TCEC is cool but has less statistical power than many ratings lists out there, which show that Houdini, Komodo and Stockfish are very closely matched, with Houdini having a slight edge at long time controls and a moderate edge at quick time controls. Stockfish does release more frequently and I'm not sure which version competed in TCEC, but until the lists catch up this article is fluff.
Strongest chess player, ever
61–70 of 113 posts
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a surprise to me. I've always thought that the reason we stopped having computer vs grandmaster is that the computer will just beat the grandmaster absolutely.
In 2006, Deep Fritz 10 beat Kramnik (then world champion) with a score of 4-2 [1] On the Computer Chess Rating List, Stockfish is currently about 350 elo points stronger than Deep Fritz 10. [2] That means Stockfish would have about 88% chance of winning vs Deep Fritz 10. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human%E2%80%93computer_chess_ma... [2] http://www.computerchess.org.uk/ccrl/4040/rating_list_all.ht...
A six game match is not a statistically significant set of data. And Deep Fritz hasn't played many humans in those 8 years since.
The Deep Fritz on the rating list, is that the same Deep Fritz that played Kramnik? (Notably the hardware and software version used may be different - perhaps the Deep Fritz on the rating list is weaker than the one that played Kramnik?)
And also, be careful trying to compare computer-list Elo with human-list Elo. Because participants on both lists are isolated from each other, there is a tendency for one set of ratings to be inflated/deflated compared to the other. We see this in international chess where countries that don't have regular FIDE tournaments, players either seem to be significantly stronger or significantly weaker than the prevailing norms in the bigger pool of players. South Africa, Myanmar are two such examples.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#63This is extremely impressive - it's cool that talented programmers are pushing the limits of computer science to advance the state of the art of chess engines. However, I also wish that there were comparable efforts to create AIs that train humans. Basically, figure out a way to systematically, efficiently, and scalably train amateurs into masters. That IMO would be absolutely amazing (and something I'd gladly pay fo…
In my opinion, this would be a lot more difficult. I am slightly naive as to exactly how stockfish works, but:
Computers can do a lot of accurate brute-forcing; humans must see the position in a more holistic, intuitive way.
Excellent human players and excellent computer players are presumably doing completely different calculation tasks.
I would suggest that computers are still bad at approaching the task in a human-like way, but they will always be able to improve their method via Moore's law (at a minimum) where humans are stuck at their current level.
Stockfish might be able to tell you what it was doing, but not in a way that it would be reasonable for a human to follow.
What you are looking for is a teacher. You can pay for those ;) The closest we have got to a teacher app is perhaps a MOOC: not much computational progress has been made.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#64This is extremely impressive - it's cool that talented programmers are pushing the limits of computer science to advance the state of the art of chess engines. However, I also wish that there were comparable efforts to create AIs that train humans. Basically, figure out a way to systematically, efficiently, and scalably train amateurs into masters. That IMO would be absolutely amazing (and something I'd gladly pay fo…
Are you sure you wouldn't rather learn, say, mathematical physics or computer science? The neurological topiary for chess is strictly harder, because chess has fewer analogues in day-to-day experience.
Chess is a fun hobby, and I feel it gets more fun the better I get. That's a good enough justification for me.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
The first analysis isn't terrible. It gets the important points right (that the draws are not evidence of difference in skill) and moves on to the remaining evidence (difference in wins to losses). The draws are at best evidence towards equality (not against it). Allow them to vary and the likelihood of seeing a difference of 9 wins in 64 games with 45 draws moves up to 0.13 or 13% (when we assume the two players are…
(it is weird that somebody, not me, created a throw-away account to make the original comment. likely they are involved in chess development, or know how quickly stat discussions go sideways) I'm not involved in chess, I just don't like long-term accounts. You get a slightly different p-value because the ordering you chose is slightly different from mine. Compared to mine, it favors matchups where the draw probabilit…
I get you. I set the draw probability to as observed, whereas you set the number of draws to as observed. But really I just meant to point out you were right (while giving a simulation that didn't involve explicit conditioning).
