Computer Program/chess

[Hobo Joe]

And once again we prove that the human mind > computers?

Nowadays even a medium chess program running on a cheap computer can beat any human. Where's your superiority now?

Also, I'd like to see a human running all the calculation of a typical BA DSD 8v8 game, and then drawing what happens 30 times per second, with only his organic brain, his hands, a paper, a set of pencils, and an eraser.

Well I'd dip to the old clich├® and say - can a computer solve a crime or paint a masterpiece? I know you'll say that even most people wouldn't be able to do that and it's true, but the point I'm making is that computers aren't capable of independent thought, and their ability to perform tasks outside of their set of instructions is limited at best. Obviously this will improve over time, and only time will tell how far down that rabbit hole goes.

Even when computer will be superior to human mind in every aspect, there still will be people denying it, and claiming that the humand mind has such and such peculiarity that make it different and that computer can't have.

Maybe so, but there are people (myself included) who would put thoughts and feelings and art above pure mathematical and analytical power. What's the point of existing if there's no purpose like love/creation/emotion etc.? (weeee clich├®s)

Anyway, already/still nowadays there are people claiming, believing and trying to convince others, that humans have a "soul" that transcend matters, is immortal, was granted by God, and similar nonsense.

So yeah, computer are already superior to human in many aspects, will probably one day be superior in every aspect, but that won't prevent some humans to keep believing they're "specials".

What people believe is up to them, but yes, unless computers start to feel emotion and do human-like things I'll always consider humans superior, regardless of how 'smart' computers get.



Well this debate is certainly going places. We're already touching on morality and the soul and the meaning of life.

[KaiserJ]

Rybka v.2.2n2 - Vasik Rajlich (Czech Republic)

highest ELO on the wikipedia list : 3085 (64-bit 4CPU)

(i think the ELO is calculated against other computer opponents)

[zwzsg]

computers aren't capable of independent thought, and their ability to perform tasks outside of their set of instructions is limited at best.

Genetic Algorithms are old, and althought they're not that much used outside of research, they've still be proven to be able to find out solutions by themselves.

paint a masterpiece?

How do you define art, what is artistic, and what is not? I mean, personnaly, I find a computer-generated Julia's set more artistic than a Klein's monochrome, against art critics.

thoughts and feelings and art above pure mathematical and analytical power. What's the point of existing if there's no purpose like love/creation/emotion etc.?

Tell me, how do you know that beings other than yourself have independant thought, feelings, emotion, etc..?

When you meet another human, how do you know that he really feels emotions? How do you know he's got a human mind of his own?

If there was an android that could fake all external sign of having feelings and emotions and thought, how could you tell it's merely simulating and not experiencing the true thing?

Would you rate dolphins, octopus, ants, or dogs as intelligent beings or as having feelings? And if so (or not) on which ground?

I know of the Turing Test, but I bet you're kind of person that would counter with the Chinese Room argument.

My stand is that until reliable Voight-Kampff tests quit the realm of fiction, it is useless to wonder if machine could be as intelligent as human, cause anyway we would not be able to prove it indisputably.

[Gota]

Oo...
Humanity isnt a single person...
A single person cannot create an intelligent computer,hell it can hardly do anything...Humanity as a whole...why cant humanity create something that is smarter than a single person?It itself is much much smarter and superior.
We created computers to aid us in tasks we could not do.
We have computers both working in their own world,one we created in a way we could understand,and they work in the physical world as well,actually changing it..
Question is where do humans stop and machines begin.
Maybe instead of going on different branches we will merge technology into ourselves like we are doing now,augmenting our abilities.
Maybe one day "Technology" will become an actual physical part of us..
I dont see why in the future We would not be living with technology operating inside of us mimicking biological mechanisms or why communication will not eventually become telepathy blurring the line between what is human and what isnt.

What if we could access Wikipedia or Google within our mind?
Like you know the answer to 2+2 so will you know the answer to any question solved by humanity at the speed of thought...
A collective mind,much like humanity already possesses to a degree only faster,more fluid and more accessible.
I really don't think such things are that far away from us.
A few hundred years maybe?

[MidKnight]

Hobo Joe, define superiority. Right now, you seem to be equating the concept with skill in acting human, something that humans, being human, are natural experts in.

[Hobo Joe]

Oo...
Humanity isnt a single person...
A single person cannot create an intelligent computer,hell it can hardly do anything...Humanity as a whole...why cant humanity create something that is smarter than a single person?It itself is much much smarter and superior.
We created computers to aid us in tasks we could not do.
We have computers both working in their own world,one we created in a way we could understand,and they work in the physical world as well,actually changing it..
Question is where do humans stop and machines begin.
Maybe instead of going on different branches we will merge technology into ourselves like we are doing now,augmenting our abilities.
Maybe one day "Technology" will become an actual physical part of us..
I dont see why in the future We would not be living with technology operating inside of us mimicking biological mechanisms or why communication will not eventually become telepathy blurring the line between what is human and what isnt.

What if we could access Wikipedia or Google within our mind?
Like you know the answer to 2+2 so will you know the answer to any question solved by humanity at the speed of thought...
A collective mind,much like humanity already possesses to a degree only faster,more fluid and more accessible.
I really don't think such things are that far away from us.
A few hundred years maybe?

