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You skipped the best part of the story! > We [Chinook and the lead programmer] played an exhibition match against Marion Tinsley in 1991. And the computer tol

You skipped the best part of the story! > We [Chinook and the lead programmer] played an exhibition match against Marion Tinsley in 1991. And the computer told me to make this one particular move. When I made it, Tinsley immediately said, "You're going to regret that." > Not being a checkers player, I thought, "what does he know, my computer is looking 20 moves ahead." But a few moves later, the computer said that Tinsley had the advantage and a few moves after that I resigned. More details on this epic match from Wikipedia: > The lead programmer Jonathan Schaeffer looked back into the database and discovered that Tinsley picked the only strategy that could have defeated Chinook from that point and Tinsley was able to see the win 64 moves into the future. --- https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/science/short-history-ai-schooling-humans-games https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/science/short-history-ai-sc... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion_Tinsley https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion_Tinsley

thaumasiotes 4y ago
> and Tinsley was able to see the win 64 moves into the future. It's more likely that Tinsley was able to see a winning position much closer to the present than that, without bothering about the details of how exactly the winning position 6 turns in the future converted into an actual win 64 moves in the future.
- cupofpython 4y ago
  the point is that his winning position was a 64 move convert and he was correct. Lots of players believe they will end up in a winning position, but overlook something while "not bothering with the details". it's less about how much he calculated in that moment and more about the accuracy of his confidence and the work he had to have put in alongside his talent prior to that moment to achieve that confidence and back it up.
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    > it's less about how much he calculated in that moment and more about the accuracy of his confidence and the work he had to have put in That is a matter of opinion. Looking a certain number of "moves ahead" is an important metric in game engines and also something that human players will tell you that (1) they are consciously doing and that (2) is important to them. So it's worth discussing on its own terms.
    - Closi 4y ago
      Eh, sometimes you aren’t ‘looking ahead’ that many moves, just that you can calculate the number of moves from a known-winning position. This is why chess programs usually say “mate in 24” but humans would more likely just be looking a few moves ahead to get in a ‘winning position’ which they know is an eventual checkmate. I’m not good at chess, and don’t calculate more than 5 moves ahead, but have ‘spotted’ a mate 20 moves ahead just because you recognise that a certain position is winning even if you don’t know every single possible move and response.
      - thaumasiotes 4y ago
        How does your comment differ from my comment?
        Closi 4y ago
        I mean you don't actually have to 'look ahead' 65 moves to know that there is a winning move, even if that move is 65 moves ahead. You can just go 'this move is winning, and I can infer that because of these logical points'. This isn't really 'looking ahead x moves into the future', you can just know a position is winning and will cause a cascade of moves of a predictable-length that will end in an eventual checkmate. If you call this 'looking ahead x moves' or not depends on the definition I guess, but I just mean they might not be actually evaluating / imagining all those positions (because you can either use logic or pattern-match to previous situations).
        thaumasiotes 4y ago
        > I mean you don't actually have to 'look ahead' 65 moves to know that there is a winning move, even if that move is 65 moves ahead. > You can just go 'this move is winning, and I can infer that because of these logical points'. This isn't really 'looking ahead x moves into the future', you can just know a position is winning Yes, that's exactly what I said in my original comment.
    - cupofpython 4y ago
  - hosh 4y ago
