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Kasparov King No More
soccerdad writes: "After 15 years as world champion, Garry Kasparov has been beaten by Vladimir Kramnik. Kasparov is generally acknowledged as the greatest chess player of all time, but he was unable to beat Kramnik in the 16-game match. Kramnik won twice as white. Kasparov needed to win the final two games to come out 8-8 (which would have retained the title). However, he agreed to a draw in the 39th move of game 15, giving the championship to Kramnik. For detailed match information, check out
FT.com Match Centre."
Kasparov is acknowledged to be the greatest human player ever. I believe he had a problem when he played Deep Blue... IBM has subsequently adopted Linux... imagine a Beowulf cluster of Deep Blues ;)
It was Kasparov vs. IBMs' SP2 that inspired me to take a position managing a SP2. I hope that he's had as rewarding an experience as I have had.
- real hackers don't have sigs -
Anyone see it? I think the name was "Searching for Bobby Fischer" You would never think they could make an interesting movie about playing chess but it was actually really cool.
Great, more fodder for big blue. I wonder if they'll have it put Kramnik to the test. Also, has Kasparov beaten Kramnik before in a tournament? Or have they just never faced eachother before so maybe Kramnik was the underground best player all along.
Of course, now we must see if this Vladimir Kramnik fellow can beat Deep Blue...
Last I checked, Kasparov was beaten a while back by a computer.
It was sad. :( I saw Kasparov getting frustrated in this one move. I heard that he was having personal problems with his life. ABC News.com has the full story and the video (not sure if it is the same one on TV) as well.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Let's see:
Kasparov was beaten by a computer...
then he was beaten by a human...
How would he fare against infinite monkeys?
Or better yet, if Kasparov was so good, imagine... a Beowulf cluster of him...
Or... if Kasparov linked to a commercial library, would RMS approve?
(doh)
My question is has anyone done anything to increase the variety of chess like create more formalistic rules to things like star trek's creation of 3d chess or the like. I havn't seen too much of that out there.
Respond to s
see subject
Respond to s
that nerds (ie: news for nerds) like Chess... Are there no nerds in this modern age of social and digital revolution that like the extreme sports? Why are we still contained to such sports as Chess, Backgammon, and the like? Why haven't 'nerds' invented their own game, much like societies 'dating game' that is highly exclusive and highly competitive? Oh well, just my rant against society.
Information is the catalyst for revolution
Indentially, I believe I saw an article two or three months ago talking about the Star Trek 3D chess. I think someone actually created the boards. I know the rules are outlined w/in the many Trekkie dictionaries (suprisingly). Personally, I'd like to see the Klingon sort of games. I mean, what guy wouldn't love to be given a really sharp weapon and be told to maim and mutilate the opponent in the name of sport? Footbal - fah.. It's for sissies who want pads >=)
Information is the catalyst for revolution
Kramnik vs Tyson.
Bra and panty match
I am become Troll, destroyer of threads
Kasparov lost most likely due to some problems that didn't let him concentrate and prepare fully for the game, but he is still so far ahead, that I am pretty sure he will return very soon. He is natural genius supported with extremly hard work, sometimes I really wonder how much work he put in his preparations. He is the kind of strategic mastermind that none of US generals would like to face in battle :)
If programs would be read like poetry, most programmers would be Vogons.
I used to play when I was younger. My father taught me the game, and I honed my skils in high school (some of my opponents were very good: one of them was the provincial champ for several years running). I got half-decent at it, but never exceptional.
Recent I had the pleasure of losing (as funny as that might sound) to a fellow I met in an "Einstein's Bagels": I had seen him play another once, and play several games out of an openings book, and he was willing to engage me in a game. Note: I hadn't played seriously in at least 20 years.
While I lost (Well, I resigned. The one redeeming fact was that I realized it was over earlier than most), it was a lot of fun.
- RSH
You could've hired me.
Nothing looks weaker than offering the draw when you need the win...
This isn't meant to be flamebait, btw...
Representing this story with the Nintendo Joystick is just WRONG :)
Slashdot 's editors are dickheads
In regards to the computer comments, I don't think it's a big deal that he was beaten by a computer; it's just a matter of raw computational power, like being beaten in the 100 meter dash by a car. It's too his credit that he could give it a good run for it's money; GNUchess trounces me quite easily.
--
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Prior to this, they'd met 23 times in tournament play, each winning three and drawing 17. To say that Kasparov is no longer #1 is a bit rash; he'll rise again.
-- Anne Marie
That was a good movie, but it was about Joshua Waitzkin, what does that have to do with this?
And this -
Umm... Please dear god, as long as I love - never let me see a bunch of chess fans 'dancing' for any reason...
Think outside the... Hey, where'd the friggin' box go?
the king is dead, long live the king!
--
Peace,
Lord Omlette
ICQ# 77863057
[o]_O
In case anyone wanted more information about the backround behind this, The New York Times Online has an informative article about it here (free reg. req.). It turns out that Vladimir Kramnik, the winner of this match, was taken on as a student at the age of 11 by Mr. Kasparov at his elite chess school in Moscow. I still think that Kasparov is the best player out there right now, though. He may have lost this one championship match but being the champion for 15 years allows for a few mistakes. Still, I think that it was very impressive that Kramnik was able to defeat him, where no one else had been.
"I have not failed. I've simply found 10,000 ways that won't work." --Thomas Edison
"Only human".
ZOMG I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS ON MACINTOSH VERSUS WINDOWS, VI VERSUS EMACS, AND HOW YOU'RE NOT A DORK
I'm curious: How do the best open source programs fair against the deep blue's of the world? How do they stack up on equal hardware against commercially available programs?
Whether Deep Blue is a world champion only depends on if you think a computer can be or not. Considering it has been disassembled though, I think the computer has forfeited the title. ;)
The title of greatest does not always go to the latest great player. IMHO, one must also keep in mind the historical perspective. I view greatest as someone that had a major impact on his/her field, and one that set a relative standard that must be met.
"The old order changeth heralding in the new." The very thing we techies survive on and dream of.
There's always sufficient, but not always at the right place nor for the right folks.
Mod that up!
I just tell everyone that aliens have stolen his brain...
Man, that's funny...
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
maybe i'm wrong, but didn't bobby fisher regularly dispatch kasparov at the world championships? on the other hand i watched a lot of kasparov's play over the last ten years. when he goes on the attack it is over, man!
The REAL sam_at_caveman_dot_org is user ID 13833.
Only in the US do football players wear pads :-). But then, leave it to the US to call a game where the ball is primarily handled with the hands football.
As for the sharp-weapon sports, I think that went the way of the Romans. It'll be back sometime though. This society thrives on depictions of such things, how far away is the real thing? (If you're a major carnage fan, note that I'm merely observing the status quo)
.sig fried
How about, you vote for who you think will do the best job running this country and stop pushing your politics on everyone else?
I see enough advertisement, Thank You
Jeremy
Hmmn.. well perl scripts definately require more motion than chess... I think Chess is less active.. hehe, :)
What I do know about is that Mr Polgar (father of the three chess playing Polgar sisters, of whom Judit is the best) has been experimenting with variants of chess, including different dimensions of the board.
I have no idea how these variants play though, so I can't tell you anything about those.
Kasparov hasn't been the official FIDE world chess federation champion since 1993, when he broke with FIDE to play against the legitimate challenger Nigel Short.
Karpov regained the FIDE title in a 1993 match and lost it by not playing in the 1999 FIDE world championship. This matter is currently under legal dispute.
Kasparov did not play his legitimate challenger, Alexei Shirov, and attempted to set up a "championship" match with another leading player, Viswanathan Anand of India before hand-picking Kramnik as his challenger here.
However Kramnik is number 3 on the FIDE rating list and so was a worthy challenger, just not the man who deserved the match, Shirov.
So some people on the chess newsgroup are saying Shirov's the world champion now! :-)
but not unexpected. He may be the greatest chess player of all time but I don't think he could maintain that level of playing forever. People seem to become less able to perform intellectual feats as they get older. Kasparov beat Karpov when Karpov was 34. Kasparov is about 37 now. He's getting close to that age where one is no longer so sharp. Here's a good article on aging from Feed.
"sweet dreams are made of this..."
I got it for Christmas many years ago, when I was still into tournament chess. Not that I was a great tournament player--I could never break a 1600 rating, which if you know about tournament chess isn't a very good rating at all--but I enjoyed it a lot. Of course, I was about 13 at the time, and unless you're a prodigy you're not going to be great at chess that young; so that might be a good excuse to use for my poor rating. :-)
Anyway, the set I got for Christmas and still have was, I think, made by The Franklin Mint as an authorized *Star Trek* item. It was very attractive, made from clear and blue glass, with gold-plated pieces. It came with some detailed and cumbersome rules. We played it a few times, but it proved rather uninteresting compared to real chess.
See, the reality is that chess doesn't need to be "improved." It can't be "improved," and more variety would be a detriment instead of an improvement. As it stands, chess is complicated enough that you'll probably never play the same game twice in your life, even if you play in tournaments every week. I've known plenty of people with Master and International Grand Master ratings who've been playing chess their whole lives and are never bored with it. It's just not repetitious; there's practically infinite variety.
There are so many practical and useful variations just of the opening moves, that chess is incredibly interesting and never truly mastered. Tournament players usually have two or three openings that they use most of the time and study extensively, but they'll try new things whenever they feel like it or when an opponent's unusual strategies force them into something different.
Chess also has such a rich history and wonderful traditions that it could never be replaced by anything new. There have been many, many, many variations on chess created in the last century; the reason you've never heard of them is that chess players view them as a curiosity and distraction, but not as anything useful. After all, regular chess is complicated enough for people to devote their whole lives learning about it and still not master it; things like four-player chess, three-dimensional chess, etc., just distract from those studies.
One of my favorite things about chess is its history--dating back a thousand years in the Middle East for early variations, modern chess was codified in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and in the nineteenth century it became the first real international sport. Most people today don't consider it a sport, but before the modern Olymics, before baseball and basketball and football and soccer were even invented, there was a structure in place for the best international players to compete with one another.
One of my favorite bits of chess lore is of one of the greatest players of all time, a very rough-and-tumble English gentleman. In the 19th century the world chess championship was set distinctly apart from the rest of the chess world; the title holder could see fit to accept or decline any challengers to his title, as he saw fit, and if the challenge was accepted the champion could decide the time and place. Unlike the timed matches common today, championship matches in the 19th century could last for days or weeks, with the players working for ten to eighteen hours straight before breaking for the night, even having their meals at the board. It's been a long time since I heard this story, so some of the details may be lacking, but on the whole it's a fairly accurate account...So anyway, this particular Englishman decided that the championship match would be held...in his favorite pub, during the busiest time of the evening when people would be laughing and singing and getting ever more drunk around them. The challenger arrives, and takes his seat across from the vaunted champion, a man who he's been warned is very, very intimidating, with an intensely jovial Falstaffian presence. They make some small talk, and the challenger notices the empty glasses in front of the champ. The champ calls the serving girl over and orders another, and the challenger orders a drink as well. They get the board and pieces set up, and they're settling in for a long night when the serving girl brings their drinks. The champion, seizing the opportunity to further intimidate this challenger who's awed in the presence of the storied world champ, grabs both drinks from the serving girl's tray and drinks them both voraciously, slams the glasses down, and proclaims in chess-speak: "You left your drink *en pris*, so I took it *en passant*!" The challenger was so intimidated that he resigned immediately.
Now, who would want to mess with a sport so ancient, noble, and complex, as chess?
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, *The Annals*
>After 15 years it is finally over. This is very
>depressing.
Why is it depressing? It is widely regarded
in some chess circles that the Kasparov-Karpov
matches where bogus and fixed from the outset.
If this is true (Boris Spassky and Victor
Korchnoi are convinced of it, and besides,
Russian players are well known for sandbagging
and pre-arranging their games when it suits them),
combined with all the political bullshit between
FIDE and Kasparov's GMA, yadda yadda... then, can
you really say it has been a great 15+ years for
the chess world?