Imagine the possibilities.

Hobo Joe, define superiority. Right now, you seem to be equating the concept with skill in acting human, something that humans, being human, are natural experts in.

Don't really have one, intelligence, aptitude, emotion, they're all pretty grey areas to try to tack definitions onto. I'd say it's fairly subjective.

[Argh]

It's a physical limitation, not matter how far in the future, no matter how powerful computers will be, this universe is too limited to evaluate all chess states.

You simply don't need to do so. Most moves go down blind alleys and can be reliably shown to lead to a bad state after moving down the timeline through only a few states. Ultimately, the solution lies with figuring out what a bad state is, which is where most of the effort goes. It's one of those problems where we'll probably see a sudden breakthrough, and then it'll resolve itself rapidly.

On all the human-vs-computer stuff... I guess my response is that chess is one of the worst areas to compare humans and machines.

Chess is algorithmic, and will be solved.

It doesn't involve any bluffing or chance or any fuzzy logic at all. It's straightforward state mechanics, if I do ABC, I win, you lose.

Moreover, I feel that people's perception of the meaning of the problem is really incorrect. It's not a demonstration of "artificial intelligence" in any meaningful way, nor of "machines being superior to people". The algorithms that will be used will have come from human brains, not from the machine that executes them and provides the roadmap to the perfect game.

In short, it will be a demonstration that smart people who spent decades working on better algorithms and better hardware are able to solve a very complex problem with the aid of a very fast calculator, not that machines are 'smart'.

It's not remotely equivalent to a Turing Test. My guess is that we'll have solved chess long before we see a machine consistently pass a Turing Test.

[SwiftSpear]

I mean being able to completely calculate all possibilities and moves from any position.

No, there isn't.

[Argh]

...and there probably won't ever be one, either, because that does hit that computational barrier really fast.

[SwiftSpear]

...and there probably won't ever be one, either, because that does hit that computational barrier really fast.

Nah, there is a finate realm of possible moves. Given enough time and enough computational power, it can be mapped.

[Caydr]

I don't see how you worked bluffing into chess. Sure you can lure them into a false sense of security but it is never a real bluff as all the information in the game is available. As it has complete information I think there is an optimal response to every move.

Look on the bright side. If chess is solved everyone can move on to Go.

Bluffing is the act of deceiving someone into feeling a false sense of security or insecurity, and chess has a very real psychological element to it. Some of the most famous recorded games of all time involve manipulation of the other player's perception.

[Teutooni]

You don't need to be able calculate all possible chess branches to beat a grand master.

dont get in in the 1990s there were already progs winning world champs...Were in 2010 with much more powerful computers and we still dont have a prog that can calculate the game out completely?

No.

The total number of valid game paths (you do a move, your opponent moves in response, etc.) in chess is somewhere in the order of 10^120. If you had a computer that could calculate ten billion (10^10) moves per second, your program would still take 10^110 seconds to evaluate them all.

The age of the universe (~14 billion years) is roughly 4.4*10^16 seconds. Still think it's possible?

I heard quantum algorithms can offer more than polynomial speedup on certain problems. I don't know much about chess AIs or quantum computing, but I think it's too early to say even such insane tasks cannot be done as calculating every possible branch in chess.

[Gota]

yo never say never.

[TradeMark]

is there some site where i can see best moves for chess so i dont have to think when i play chess? would be useful... like some book, you just read next move there

[zwzsg]

There's plenty of book about chess openings. But any competent chess player would have read them already.

Scorpion-Horus Gambit of the Caro-Kann Defence, I chose you!
/me casts 1.e4 c6 2.Nc3 d5 3.d3 dxe4 4.Bg5

[hoijui]

if you de-cap a human brain from all its sensory input, from the start (first cell), making sure it gets the resources it needs to grow/function, will there be independent though inside of it?

more knowledge can make you more stupid. most simple example:
watching telle-tubbies 24/7
this is the case for all knowledge, though there are a lot of factors that matter here of course: how much, how fast, sleep?, stress, food, knowledge composition, presentaiton, distraction, ...

[KaiserJ]

i think that a comdrop can be interpreted as a variation of kasparov's gambit.

bluffing i would say plays a fairly large part of chess once you've reached a certain level... sure, both players will be thinking many moves ahead, but neither of them know exactly what the others plan is, and there's no way to keep every possible move in your head...

[TradeMark]

i think when people get smart enough, it doesnt matter do you play rock-paper-scissors or chess. The outcome is the same; you win by guessing, and when both are equal in their epic smartness, it doesnt matter how fucking smart you are anymore...

I would say people will play more rock-paper-scissors than chess at year 3000... its like speedball when you play rock-paper-scissors; really short games and lots of action, instead of long boring game that you win by luck anyways.

[CarRepairer]

I would say people will play more rock-paper-scissors than chess at year 3000... its like speedball when you play rock-paper-scissors; really short games and lots of action, instead of long boring game that you win by luck anyways.

Uh.. you.. uh.. errr.... um. uh. er. ugh.

[JohannesH]

more knowledge can make you more stupid. most simple example:
watching telle-tubbies 24/7

you sure?