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#66This is extremely impressive - it's cool that talented programmers are pushing the limits of computer science to advance the state of the art of chess engines. However, I also wish that there were comparable efforts to create AIs that train humans. Basically, figure out a way to systematically, efficiently, and scalably train amateurs into masters. That IMO would be absolutely amazing (and something I'd gladly pay fo…
That seems to be what they are going for with the game analysis that also makes alternative move suggestions.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#67This is extremely impressive - it's cool that talented programmers are pushing the limits of computer science to advance the state of the art of chess engines. However, I also wish that there were comparable efforts to create AIs that train humans. Basically, figure out a way to systematically, efficiently, and scalably train amateurs into masters. That IMO would be absolutely amazing (and something I'd gladly pay fo…
Are you sure you wouldn't rather learn, say, mathematical physics or computer science? The neurological topiary for chess is strictly harder, because chess has fewer analogues in day-to-day experience.
It's a place to start.
It's not a huge leap from modelling the game of chess to modelling the skill of chess-playing. Stockfish already offers post-game analysis. Imagine extending that to analyze a players entire career, and offer a series of problems, games against specially-constructed opponents, analysis of relevant historical games etc, all of which are designed to help the player improve. Given Siri, Google Now, Watson and so on, we're probably not far from being able to have a meaningful natural-language conversation with a computer on a narrow subject like chess.
One could imagine this kind of thing being extended to teaching other, similarly focussed skills, at least for beginners. Piano. Tennis. Rock climbing. Maybe even things like soccer and basketball.
But that kind of teaching-based-on-deep-analysis is a long way off for subjects like physics or electrical engineering. Computers can't do physics, much less evaluate human physicists. The best we can do in these areas is something like the Khan Academy, where computers present "content" created by humans, administer standardized tests designed by humans and present the results to humans for interpretation.
So yeah, teaching chess in a really sophisticated way isn't all that useful in the sense that physics or EE are useful. But really, if we could teach computers to understand physics better than people do, we'd use them to make breakthroughs in physics, and that would be a much bigger deal than being able to teach physics more effectively.
On the other hand, we don't play chess or tennis or piano because they're useful, so expert AI teachers for these subjects would be really valuable.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#68Are chess engines still trying to play against humans in an interesting way? (I understand they beat human players, but that people feel computers play in dull ways). Is there a Turing Test for computer chess, where humans and computers play each other and they, and commentators, analyse the play, but no-one knows who is a computer or human until after the commentary is published? And if we ignore humans are people p…
> I understand they beat human players, but that people feel computers play in dull ways. Without knowing anything about chess, I'd say that makes humans sounds like sore losers. I wonder if this will lead to having tournaments where you don't get points for winning matches but rather get judged on style by a panel of (human) judges...
In the 1800s, most chess was much more aggressive, and it was frowned upon to reject an offered exchange of pieces. Consequently, games were faster, moves were riskier, and everything was arguably more interesting.
In other words, modern humans have been playing in dull, more reliable ways for over a century, so even if not sore loserish, it's at least a bit like the pot calling the kettle black.
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
It sounds like you think humans can still beat top computers? According to my research the last time a human beat a top computer was 2005. Almost a decade ago!
Computer software don't play that many human tournaments. It's a rare sight, even when they were clearly weaker. There's a lack of data, so the result is inconclusive. Computer software doesn't play chess. It doesn't understand positions. It has a bunch of algorithms and processes that turn a board position, tries each candidate move, turns the resulting position into some sort of number, through an evaluation functi…
Although it is pretty clear already that it is your position, let me make sure: it is your position that Magnus Carlsen has a significant chance of winning against any existing chess-playing program (no matter how strong or how powerful the hardware it is running on) even when Magnus has no access to a computer during the game?
Re: Strongest chess player, ever
#70I don't think that the present situation, when the top chess playing program is free and open-source, is good for innovation. I estimate that it would take me six months of work to get to the top-20 in the world, and I don't see how I can justify that work to myself.
Seems like an idle boast to me. Also why isn't open source good for innovation?