Besides, it wasn't exactly a surprise
that Kramnik defeated Kasparov. People were
speculating on the inevitability of this
long, long ago.
Kramnik is a fantastic player in every
respect. And he's now the Champ.
Good for him. As Jamella says in D2, Hail
to you, Champion.
Another thing: a +2-0 win result in such a
high caliber match isn't just a marginal
victory for Kramnik. It's a decisive
performance.
>But I think he only lost because of
>his personal problems.
Kasparov lost because Kramnik is an awesome
player. For all we know, Kramnik may
have been facing some of his own personal
problems during the match.
I think you have to be Russian with a K. Though, is Khaliman?
I certainly don't have any chess talent...
Glückwünsche, haben Sie Slashdot ermordet, indem Sie zum korporativen Druck beugten und Subskriptionen einlei
I waited all night in the rain just to get my stupid Sony SP2, and there's no good games for it yet!
Khalifman (also listed as Halifman at times) is Russian.
Is did he cry like a three year old girl when he got his ass handed to him the same way when deep blue waxed him?
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
Check http://www.chessvariants.com or try to get your hands on a copy of Variant Chess, published by the British Chess Variants Society. These variants use the same equipment as 'regular' chess.
Or maybe you're referring to 'Fairy Chess' variants like the Star Trek 3-d chess, where you use different pieces or boards.
C h a z m a t i
Deep Blue was programmed to beat Kasparov. "Taught" all his tendencies, openings, strats, etc. It was mentioned that if any other Grand Master were to have sat down after Deep Blue beat Kasparov, the computer would have been beaten, beaten, and beaten again.
I heard on NPR tonight that Deep Blue "wasn't defending" his championship.
i.e. that IBM hasn't let Deep Blue play any more games, even though many have offered challenges. I doubt they'll let Kramnik play. I also heard that Kramnik is a lot better at playing against computers than Kaspy. Allegedly he beats them into the ground.
Dlugar
Computer Go: Writing Software to Play the Ancient Game of Go
Kasparov may be a great chess player, but he has room to grow in the personal skills department. Reading somethings written by him, and interviews with him after the Deep Blue incident made me lose respect for him as a man. Someone that intelligent and respected should prove himself respectable. Kasparov seemed arrogant, and made excuses for losing, rather than accepting the fact that the computer beat him. As for getting beaten, it happens to us all. Kasparov should have the grace to accept it.
I think its a shame when "stars" of this magnitude don't conduct themselves well "off the court." It is for this reason that I basketball star Michael Jordan. Arguabluy the best player of his game (like Kasparov) Jordan not only performed well on the court, but off it. I also respect The Offspring, not because their music is amazing (who here doesn't own Smash?), but because they, unlike other bands (cough, Metallica, cough), realized that they are popular because of their fans, and battled Sony in an attempt to release their last album online, for free, to thank their fans
What do you slashdotters think? I'm I out of line? Or should people who could be seen as role-models act like them?
Captain_Frisk
I'd rather be rich than stupid.
one loss? oh c'mon. what does that matter? nothing. n-o-t-h-i-n-g. there's always somebody who is better.
ound the message used repetitively over and over still nothing grows silen
The guy is an arrogant prick. Not to take anything away from his playing ability but the Deep Blue debacle was ridiculous. Accusing the IBM guys of "cheating" by having the computer study his games.
Besides, we're less than a decade away from Chess-AI-complete. After that it'll be another trivial game.
Go on the other hand...
it seems kinda strange how this guy just pops out of nowhere. i mean, you would think a guy that was better than kasperov would have challenged him already.
tap 2 blue, I counter that
When I first glanced at this article, and remebered that I was at /. , I thought it was referring to a Deep Blue remach. Didn't the computer beat him, or was it a draw or something? Shouldn't that computer be the undisputed king of chess?
Many people consider Khalifman the "real" champion, because his title is sanctioned by FIDE, the world chess federation. Others think the FIDE Championship has been devalued since they went to a single-tournament championship. Its detractors call it "speed chess," and not without justification. I get the sense that most people still think Kasparov is the most legitimate champion, mainly because he keeps showing himself to be the best player in the world.It's rather shocking to see Garry lose -- it just doesn't happen. Until now.
