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How about rock-paper-scissors?
[X] physical skills involved
[X] some kind of scoring system
[X] objectively declare winner
Ticks all your boxes!

And guess what? It's a sport!

Furthermore there are even 'advanced' tactics. http://www.worldrps.com/advanced-rps

These hand signals are delivered simultaniously [sic] by the players

- THE WORLD RPS SOCIETY - OFFICIAL ABRIDGED RULES OF PLAY

Clearly, the robot is deliberately waiting for the other side to deliver their signal before delivering its own. So, the headline, summary, and article are all false. But it's still impressive, because it actually loses every time.

LOL it does Basic strategy: watching your opponent to know what physical "tells" they give when making particular moves. Advanced strategy: memorized statistical analysis of your opponent. I don't see why it's very much different than basketball. For instance, trying to read Jordan's crossups were near impossible unless you'd studied hours of footage.

Pro Player Mr. C. Urbanus quickly offered his consulting series to one of the lawyers and received the following response from one of them: Fortunately, we, the attorneys have worked out our differences by agreement. We will not have to resort to combat by RPS. Thanks again and best of luck.

Sidenote: "Combat" is that what lawyers are calling "conflict resolution" these days??

World RPS Society is nerdy enough for me

http://www.worldrps.com/

and perhaps they can work together to finally settle the questions surrounding the existance of Dynamite as a fourth choice

Paper is often considered the most subtle throw. There is nothing aggressive about the limp documents that move through our desks and offices. Even the gesture used to represent paper is peaceful - an open palm like that used in a salute or handshake. Historically, an open palm has been a sign of friendship and peace because an open hand cannot hold a weapon. Some players, who unconsciously perceive Paper as weak or a sign of surrender, will shy away from using it entirely or drop it from their game when they are falling behind. On the other hand, Paper also connects with a player's perceptions about writing. There is a quiet power in the printed word. It has the ability to lay off thousands of employees, declare war against nations, spread scandal or confess love. Paper, in short, has power over masses. The fate of the entire world is determined by print. As such, some players perceive Paper as a subtle attack, the victory of modern culture over barbarism. Such players may use Paper to assert their superiority and dignity.

Well son, you've gone and got yourself in for a battle.

Heres what you gotta do:

study up http://www.worldrps.com/ and get this http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743267516/ theofficiaroc-20

You may want to get some fancy RPS gear, http://www.worldrps.com/index.php?option=com_wrapp er&Itemid=53, and dont bother bringing that rolex, it will slow you down

Also, we knoe those who ignore history are doomed to repeat its mistakes, so why dont you read up on the history of the game too, could come in handy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock%2C_paper%2C_scis sors

Well son, you've gone and got yourself in for a battle.

Heres what you gotta do:

study up http://www.worldrps.com/ and get this http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743267516/ theofficiaroc-20

You may want to get some fancy RPS gear, http://www.worldrps.com/index.php?option=com_wrapp er&Itemid=53, and dont bother bringing that rolex, it will slow you down

Also, we knoe those who ignore history are doomed to repeat its mistakes, so why dont you read up on the history of the game too, could come in handy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock%2C_paper%2C_scis sors

... if they're allowed to summon expert witnesses.

You, my friend, must be a member of the World Rock Paper Scissors Society.

http://www.worldrps.com/

You've got to try the "Online trainer." Read all about it's sophistication before playing.

Best of all IT'S OPEN SOURCE!

An increadable piece of AI technology completely written in Javascript. Check out the page source when you are done playing.

I am not saying RPS is not a real skill game. I agree it is a more social game than a computer could probably pull off and play well, but it could be programmed to keep track of patterns a person could subconsciously be doing, and apply a RPS gambit (http://www.worldrps.com/gambits.html) to try to win. I've tested these strategies against a computer that was picking random choices and some worked better than others. So, if a person was really choosing by random, maybe some of the strategies would work if a machine used them. But, since our brains are always picking out tiny patterns and can not do something 100% randomly, could a program potentially pick up on subtle patterns? I never got a chance to have Rock, Paper, Scissors battles between basic programs to play the games, but I am also curious how they'd do against each other or if more complex programs could do reasonably well against a human...

This machine learns how to referee games, by structured watching. Though I'm a longtime fan of RPS, I know that there's little to learn in strategy except cute names, and timing the throws more (or less ;) simultaneously. The only skill to learn here, which itself is quite impressive, is recognizing which player has won. Frankly, I think that role is more important for a machine, as long as the players agree to its authority.

Yes, but can it cheat by throwing dynamite?

According to these fine folks, there is a pretty detailed strategy to RPS. I'm sure the machine is not there as yet, but it's an interesting project for some AI folks.

and the backing of legitimate organizations to help it thrive.

www.worldrps.com

Need I say more?

normal intelligence is just the ability to make our own choices

That's a pretty big 'just'. You could build a rock paper scissors simulator using a decent random number generator, and it would win as often as it lost. Humans, on the other hand, play using actual strategies in order to try to win more often than they lose, which is interesting.

It's that very act of making our own choices that we don't understand. And if we could understand it, perhaps we'd have a good start at building machines that could make their own choices as well.

If that bothers you, you certainly don't want to read about the 2002 International Rock Paper Scissors Championships Official Results.

They even have rules and play-by-play box scores in case you missed any of the action.

If that bothers you, you certainly don't want to read about the 2002 International Rock Paper Scissors Championships Official Results.

They even have rules and play-by-play box scores in case you missed any of the action.

Did the editors decide to replace the term "Rohambo" with the more commonly recognized term?

Lets see, yes. First I kick the house majority leader in the nuts as hard as I can....

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... is at http://www.worldrps.com
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There is also no dynamite. As explained here