4 ms·

> It has to judiciously pick which places to look in the same way humans do There's a lot in that statement that can mislead. It has to "look" - that's true,

> It has to judiciously pick which places to look in the same way humans do There's a lot in that statement that can mislead. It has to "look" - that's true, AFAIK, and is super interesting. But that's not the same as a human. If AlphaStar is watching 5 points of interest on the map, there is basically no chance that it screws that up. For humans, that would involve bouncing between the minimap to commands (assuming we're not talking about hotkeyed locations), which invites lots of dexterity/accuracy issues, not to mention visual comprehension. Do you really think AlphaStar will have issues making out the blur of a cloaked observer? (for example). Consider some blink stalker micro - a human CAN select each unit as it's attacked and blink it to the back of the pack, keeping a steady rotation of fresh shields to tank the damage. But that is error prone, and even the best pros only do it in limited skirmishes. Not because of APM - it's not the raw clicks that are the problem - but because of accuracy and the opportunity costs of the attention. Alphastar won't have accuracy problems, and the opportunity costs of the attention are VERY different from the human costs. I think Alphastar is a great experiment, and I am glad they are cutting off some of the brute force advantages a program has vs a human opponent, but that's not the same as saying it is doing it "the same way humans do".

tempestn 7y ago
I suppose if they wanted to, they could pretty easily add a click accuracy limitation as well, and force it to work around that, as with APM and map view.
- baddox 7y ago
  My prediction is that no matter what limitations you add, some people will always reject the notion that a computer can be competitive with a human at anything that humans are perceived or expected to be uniquely good at. In chess, there were decades of resistance to the idea that computers were truly competitive the best human players in a "fair" match, even though that game has little or no physical component (I suspect this persists to this day). For some people, either there will be endless litigation of every tiny physical difference between the computer and human player that makes it "unfair," or the premise will just be abandoned and we'll hear things like "well, yeah, computers are great at RTS games, but RTS skill isn't really a sign of true intelligence."
  - ergothus 7y ago
    As the objector above, I feel the need to defend myself despite the lack of an attack :) I think you are correct. There will always be those people. I hope I don't fall among them - I raise the distinction about being "like" a human not because I think it's makes a good/bad qualitative difference, but because I'm hoping to avoid such comparisons. To me, far from proving it is "good" or "bad" at the game, AlphaStar is interesting for the behaviors it uncovers that are useful to humans. (example: AlphaStar overloaded workers - a strategy that had been discarded by almost all pro years before, and is now enjoying a reevaluation as a result). Paying attention to how the I/O is different matters to such elements, even if it is pointless in the comparison of "true intelligence". FWIW, when it comes to AI I have a more Minsky-view of things (in my limited understanding) and think that we're comparing apples and oranges without any awareness that its all fruit - we only KNOW apples. I think AlphaStar already has a better understanding of RTS than I do (low bar), even if we ignored the differences. That, however, isn't terribly exciting. AlphaStar showing us new tricks we can use - THAT'S interesting. (And now I want a segmented apple, dangit)
    - baddox 7y ago
      I think philosophically the idea of humans competing with computers comes down to balancing two sometimes opposing things: A) which types of skills are interesting to test, and B) which types of skills are inherently interesting for humans to have. For A, this comes up a lot in discussions about video game design and balance. Do we really want to be testing how good players are at detecting cloaked units or exactly counting groups of units in battles? I tend to think those aren't super interesting strategically, tactically, or mechanically. For B, there's a reason that human competitive weightlifting or sprinting is still interesting, even though everyone knows that machines could trivially win those competitions. Of course, those aren't really tasks that are considered primarily measures of intelligence (although, see Moravec's paradox). It's damn cool to see the limits of human ability stretched. Of course, questions about expensive gear, performance-enhancing drugs, and even prosthetics and cybernetics can already challenge our philosophy of what makes human competition "fair." We inherently want to test the inequalities of humans, both we're only interested in certain inequalities. Generally, we're interested in who can lift the most weight, not in who could take the most growth hormones without dying.

tempestn 7y ago

I suppose if they wanted to, they could pretty easily add a click accuracy limitation as well, and force it to work around that, as with APM and map view.

baddox 7y ago
My prediction is that no matter what limitations you add, some people will always reject the notion that a computer can be competitive with a human at anything that humans are perceived or expected to be uniquely good at. In chess, there were decades of resistance to the idea that computers were truly competitive the best human players in a "fair" match, even though that game has little or no physical component (I suspect this persists to this day). For some people, either there will be endless litigation of every tiny physical difference between the computer and human player that makes it "unfair," or the premise will just be abandoned and we'll hear things like "well, yeah, computers are great at RTS games, but RTS skill isn't really a sign of true intelligence."
- ergothus 7y ago
  As the objector above, I feel the need to defend myself despite the lack of an attack :) I think you are correct. There will always be those people. I hope I don't fall among them - I raise the distinction about being "like" a human not because I think it's makes a good/bad qualitative difference, but because I'm hoping to avoid such comparisons. To me, far from proving it is "good" or "bad" at the game, AlphaStar is interesting for the behaviors it uncovers that are useful to humans. (example: AlphaStar overloaded workers - a strategy that had been discarded by almost all pro years before, and is now enjoying a reevaluation as a result). Paying attention to how the I/O is different matters to such elements, even if it is pointless in the comparison of "true intelligence". FWIW, when it comes to AI I have a more Minsky-view of things (in my limited understanding) and think that we're comparing apples and oranges without any awareness that its all fruit - we only KNOW apples. I think AlphaStar already has a better understanding of RTS than I do (low bar), even if we ignored the differences. That, however, isn't terribly exciting. AlphaStar showing us new tricks we can use - THAT'S interesting. (And now I want a segmented apple, dangit)
  - baddox 7y ago
    I think philosophically the idea of humans competing with computers comes down to balancing two sometimes opposing things: A) which types of skills are interesting to test, and B) which types of skills are inherently interesting for humans to have. For A, this comes up a lot in discussions about video game design and balance. Do we really want to be testing how good players are at detecting cloaked units or exactly counting groups of units in battles? I tend to think those aren't super interesting strategically, tactically, or mechanically. For B, there's a reason that human competitive weightlifting or sprinting is still interesting, even though everyone knows that machines could trivially win those competitions. Of course, those aren't really tasks that are considered primarily measures of intelligence (although, see Moravec's paradox). It's damn cool to see the limits of human ability stretched. Of course, questions about expensive gear, performance-enhancing drugs, and even prosthetics and cybernetics can already challenge our philosophy of what makes human competition "fair." We inherently want to test the inequalities of humans, both we're only interested in certain inequalities. Generally, we're interested in who can lift the most weight, not in who could take the most growth hormones without dying.