I'd really like to see Kramnik play Khalifman for the Undisputed Championship of the World. It's like boxing. Of course, FIDE has these knockout championship tournaments every year, so Kramnik would probably be unable to play a match before the new FIDE champ is determined. Most people don't give Khalifman that much of a chance to repeat because he's considered a fairly middlin' grandmaster, rather than one of the elite. The older system, a three year cycle of grueling matches, always selected players who had proven convincingly they are the two best players in the world (the champ didn't have to go through the cycle. He just waited for the candidates' match winner.). The new knockout system seems to make chance a much greater factor, and Khalifman's victory seems to support that theory.
ChuckleBug
Lets face it... Deep Blue only had one job, to play chess. Kasparovs brain has many jobs. How can you all be so ignorant. As to this new guy lets see if his 'Chess' brain can kick Deep Blue's Butt.
That's why (just a little OT here) the game of GO is such an excellent model for computational game theory. I lost the bookmark, but I've read a great paper once on why chess was relatively easy to program, but CompSci's spend a good amount of time working on good GO implementations. One reason is that any single moment in chess can be summed up (in general) by a point count of pieces on the board, or in other words, used in part of a branching equation. Piece count is irrelevant for GO, and the game state at any moment is hard to summarize in any sort of neat numerical way: the shifting "influences" on the board don't translate very well.
This isn't to say there aren't GO programs out there, the GnuGO is pretty good. It's just a very difficult problem to solve, which hasn't received as much attention from the computational set...
Check my Go-related blog for beginners: DGD
Have you tried Kasparov home site!
"Failure is not an option, it come bundled with the software"
Last time (2 years ago)
:)
I join yahoo.com 's games & play chess.
& then i choose somebody & play with him.
what i do is, run xboard ppl versus computer.
Then copy his step, as my step on my xboard.
Then what xboard run, i copy as my step agaisnt
people at yahoo.
I win
hahahahaha
p/s: I'm using dual CPU 200Mhz pentium PRO.
-- Hasbullah bin Pit (sebol)
Hey, he ain't no Rookie.
It's been a hard day's Knight.
Now he can get on the net, download some Pw4n and bash the Bishop like everyone else.
--
The shareholder is always right.
Hey, I was fascinated to see the chess news pop up on slashdot. A bit biased because I grew up in Hastings (UK) - home of a large international chess competition of many years standing.
Also the town I went to school in, bought my first computer, learnt to rig pyrotechnics, canoe in heavy winter seas, dated my first girlfriend and snapped my arm in half while rock hopping
I don't find being into computers and loving chess excludes these other activities... or to quote my long standing chess opponent...
"There are those in life who play chess, and those who merely push wood"
There is an established international federation that deals with the ratings, and runs the international tournatments, FIDE. The FIDE world championship is a big tournament, no mumber 1 contender stuff, anyone can play. It starts with local tournaments, then tournaments like the british championships, then on to a zonal tournament and interzonal tournaments. Eventually you are at the knockout stage and most non GMs are out already. Finally they battle there way down till one is left - he then plays the current champion. In short, the FIDE world championship is a monster of a competition and anyone who wins this is a very worthy champion.
The current FIDE world champion is Alexander Khalifman, who won in Las Vegas last year. Kasparov did not play as he has set up his own chess organisation (the name escapes me, PCA or something) a few years back whilst have huge disagreements with FIDE. Basically a lot of other top GMs followed Kasparov to this new organisation with the promise of more money, less FIDE bullshit etc.(leaving Khalifman who is a good player, but not the best in the world) as world champion.
My view is that if there is a problem with the main organisational body, fix it, dont just ignore it and form your own body to satisfy the control freak inside you. The situation is akin to Michael Jonson saying he does not like the Olympic Committee and so running the "Michael Johnson Olympics", where he chooses his opponents, and indeed chooses the number 2 contender rather than the number 1 contender to race against.
In any case, he is almost certainly the strongest player of all time, and I would not be surprised if he won "Gary Kasparov's World Championship" back next time. As for the real world champion, who knows.
