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Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

reuters.com

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Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#71

Post by marcus_holmes »

Morromist wrote: post #37
phtrivier wrote: post #20

My biggest fear at the moment is robot armies and police forces. Case in point : we're all expecting China needs to invade Taiwan soon, or they will run out of soldiers because of the one child policies of the 70s/80s. Meanwhile, Ukraine is holding up against a "modern" army with quickly assembled drones. So it all seems a bit like "they'll never put tanks through the Ardennes", sort of ? Where and when will the firs…

China had more births in 2025 than all of europe and russia combined so I don't think they're going to run out of soldiers.

The more important fact is that China makes all the drones

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#72

Post by segmondy »

hermitcrab wrote: post #3
dmurray wrote: post #2

A year ago this [0] table tennis robot backed by Google DeepMind was discussed on HN. It plays much worse and the HN discussion is anchored around whether it's OK to call it "human-level" or if the authors should have clarified that they meant a human who doesn't actually play table tennis. But it was accepted as being SOTA at that time. What happened since then? This looks like the kind of level of advance we see in…

As a human player (of a not-high standard) I cannot see the spin of the ball directly. I can only infer it from the movement of my opponents bat. So I would wonder that a camera could pick it up in real time. Also IT'S TABLE TENNIS, NOT PING PONG!

It's ping pong.

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#73

Post by mjcohen »

Morromist wrote: post #37
phtrivier wrote: post #20

My biggest fear at the moment is robot armies and police forces. Case in point : we're all expecting China needs to invade Taiwan soon, or they will run out of soldiers because of the one child policies of the 70s/80s. Meanwhile, Ukraine is holding up against a "modern" army with quickly assembled drones. So it all seems a bit like "they'll never put tanks through the Ardennes", sort of ? Where and when will the firs…

China had more births in 2025 than all of europe and russia combined so I don't think they're going to run out of soldiers.

If you believe them.

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#74

Post by cool_dude85 »

zingar wrote: post #29
ACCount37 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do expect this to have a "novelty edge" over human opponents - which can be closed with practice, on the human end. And, like many AIs, it can have "jagged capability" gaps, with inhuman failure modes living in them - which humans can learn to exploit, but the robot wouldn't adapt to their exploitation because it doesn't learn continuously. Happened with various types of ML AIs designed to fight humans.

Chess players learned to exploit chess computers’ weaknesses in the beginning too, but they can’t any longer. This version of the robot might not learn continuously, but the next will be better.

I believe there are still some echoes of the concept. Even top engines will play certain grandmaster draw lines unless told more or less explicitly not to. So if you were playing a match against Stockfish you'd want to play the Berlin draw as White every time, for example.

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#75

Post by user3939382 »

throwup238 wrote: post #55
hermitcrab wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a human player (of a not-high standard) I cannot see the spin of the ball directly. I can only infer it from the movement of my opponents bat. So I would wonder that a camera could pick it up in real time. Also IT'S TABLE TENNIS, NOT PING PONG!

> Also IT'S TABLE TENNIS, NOT PING PONG! Alas HN has finally found its next religious war! I’ve been feeling a little bored after that whole tabs vs spaces one was settled.

Settled how? Tabs win, right?

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#76

Post by mcmoor »

paolovictor wrote: post #68
hermitcrab wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a human player (of a not-high standard) I cannot see the spin of the ball directly. I can only infer it from the movement of my opponents bat. So I would wonder that a camera could pick it up in real time. Also IT'S TABLE TENNIS, NOT PING PONG!

To be honest, if Chinese folks are fine with calling it "ping pong" (乒乓), I'm fine, too. (Also, you sorta can infer the spin from the ball arc or even if you catch a glimpse of the rotating label)

Lmao the character used is so cute

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#77

Post by QuantumGood »

stavros wrote: post #64
QuantumGood wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Visually reading spin is unreliable at all levels; the ITTF passed the two-color rubber rule requiring one black and one red side to neutralize players taking advantage of their opponents being unable to read the spin from watching the ball rotation via twiddling rackets with the same color rubber on both sides, but different characteristics.

I can't parse that sentence, can you please clarify?

Apologies! I left a much clearer edit on screen, and when I noticed I had not commited it, the edit window had closed.

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#78

Post by scythe »

user3939382 wrote: post #75
throwup238 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also IT'S TABLE TENNIS, NOT PING PONG! Alas HN has finally found its next religious war! I’ve been feeling a little bored after that whole tabs vs spaces one was settled.

Settled how? Tabs win, right?

go fmt

Re: Ping-pong robot beats top-level human players

#79

Post by SecretDreams »

kibwen wrote: post #32
phtrivier wrote: post #20

My biggest fear at the moment is robot armies and police forces. Case in point : we're all expecting China needs to invade Taiwan soon, or they will run out of soldiers because of the one child policies of the 70s/80s. Meanwhile, Ukraine is holding up against a "modern" army with quickly assembled drones. So it all seems a bit like "they'll never put tanks through the Ardennes", sort of ? Where and when will the firs…

Marching humanoid terminator robots will never be as cheap as a drone. Autonomous suicide drone swarms are what should terrify you.

> Marching humanoid terminator robots will never be as cheap as a drone. Autonomous suicide drone swarms are what should terrify you.

If money or economics were relevant in these decisions, most wars would probably not play out in the first place. Tesla probably wouldn't be worth 1.2T. And we certainly wouldn't see AI buildouts happening at their current rates.

Economics and costs only matter for normal humans, small countries, and efforts that might actually help humanity. They're not seemingly considerations in nefarious applications.

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