    That sounds a lot like Go Seigan in the Go world. Dude was ahead of his time and developed a style of play that was remarkably similar to AlphaGo. His intuitions on the importance and usefulness of a position fueled his fighting ability.
    - astrange 4y ago
      Maybe his opponents were too confused by his name being Go.
      - hosh 4y ago
        Go is the Japanese reading of his Chinese name. He was born Chinese, and his surname is 五, the number “5”, pronounced Wu in Chinese and Go in Japanese. Not the same “Go” as in igo (… but the same “go” in “gomaku”, the game of five-in-a-row) His opponents who played him were sometimes mystified, though the reason often becomes clear many moves down the road. He was not afraid of starting complex fights, even ko fights, and the games often have huge swings in territory. He played in a way with great freedom. Opponents would play thinking they played a forcing move, only for Go Seigan to tenuki (play elsewhere on a board, often at strategically vital points). People have tried to replicate his style, but it is difficult to put into practice without Go Seigan’s reading skills.
        junar 4y ago
        His surname is 吳. Not only is it a different character from the one used to write 5, but it's also pronounced with a different tone in Chinese. Also, his given name contains the character 源, which is read "gen" in Japanese, not "gan". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Seigen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Seigen
        thaumasiotes 4y ago
        > Also, his given name contains the character 源, which is read "gen" in Japanese, not "gan". This may be way outside of your wheelhouse, but I have to ask - The Mandarin reading of 源 is yuán. The phonetics are something like [ʲyɛn]. A similar raising of the written vowel occurs in the pinyin syllable yan (e.g. 言, 严, 眼), which is [jɛn]. In other pinyin syllables, an "a" represents /a/, which is something sort of intermediate between the English PALM and TRAP vowels. It makes perfect theoretical sense that /a/ might be realized as [ɛ] when following a high vowel. But I've always wondered whether yuan and yan really do have a phonemic /a/ there or whether there might be an /ɛ/ phoneme. And it's interesting to me that the Japanese reading of 源, presumably taken from a much older Chinese, uses /e/ there instead of /a/. Can you provide any insight?
  - tetha 4y ago
    It also strongly depends on the branching factor. Like, if you're in a chess midgame, there might still 6 major pieces and 4 or 6 minor pieces and tons of pawns on the board. It's tricky to calculate far into the future. At each node, there's easily dozens of possible moves, and 4-8 viable or not-horrible ones. That's becoming a lot of possibilities to consider very quickly. In an endgame, there's like, 2 kings, 2 pieces and 4 pawns or a similar constellation. There's 6 possible moves, 3 of them immediately lose and 3 are worth thinking about. 2 of them probably only have one possible answer. Suddenly even an utter beginner like me can calculate 4-8 moves. A master-level player probably knows the endgame entirely, or can see 10 - 20 moves into it easily, because the branching factor is a lot lower now.
  - shitpostbot 4y ago
- whatshisface 4y ago
  People aren't like minimax, they can see 64 moves into the future if there's something about them that fits into a simple pattern.
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    Potentially. A ladder in go would match this description if the board was large enough. I stand by my comment. Note that the first quote agrees with me: > Not being a checkers player, I thought, "what does he know, my computer is looking 20 moves ahead." But a few moves later, the computer said that Tinsley had the advantage and a few moves after that I resigned. We know as a matter of literal truth that the computer is looking 20 moves ahead, but it doesn't need 44 moves to realize that it's losing, even though the other guy says that recognizing the win would require looking 64 moves ahead. That guy was wrong; recognizing the win didn't require looking 64 moves ahead. He just had trouble imagining other methods of recognizing a win.
    - lupire 4y ago
stiltzkin 4y ago
Clicky without AMP: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/short-history-ai-schooling-humans-games https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/short-history-ai-school... You are welcome.
xiaodai 4y ago
that's one hell of a story!