It may be that Kramnik beat Kasparov, but can/could (have) Kramnik beat all of Kasparov's previouse oponents?
If Kasparov does not retire, there is a good chance that he will be champion again. Even if Kramnik is never defeated by Kasparov, others might beat him, and Kasparov might beat them.
As has been said, Kramnik had a unique advantage.
Thad
Thad
1) There are many more possible moves in every position. Something like 300 (vs 30 in chess).
2) A game of Go lasts much longer than a game of chess, typically around 300 moves (150 ply).
3) There is no simple way to estimate the value of a given position. It needs to be analyzed carefully. Some pieces may be an asset (alive) or a liability (dead). Sizes of loosely defined territories are hard to estimate. All this depends on the configurations the pieces can achieve.
4) There is no clearly defined winning position (checkmate). Instead you need to secure more territory than your opponent.
5) The game consists of several almost independent battles which anyway affect each other.
6) It is all a matter of balance: Greed vs security; actual territory vs potential; possibilities of future gains... All these are difficult to define so that a program understands them.
So, the huge branching factor and expensive evaluation makes the game hard for computers, while humans are strong in isolating local fights, balancing things, and keeping a strategical overview.
GnuGo is one of the stronger programs, and I can beat it with maximum handicap. I am just a middle-level club player (5 kyu). I do not expect go programs to beat me within the next 5 years, maybe 10.
In Murphy We Turst
Some of the best mathematicians I've know have been professors....most over 50. Maybe in *SOME* people skills start declining in their 30s, but I think that a blanket statement like that is quite idiotic and unprovable.
Everything is but a number spoken by itself.
There have been many, many, many variations on chess created in the last century; the reason you've never heard of them is that chess players view them as a curiosity and distraction, but not as anything useful.
No, the reason you've never heard about them is you haven't been listening. First of all, chess itself is a variant. Likely the original "chess" was what we now call Chaturanga, which dates back to 7th century India. This evolved, as variants continually cropped and died out, but occasionally replaced chess itself. Soon Chaturanga became Shatranj, and so on. Rules were changed or added, one by one. Pawns became able to move two spaces instead of one on their first move. En passant was introduced. Castling began as well. The Indian pieces were replaced with European medieval figure representations. And so forth.
But it doesn't stop at historical variants... there are literally thousands of chess variants played regularly around the world. You can find many in the wonderful book The Encyclopedia of Chess Variants or on The Chess Variant Pages. Many variants can be played online at chess servers like The Free Internet Chess Server (telnet freechess.org 5000), The Middle East Wild Internet Server (telnet chess.mds.mdh.se 5555), The Internet Chess Club, etc.
Chess Variants I have played and enjoy:
Standard, Blitz, Lightning, Quantum, Hourglass, Bughouse, 3 Board Bughouse, 4 Board Bughouse, 5 Board Bughouse, Aerial Bughouse, Crazyhouse, Suicide, Atomic, Wild 5, Wild 10, Kriegspiel, Progressive, Magnetic, Fairy Tale, Alice, Fischer Random, Random, Thai, Shogi, Xiangqi, 3 Player Chess, 4 Player Chess, Cylindrical, Infinite, Capablanca's, Mutation, Absorption, Inverse Capture, Rifle, Kamikaze, Extinction, Take-All, Rotation, Marseillais, Stealth, Hostage, Insane, Ultima and Command.
Many of these variants were created by world class chess players to add another dimension to the game. For example, Fischer Random was invented by Bobby Fischer to eliminate opennings from the game. Capablanca created Capablanca's Chess. The list goes on and on.
My all time favorite chess variant is bughouse, wherein you have two boards side by side and a partner who plays the opposite color from you... you pass your partner the pieces you capture and he does likewise, then as your move you may place one of these pieces on the board instead of playing a normal move with the pieces already on the board. It is a very social game and is much more fun than chess itself.
Check out my webpage for more information on variants, chess servers, and other chess stuff: http://www.cs.rit.edu/~cem9314/chess/.
You were just some kind of monkey using a keyboard. Besides, pc-computer-chess programs really suck.
Johan V.
