Mankind pull ahead of the most powerful computer

Black M5 · 7th October 2002, 14:09

World chess Champion Vladimir Kramnik scored a point for man kind yesterday in the second of eight matches against the world's most powerful computer chess program.

The program, dubbed Deep Fritz, resigned from the game after almost six hours and 57 moves at the event, which was held at the Bahrain Mindsports centre in Bahrain.

This brings the score so far to one and a half point for Kramnik and half a point for Deep Fritz. Kramnik and Deep fritz drew in their first match on friday.

The man versus Machine, Brains in Bahrain chess championship is being held under the patronage of his Majesty the King.

In a press conference folowing the epic match, Kramnik said he would not be resting on his laurels. "Its nice to take the lead but there is no reason to start celebrating" he obeserved. He said he was confident of victory in the final minutes of the match.

"It made little difference what move the computer made. At that point i was not thinking about playing and enjoying the match. I was thinking about how to win."

Kramnik said that it was difficult at times for him to adjust to the computer's way of playing. "It used some strange tactics that only a computer could come up with" he said. "Sometimes i couldn't find out what was behind it's moves." But towards the end, Deep Fritz found itself unable to keep up with Kramnik.

"The endgame might have been played better by a human being because it required long variations, which human beings are better at than computers." he added

Kramnik will play his third match against Deep Fritz tomorrow. matches will also be held on thursday, sunday, October 15, 17 and 19. It will begin at 3pm local time (8am est..12pm GMT) on each day.

The stakes are high, with a $1 million prize on offer for Kramnik if he wins and $700,000 for a draw. An estimated 100 million world wide are following the contest on TV or live on the internet website www.brainsinbahrain.com

In each game Kramnik and deep Fritz each have up to three hours to make their moves. They each have to make a min of 40 moves in the first two hours and a min of 16 moves in the last hour.

Kramnik sits behind a real chess board in a room with five cameras and three cameramen. There is a fourth man in the room to make Deep Fritz's moves.

Go Humans...

adegiulio · 7th October 2002, 15:39

I played tic-tac-toe against the Nav computer in my 2001 M5 and won 10 out of 10 times....

tfung · 7th October 2002, 15:51

very interesting.. I followed the last computer match with Deep Blue... I wonder what the differences between this computer and that one..... there doesn't seem to be much info on Deep Fritz.. so I guess it might not be as powerful as Deep Blue

Ben_FR · 7th October 2002, 20:49

I knew someone who built a computer program similar to Deep Blue that played chess. Basically, the program would look something like 9 or 10 moves ahead, and then make a move that would take into account the best possible move of the opponent. Given that each player starts out with an equal probability of winning, you need to make these assumptions about a scenario if the computer doesn't win:

1. The human player can mentally iterate all possiblities for greater than the number of moves the computer calculates.

2. There are many moves that the computer see as equally good so it randomly picks one, but the human player is able to detect which one is better.

Honestly, I don't understand how a human can beat a computer if the computer can look ahead 10 moves. Looking out 10 moves, there must be billions of possible combinations of play. I don't understand how the computer could lose if it could choose an optimal strategy.

Anyone with insight into chess and/or programming?

-Ben FR

de Witt · 7th October 2002, 21:07

Not sure on the programming, but I would also have to believe that a computer with a high FLOPS rating could definetly beat a human at a chess match. If the computer can somehow take the information, compute all possible moves and act on it in a short period of time, the computer should win. I wonder how much of a difference it makes if the computer is black or white? Maybe it would be better for the computer to go second, after it has an input?

Still it is a feat of human ability. A computer is able to take strings of 10101's that are x^128 long (128 bit), and subtract and add them in an instant. The computer has an obvious edge....so my hat is off to Vladimir.

-MVI- · 7th October 2002, 22:56

The computer is only as good as the programmer that made the program.

Computer can calculate every possible move in a short time, which I think is almost impossible for a human brain to do, but at the same time the program has to anticipate the human opponent and it makes the best logical move based on the assumed best logical move of the opponent.

Here comes the big problem, the human opponent can choose not to make the best logical move at that situation and the program has to re-calculate its whole stragegy again.

Finality · 7th October 2002, 23:22

If any of you follow the events of Kasparov vs Big Blue you would know that Kasparov really should not have lost.

Essentially between the matches they where allowed to re-program Big Blue to combat Kasparovs style hence the reason he lost. There where some other irregularities that where not allowed in the Bahrain tournament hence human superiority

tfung · 7th October 2002, 23:29

I don't see anything wrong with reprogramming Deep Blue when it was up against kasparov... a human can rethink his strategy against his or her opponent during the breaks.. so why can't the computer?

Finality · 8th October 2002, 00:13

Quote:

Originally posted by tfung
I don't see anything wrong with reprogramming Deep Blue when it was up against kasparov... a human can rethink his strategy against his or her opponent during the breaks.. so why can't the computer?

What was happening is they where bringing in chess experts to counteract Kasparovs moves ie pre-planning for the first X moves do this etc. It was more than just a simple change of code (which would be acceptable). Basically Big Blue for all its power was no match for Kasparov in the form it was originally programmed for.

Hence they retired it from players straight after the match. Though I understand they bought it out of mothballs recently?

Black M5 · 8th October 2002, 18:19

Quote:

Originally posted by tfung
there doesn't seem to be much info on Deep Fritz.. so I guess it might not be as powerful as Deep Blue

I know there isn't alot of info on this site but i did a little search on one of our local papers www.gulf-daily-news.com and found this..

"WORLD Chess Champion Vladimir Kramnik arrived in Bahrain last night, ahead of his epic battle against Deep Fritz - the world's most powerful computer chess program."

"Deep Fritz, designed by German company Chess Base, can play over 3m moves per second."

"The match is a straight duel between World Classical Chess Champion Vladimir Kramnik and a powerful eight parallel-processor computer, running the highest rated computer chess programme Deep Fritz, which was designed by ChessBase of Hamburg."

I found this on the BBC site too "I want to prove that the human brain is worth something" -Vladimir Kramnik

I wonder what happened in today's match. Still no updates