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Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

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291–300 of 484 posts

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#291
post #16
post #5

For being the headline, they sure hid his age pretty well. Not at the opening paragraph nor end of the article, nor photo captions near the top or bottom. cmd+f "years" 0 results cmd+f "age" 0 results And scanning for numbers is useless since most of the article is chess moves written out.

for anyone wondering hes 18

For anyone wondering about related facts: the oldest age someone had while being the chess world champion was 58 years [1].

https://www.chesspower.co.nz/chess-records.html#theoldest

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#292
post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making a computer play like a 1300-rated human is harder than making a computer beat Magnus Carlsen.

This is really interesting because i ran into a pokemon bot the other day were its training led to calibration of 50% winrste at all levels of play on Pokémon showdown. It was a complete accident.

Playing a chess bot that works this way feels like playing a Magnus Carlsen who's trying to let you win.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#293
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HAHAHA Only an HN comment could call the youngest person ever to do something would be said to "not that big of an accomplishment". How would you change that headline?

To really put it in perspective right now is the hardest and most competitive chess era in history thanks to computer-aided practice and international popularity.

[deleted]

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#294
How come Gukesh got to sit in a really tall gaming-style chair which towers above Ding’s ordinary looking chair?

To me that looks like a power move designed to intimidate the opposition. Is there a story behind it or do they just get to choose their own chairs?

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really misses the key drama of what happened in the last game. Ding had a perfectly safe position where he could try to squeeze Gukesh pretty much endlessly with basically 0 risk. He then, completely inexplicably, went down a forced line which led to the final phase of the game. In this phase the position was drawn with perfect play, but that is completely irrelevant because it is really tough to play. And more…

Chess engines should come with another metric bar: "The twitchy-ness" of the position aka the gradient of primary eval metric as you pareto the possible moves from best to worst. The stronger this gradient, the more risky it is to play, and more changes to make a mistake.

Agreed. I always thought of it as 'how close to the cliff edge are you' metric. It'd probably be easy to do, look at all the possible moves and add up the resultant evals. If you're currently tied but you have only one good move to keep it tie while the rest of your moves give mate in 1, well, saying the board is tied is not helpful.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#296
post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take the computer which beats Magnus and restrain it to never make the best move in a position. Expand this to N best moves as needed to reach 1300 rating.

You've identified a potential strategy by which a computer can play like a 1300-rated player, but not one where it will "play like a 1300-rated human". Patzers can still find and make moves in your set of N (if only by blind chance).

Yeah, you would have to weigh the moves based on how "obvious" it is, such as how active the piece has been, how many turns until it leads to winning material, or other such 'bad habits' humans fall for.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn't how most appreciate sports. People are hoping for the contenders to be at the top of their game towards the end of the championships. Nobody says "Hey, at least this has a human touch! I'm sick of basketball video games." if the NBA finals are relatively boring one year. I think maybe "that was a absolutely horrible finish" got interpreted as saying that the win wasn't well earned. That's not how I saw it…

> That isn't how most appreciate sports. People are hoping for the contenders to be at the top of their game towards the end of the championships. I'm not sure how "hope" plays into it but few of the sports I follow allow for contenders to be at the top of their game towards the end of the championship. People are tired or playing injured, and it never occurred to me to believe that this made their performances less…

there's definitely the odd game where a player suffers an injury in practice or early in the game, and a potentially close matchup becomes a disappointing wash as a result.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#298
post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making a computer play like a 1300-rated human is harder than making a computer beat Magnus Carlsen.

This is really interesting because i ran into a pokemon bot the other day were its training led to calibration of 50% winrste at all levels of play on Pokémon showdown. It was a complete accident.

It's not hard to make a chess bot that plays at a 1300 strength, i.e. its rating would converge to 1300 if it were allowed to compete. But it will not play like a 1300-rated human. It would play like a superhuman genius on most moves and then make beginner-level blunders at random moments.

Making one that realistically plays like a human is an unsolved problem.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#299

How come Gukesh got to sit in a really tall gaming-style chair which towers above Ding’s ordinary looking chair? To me that looks like a power move designed to intimidate the opposition. Is there a story behind it or do they just get to choose their own chairs?

They can pick their own chairs.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#300
post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ding has nothing to be ashamed of. He fought like a true warrior. He was a great champion, with class and brilliance. I just don't think he was physically as strong as he could be, and that affects one's ability to think as they must at that level. All said, tho, it was definitely Gukesh's time, and being 18 has some serious benefits in terms of recovery and stamina.

I don't think 26. a4 was fighting like a true warrior, it was more giving up half your kingdom in the hope that your opponent will then accept a peace treaty.

I can't speak to the subtleties of chess, but I did watch Hikaru's recap and he was of a similar opinion.

I still think Ding was physically and/or emotionally compromised to some extent. That's why I still consider his effort lionine, because his game 12 game was masterful and he was in it until the end. I hope he holds his head high.

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