How many years ago was that again? He has already admited to a drinking problem, A problem which he has over come and no longer has. He plead guilty and paid his debt to society. Much less than I can say for the current president who has sold us out to the Chineese and bombs pharmicutical factories when he is getting charged with sexual assault or something trivial as that. You liberals just don't get it, do you. There is a BIG difference between what someone has done in the past and some one who is currently a snake and a traitor (AL GORE AND SLICK WILLIE)
After some serious analysis, I've come to the conclusion that "Anne Marie" is really just our beloved Signal 11 in drag. Allow me to share some of my findings:
/. all day long.
1. High user ID number. Her number is high enough to fall around the time Sig11 declared he was leaving Slashdot for good.
2. Blatant karma whoring Here is a perfect example
3. Unfunny posts moderated to +5 Funny. Honestly, I could never figure out how Signal 11 would be able to get a corny, painfully unfunny post modded so high. "Anne Marie" seems to have that uncanny knack as well. Try this one.
4. Knows Slashdot history very well. Here's proof. Clearly this person knows what Slashdot was like, and knows how to find old stuff. Signal 11 was always quick to point out how long he'd been around and seen things change.
5. Posts early and posts a lot. Ever take a look at Signal 11's posting history when he was in full force? You'd see something like this. Nobody but Siggy 11 could have that much free time to be posting, and posting early enough to get the moderation points. He confessed at one time that his job was so boring he had the time to be posting to
If that is not enough proof for you, I don't know what else there could be. My conclusion is that Signal 11 has taken on the role of "Anne Marie" as another experiment. Do you all remember his karma experiment? Well now he has decided to try life on Slashdot as a "woman". I urge you all to stop helping Signal 11 make Slashdot his personal playground.
I still don't understand why we hear on and on about the hardware, when the real victor was the code -- anyone know who the programmers were on the Big Blue vs. Kasparov project?
They were the real heroes, not some chunks of silicon...
I remember playing Yahoo Chess, and I was using xboard + GNUChess too. I wonder if we ever played each other.
In the elimination matches for the '72 world championship, Fischer beat Taimanov 6-0, Larsen 6-0, and Petrossian 6 1/2-2 1/2. Playing black, he won routinely. No one else has dominated like this.
I recently read an article that suspects that Kasparov has a special handycap at the moment: His mother, who normally watches every game he plays seems to be very ill and is reported to leave matches early recently, guided by a nurse. Unfortunately, I have no link available (the article appeared in last week's issue of Der Spiegel, a german news maganzine). They say that Kasparov plays really uninspired recently and they believe it may be due to that. So maybe when she gets better, there will be a rematch.
is too serious to be entertaining, and too frivolous to be taken seriously.
It is also the greatest waste of human intelligence found outside the advertising industry.
(From Martin Gardiner's "Dr Matrix")
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
"I beat Gary Kasparov, and all I got was this stupid T-Shirt."
Give it a rest. Nobody cares.
The ivory tower has never had to reach so h
2 years ago, Karpov in Las Vegas at the Nat'l Open and Kasparov in Peoria, AZ at a high school event. Karpov was much warmer, much more friendly and approachable. Kasparov was a cold, arrogant bastard. There's no way I'd want to associate with him.
And congrats to Boris Gulko, once again the U.S. Champion! VERY nice guy. (yes, he's a former Soviet but is now a US citizen, thus he can compete for the US Championship)
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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
That is such a horsesh** argument. I fail to understand how a computer being programmed to optimally defeat a given opponent, based on the weaknesses and tendencies of his previous games, is any different than a human player studying, and adjusting his strategy for, the same weaknesses and tendencies of an upcoming opponent. Regarding the other GM comment: it is hard to say how a computer programmed to beat Kasparov would fare. But in all fairness to the computer it should be allowed to be optimized for an opponent, regardless of whether the codebase is modified. When I used to play, I'd change my strategies for my opponents known weaknesses, it is only fair that a computer opponent be allowed to do the same.
--Purple lightning. That's always a good sign.
