understandable. > >> >>Calling them chicken is beside the point. They have almost nothing to gain and >>since everyone still makes a big deal out of it when they lose, (Rebel - Anand, >>Garry - Deep Blue, etc.) there is only the money. So they play for the money and >>sometimes they don't. But saying, "just take your money and shut up" is >>demeaning. These guys are dedicated professionals playing a game they love and >>computers have nothing to do with why they love it. That's it. 100% agreement here. Martin >> >>Man against machine is a hot ticket and I hope we will continue to find players >>who are eager to play them. We might have to move to longer time controls, >>however. While several GMs told me Illescas played poorly, Adams is Adams and he >>was busted... >> >>Saludos, Mig >> >>mig@kasparovchess.com
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