thaumasiotes 4y ago

> and Tinsley was able to see the win 64 moves into the future. It's more likely that Tinsley was able to see a winning position much closer to the present than that, without bothering about the details of how exactly the winning position 6 turns in the future converted into an actual win 64 moves in the future.

cupofpython 4y ago
the point is that his winning position was a 64 move convert and he was correct. Lots of players believe they will end up in a winning position, but overlook something while "not bothering with the details". it's less about how much he calculated in that moment and more about the accuracy of his confidence and the work he had to have put in alongside his talent prior to that moment to achieve that confidence and back it up.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago
  > it's less about how much he calculated in that moment and more about the accuracy of his confidence and the work he had to have put in That is a matter of opinion. Looking a certain number of "moves ahead" is an important metric in game engines and also something that human players will tell you that (1) they are consciously doing and that (2) is important to them. So it's worth discussing on its own terms.
  - Closi 4y ago
    Eh, sometimes you aren’t ‘looking ahead’ that many moves, just that you can calculate the number of moves from a known-winning position. This is why chess programs usually say “mate in 24” but humans would more likely just be looking a few moves ahead to get in a ‘winning position’ which they know is an eventual checkmate. I’m not good at chess, and don’t calculate more than 5 moves ahead, but have ‘spotted’ a mate 20 moves ahead just because you recognise that a certain position is winning even if you don’t know every single possible move and response.
    - thaumasiotes 4y ago
      How does your comment differ from my comment?
      - Closi 4y ago
        I mean you don't actually have to 'look ahead' 65 moves to know that there is a winning move, even if that move is 65 moves ahead. You can just go 'this move is winning, and I can infer that because of these logical points'. This isn't really 'looking ahead x moves into the future', you can just know a position is winning and will cause a cascade of moves of a predictable-length that will end in an eventual checkmate. If you call this 'looking ahead x moves' or not depends on the definition I guess, but I just mean they might not be actually evaluating / imagining all those positions (because you can either use logic or pattern-match to previous situations).
        thaumasiotes 4y ago
        > I mean you don't actually have to 'look ahead' 65 moves to know that there is a winning move, even if that move is 65 moves ahead. > You can just go 'this move is winning, and I can infer that because of these logical points'. This isn't really 'looking ahead x moves into the future', you can just know a position is winning Yes, that's exactly what I said in my original comment.
  - cupofpython 4y ago
- hosh 4y ago
  That sounds a lot like Go Seigan in the Go world. Dude was ahead of his time and developed a style of play that was remarkably similar to AlphaGo. His intuitions on the importance and usefulness of a position fueled his fighting ability.
  - astrange 4y ago
    Maybe his opponents were too confused by his name being Go.
    - hosh 4y ago
      Go is the Japanese reading of his Chinese name. He was born Chinese, and his surname is 五, the number “5”, pronounced Wu in Chinese and Go in Japanese. Not the same “Go” as in igo (… but the same “go” in “gomaku”, the game of five-in-a-row) His opponents who played him were sometimes mystified, though the reason often becomes clear many moves down the road. He was not afraid of starting complex fights, even ko fights, and the games often have huge swings in territory. He played in a way with great freedom. Opponents would play thinking they played a forcing move, only for Go Seigan to tenuki (play elsewhere on a board, often at strategically vital points). People have tried to replicate his style, but it is difficult to put into practice without Go Seigan’s reading skills.
      - junar 4y ago
        His surname is 吳. Not only is it a different character from the one used to write 5, but it's also pronounced with a different tone in Chinese. Also, his given name contains the character 源, which is read "gen" in Japanese, not "gan". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Seigen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Seigen
        thaumasiotes 4y ago
        > Also, his given name contains the character 源, which is read "gen" in Japanese, not "gan". This may be way outside of your wheelhouse, but I have to ask - The Mandarin reading of 源 is yuán. The phonetics are something like [ʲyɛn]. A similar raising of the written vowel occurs in the pinyin syllable yan (e.g. 言, 严, 眼), which is [jɛn]. In other pinyin syllables, an "a" represents /a/, which is something sort of intermediate between the English PALM and TRAP vowels. It makes perfect theoretical sense that /a/ might be realized as [ɛ] when following a high vowel. But I've always wondered whether yuan and yan really do have a phonemic /a/ there or whether there might be an /ɛ/ phoneme. And it's interesting to me that the Japanese reading of 源, presumably taken from a much older Chinese, uses /e/ there instead of /a/. Can you provide any insight?
- tetha 4y ago
  It also strongly depends on the branching factor. Like, if you're in a chess midgame, there might still 6 major pieces and 4 or 6 minor pieces and tons of pawns on the board. It's tricky to calculate far into the future. At each node, there's easily dozens of possible moves, and 4-8 viable or not-horrible ones. That's becoming a lot of possibilities to consider very quickly. In an endgame, there's like, 2 kings, 2 pieces and 4 pawns or a similar constellation. There's 6 possible moves, 3 of them immediately lose and 3 are worth thinking about. 2 of them probably only have one possible answer. Suddenly even an utter beginner like me can calculate 4-8 moves. A master-level player probably knows the endgame entirely, or can see 10 - 20 moves into it easily, because the branching factor is a lot lower now.
- shitpostbot 4y ago
whatshisface 4y ago
People aren't like minimax, they can see 64 moves into the future if there's something about them that fits into a simple pattern.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago
  Potentially. A ladder in go would match this description if the board was large enough. I stand by my comment. Note that the first quote agrees with me: > Not being a checkers player, I thought, "what does he know, my computer is looking 20 moves ahead." But a few moves later, the computer said that Tinsley had the advantage and a few moves after that I resigned. We know as a matter of literal truth that the computer is looking 20 moves ahead, but it doesn't need 44 moves to realize that it's losing, even though the other guy says that recognizing the win would require looking 64 moves ahead. That guy was wrong; recognizing the win didn't require looking 64 moves ahead. He just had trouble imagining other methods of recognizing a win.
  - lupire 4y ago

stiltzkin 4y ago

Clicky without AMP: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/short-history-ai-schooling-humans-games https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/short-history-ai-school... You are welcome.

xiaodai 4y ago

that's one hell of a story!