I recall an old phrase about how you know a teacher is good if their student is able to beat him/her. Seems to apply here as well. ;-)
This is perhaps redundant, but I want to put the Deep Blue better than Kasparov debate into perspective. Deep Blue analyzes millions of moves per second, Kasparov meanwhile analyzes a very small fraction of that figure. The fact that a human player can beat Deep Blue even some of the time tells us more about the human mind than it does about the state of the art of computer science. Gumshoe
Can you imagine if ESPN, Fox, or NBC covered this with the stnadard over-excited commentator? That would be funny.
Beware, Nugget is watching... See?
No. Blue is not a world champion. The match was an exhibition, no ratings points or standings were involved because Blue is effectively an unrated player. I don't know the FIDE rules, but USCF rules state that computers cannot play rated matches against human players.
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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
I meant to mention that you'd have to do something about time pressure and sudden death. The FIDE rules governing computer play suggest giving the computer a different time control to allow for the lag with the human operator, but doesn't have a suggestion.
One thing I found interesting is that the FIDE rules say a computer "can only receive special computer prizes, if any" but doesn't say anything about rating points.
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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
Think Beowolf, then insert IBM's ridiculously high pricing.
SP = scalable parallel... (a.k.a. cluster)
At one point in time this was the SHIT! Now, well there are some better, but it is still a powerful configuration.
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The facts expressed here belong to all, the opinions to me. The distinction between fact and opinion is yours to decide.
Major Shakespearean scholar, consistently put off title defenses because he was "just finishing" a new edition! Gotta love it! That was back in the days when the World Champion chose the conditions of his defense. And he also gave us the Staunton chess pieces, which are pretty much the standard today.
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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
Bad analogy. A car outperforms humans only in the realm of going fast from point A to point B. A F-16, assuming it's not testing it's ejection seat, by this standard outperforms cars so are cars obsolete? The car requires a human to operate it, as does the jet. It doesn't negate the value and purpose of a man.
Innovations in chess? Unfortunately chess is not really a game for pedestrians. The variations in chess are nigh infinite and new things emerge literally all the time. You can use the "nothing new under the sun" analogy in that they're all probably variations on something that was named a hundred years ago (the Dragon Variation of the Deaf Sicilian Opening) but if the Deaf Sicilian was considered silly and passe BEFORE the Dragon Variation was found, and the Dragon Variation give it new life, then it's considered new and an innovation.
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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
You are the first person not to flame me for asking a question I thank you heartily
Respond to s
(fyi) deep blue was dismantled and ibm has not released any info about it's decisision algorithms. Claims that there was a human element behind the seen are still out there. Overall, the event was useless as we learned nothing about how it was done.
I don't know the chess etiquette, but in Go it would be poor form to keep fighting if the loss seemed to be inevitable. You'd be seen as wasting the other guy's time, and hoping for a silly mistake - not a polite thing to imply... In Go one should resign in such a position. Of course there are (practically) no draws in Go, so offering a draw (in one - deciding - game might be equivalent to resigning...)
In Murphy We Turst
I just cut the 8x8 board into pieces (some 3x3, some 2x2, some 2x3) and mounted the pieces on posts of varying height. Then push them all inward so looking down from the top, there's some overlap. But otherwise, it's a normal chessboard. It just makes it harder to visualize moves!
Is certainly is true, that age has a great impact on the performance of chess players. Why? Well, one of the reasons is that their physical form gets worse. This implies that they are not able to concentrate for as long as they used to. This impliy that it gets more and more difficult to in a chess match over many games.
Of course, it was worse in the old K vs. K days, where you didn't play a fixed number of games, but played until one player had won 8 gameds. This took months. (Remember the match that was prematurely ended?)
The players know, that a bad physical form affect their play, so they actually have physical training. The most popular are ordinary running, but others play tennis etc.
-- A Mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems. - Paul Erdös
Kramnik didn't just win because he is a better player; he won in part because he is a younger player. And because of that factor, it is doubtful that Kasparov will ever be regaining his championship.
I like to wear big-boy pants.
He was never "the best" . I would love see a match between kasparov vs Fischer (I know I prob. spelled it wrong:) ) Bobby come back ... We miss you
Brian Rubright