Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Wednesday, 22 Jul 1992 15:09:25 CDT
From: <U55342@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess
Subject: Re: Computers & chess ethics
 <seP4=in0BwxV5ot1Bc@transarc.com>
 <palane.711820878@pv7428.vincent.iastate.edu>

In following part of this computer-versus-human thread, I encountered a few
points that I would like to address:

1) comparison of computer and human memory: it has been stated that computers
   have 'perfect memory.' In a sense I agree, in that data decay in using
   magnetic mediums is very (10 raised to some two- or three-digit number)
   unlikely; in practice, though, a computer might miss a transposition if
   it is playing the opening through use of move-orders and not comparing
   by position what it has in memory against the actual game position or
   analysis that it is carrying out. Another problem is that the computer
   might not catch a 'near match' where a piece is positioned in a slightly
   different position. I think that it takes an understanding of the positions
   to judge if the difference between the positions is irrelevant or vital.
   'Understanding' is one thing where humans have an *unfair* advantage !

   Another problem with programs that rely heavily on using stored data is
   that a change in software can sometimes lead to the program being unable
   to access data that it once was able to. An example of this would be
   where a change in the pattern-recognition algorithms leads to the
   program less effectively scaling matches for some positions; this is
   also a type of computer 'forgetting.'

   On human 'forgetting': some believe that the problem resides primarily
   in storage and decay, whereas others believe that it is a problem of
   failure to retrieve; the last time I studied this (near 1988) psychologists
   had not come up with a relatively conclusive answer, and I think part
   of the problem is that sometimes recall takes minutes, hours, days, ...
   ..., years, decades, ... and how can you prove that it never will happen?
   (The point here is that if you always managed to output the sought-for
   information, even if it took alot of time, you might be able to make the
   case that the problem lies in the retrieval process(es), for the info
   was always in storage - it sometimes just takes alot of time to find it.)

2) I don't think that programers are creating chess programs to become
   fabulously wealthy (I doubt if the grants are that substantial!), and
   chess computers are not 'taking away' our 'royal game' - quite the contrary,
   through training against them around our 9-to-5 drudgery we can become
   better players than we could without them. I approach chess as a sport,
   and so I don't want to play them in regular tournaments; special
   'human vs computer' matches would be interesting!

                                                       See ya!
                                                        Bert

........................................................................
: Bertrand L. Wilson                :                                  :
: Department of Linguistics         : "Chess, like love, has the power :
: University of Illinois at Chicago :   to make men happy."            :
:                                   :                                  :
: U55342@UICVM.UIC.EDU              :                     Tartakover   :
:...................................:..................................: