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Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

zdnet.com

21–30 of 75 posts

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#21
"You can win 6, 12 or 24 months of membership to AiGameDev.com PREMIUM if you place third, second and first in the contest respectively. We'll also provide any single person team that ranks higher than our official bot three months of AiGameDev.com PLUS — our brand-new part of the site that launched last week."

he must be excited. until google puts out non-trivial problem sets and offers non-trivial prizes i'll save my upvotes and cycles.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#22
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't believe this Reddit quality comment is getting any upvotes. Google AI Challenge is "Yet Another Contest"? Though you may not be surprised, he is, http://quotenil.com/Planet-Wars-Post-Mortem.html/ .

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp.

The point the guy himself makes is that lisp allows him to be a great programmer.

Of course the program could be rewritten into qbasic. It is getting your ideas and thoughts into a form that is not a compromise to the language which matters.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#23
post #20
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp.

It's far from clear which way the causality runs.

Well, the 33 lisp entrants don't appear to hold the top 33 spots:

http://ai-contest.com/language_profile.php?lang=Lisp

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#24
post #23
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's far from clear which way the causality runs.

Well, the 33 lisp entrants don't appear to hold the top 33 spots: http://ai-contest.com/language_profile.php?lang=Lisp

So more than a fifth of the lisp entries are in the bottom twentyfifth of the competition. So you could also use the contest results to argue that lisp is five times worse for AI than the average language.

(Or, rather, that language alone doesn't guarantee success, but that would be too rational and boring for an online forum).

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#25
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't believe this Reddit quality comment is getting any upvotes. Google AI Challenge is "Yet Another Contest"? Though you may not be surprised, he is, http://quotenil.com/Planet-Wars-Post-Mortem.html/ .

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp.

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp.

Given that people have argued that the absence of Lisp winners from such competitions is evidence against Lisp's greatness (I'm going by memory here and don't have time to dredge up the record), it seems relevant to point out when it does happen.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#26

Bocsimako is the proof that Lisp is best for AI algorithms Cargo cultism at its finest

Ugh. Cargo cultism? The full quote is: After seeing Gábor’s performance, many participants commented that they would be taking a new look at the 50 year old language. “Bocsimako is the proof that Lisp is best for AI algorithms,” quipped one player. one player.

And as any reader of the Hardy Boys can tell you, "quipped" implies that it was said in jest.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#27
post #24
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the 33 lisp entrants don't appear to hold the top 33 spots: http://ai-contest.com/language_profile.php?lang=Lisp

So more than a fifth of the lisp entries are in the bottom twentyfifth of the competition. So you could also use the contest results to argue that lisp is five times worse for AI than the average language. (Or, rather, that language alone doesn't guarantee success, but that would be too rational and boring for an online forum).

You'd have to be an idiot to argue that language alone guarantees success. A more common bad argument is say that because this is idiotic it follows that language is irrelevant. That's actually a popular position nowadays.

Just because computers obey the law of excluded middle does not mean we should.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#28
post #22
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp.

The point the guy himself makes is that lisp allows him to be a great programmer. Of course the program could be rewritten into qbasic. It is getting your ideas and thoughts into a form that is not a compromise to the language which matters.

Yes. Any program can be written in any Turing-complete language, but is far from equally likely to be written in it.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#29
post #7

Hmm .. maybe I should consider settling in Hungary.

After seeing Gábor’s performance, many participants commented that they would be taking a new look at the 1000 year old country. "Bocsimako is the proof that Hungary is best for AI algorithms", quipped one player.

Re: Lisp developer walks away with Google AI contest

#30
post #15
post #12

Not a bad article, but did you have to make the title a Lisp promotion fest?

This very short article mentions the winner's views, as he sees it, on the suitability of Lisp (used by 0.7% of the contestants, surely interesting) for the job. Half the article never even mentions Lisp. And this amounts to a 'promotion fest'?

The point is that he won because he's a great programmer, not because he used Lisp. I was referring to the title and not the article. Do you understand that or have you got more asinine comments?
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