Chess grandmaster hid an iPod touch in the bathroom to cheat during tournaments

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 63
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    sog35 wrote: »
    not even close to the same thing.

    For the olympics its about the form and the grace of the action.

    its completely the same thing.

    by your logic we should stop playing baseball against each other because mechanical pitchers and batters can do it better than people. yet we still do, and it has nothing to do w/ form & grace but about the thrilling sense of competition people feel when playing or watching people doing things.
  • Reply 22 of 63
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    Using an iPod in a chess tournament is more like using steroids in athletics: the issue isn't that machines are better blah blah, but because it's cheating in competitive sports

    but that isnt the point being discussed. sog claims we should stop human chess competitions because a machine can do it better. that humans shouldnt compete with themselves if machines can do it better. which, if one were to subscribe to this unusual world view, would render most sports obsolete. obviously, it's a dumb argument, which tundra was showing via an example (olympics -- machines can perform many of these feats better than humans).
  • Reply 23 of 63
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    again you are totally missing the point.

     

    With baseball its not just about the ball getting hit far.  Its about the grace of movement.  The sweet swing.  The powerful motion of the pitcher.  The athsetics of the running and diving for a ball.  

     

    Are you seriously telling me chess has grace/power of movement?  Do you get a thrill seeing a chess player raise his hand and move a chess piece?  hell no.  Its 100% about the mind and computation.  Something a computer is way better at.


     

    The anti-intellectualism in this comment is disturbing.

  • Reply 24 of 63
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    so why is this grandmaster using an iPod then?




    Chess programs are mostly giant databases of past games played by humans. Opening moves, Mid-game and end-game moves are parts of huge databases of possible scenarios. In this case the grandmaster was likely using the iPod to pull up and analyze the situation, not tell him what his next move was. Contrary to your assertions that it’s 100% mind and computation it isn’t. The U.S. Chess Championship was held in St. Louis, Missouri (I live close to St. Louis and have visited the St. Louis Chess club several times) this past week. I can tell you it was very exciting to watch, very popular locally, and a nail biter. Like any sport chess players try to psyche out their opponents, mistakes are made, there are gasps from the spectators, the drama and tension are very real. 

     

    Your dismissal of the human element is disturbing. No wonder Steven Hawking, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates are raising alarm bells about AI being a danger to the human race if left unchecked and uncontrolled. 

  • Reply 25 of 63
    shenshen Posts: 434member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Leonard View Post

     



    And thus starts the downfall of human kind.  When you depend on machines for everything, what do you do when you don't have those machines. 

     

    Never depend on computer apps to do your work for you.  You use a spreadsheet to do all your calculations for you.  You should know how to do all those calculations yourself and you should be able to double check that your spreadsheet is correct. 




    Starts?!?

     

    It is thinking like that you replied to that got us where we are today. Most of my students don't know anything about art, science, religion, history, ethics or politics. And in every case it is because they think the answer can be found quickly and easily. "I don't know, let me google it" seems to be the mantra of the day. The idea that those answers are a great tool, but that being able to think about those answers in an intelligent, creative, organized and systematic way is still necessary is something they just don't understand.

     

    And the more time I spend teaching them, the more I sound like a bitter old man when I complain about "kids today" damn it!

  • Reply 26 of 63
    crimguycrimguy Posts: 124member
    sog35 wrote: »
    Not on this level.  As a game, fine.  As a profession?  That's just silly.  When some of the best players in the world can be beaten by a 99 cent App on your phone I think its time to move on.  This is like having professional arthimetic competitions.  

    Actually that's a free app :D. Stockfish. One of the best chess engines out there. It is very powerful, and I use it to analyze games as well (just not while I'm playing).

    People have been cheating at chess for as long as there's been chess. Computers are too common as well sadly enough.

    It's a shame that so many now dismiss chess professionals as useless because a chess program is stronger than they are. It is still a remarkable talent, and there is some incredible beauty in the game.
  • Reply 27 of 63
    markbyrnmarkbyrn Posts: 661member

    That will teach him for not using a passcode or using a simple one. 

  • Reply 28 of 63
    crimguycrimguy Posts: 124member
    lkrupp wrote: »

    Chess programs are mostly giant databases of past games played by humans. Opening moves, Mid-game and end-game moves are parts of huge databases of possible scenarios. In this case the grandmaster was likely using the iPod to pull up and analyze the situation, not tell him what his next move was. Contrary to your assertions that it’s 100% mind and computation it isn’t. The U.S. Chess Championship was held in St. Louis, Missouri (I live close to St. Louis and have visited the St. Louis Chess club several times) this past week. I can tell you it was very exciting to watch, very popular locally, and a nail biter. Like any sport chess players try to psyche out their opponents, mistakes are made, there are gasps from the spectators, the drama and tension are very real. 

    Your dismissal of the human element is disturbing. No wonder Steven Hawking, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates are raising alarm bells about AI being a danger to the human race if left unchecked and uncontrolled. 

    That's really not true. All chess apps have an opening book but beyond move 20 or so (sometimes as early as move 6!) the engine is thinking about the move. No database. There are endgame tablebases, but they only come into play when there are six or seven pieces left. The vast majority of commercial chess apps (and all iOS apps) do not have access to these tablebases unless you subscribe to them. They are quite large. 5 piece is gigabytes, 6 piece is terabytes.
  • Reply 29 of 63
    eightzeroeightzero Posts: 3,056member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by lkrupp View Post

     

    Your dismissal of the human element is disturbing. No wonder Steven Hawking, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates are raising alarm bells about AI being a danger to the human race if left unchecked and uncontrolled. 


    Oh, I might not be so proud of The Human Race. We are irrational, dangerous, unpredictable, and destructive. Replacing ourselves with electronic analogs might be a productive step in evolution.

  • Reply 30 of 63
    nolamacguy wrote: »
    but that isnt the point being discussed. sog claims we should stop human chess competitions because a machine can do it better. that humans shouldnt compete with themselves if machines can do it better. which, if one were to subscribe to this unusual world view, would render most sports obsolete. obviously, it's a dumb argument, which tundra was showing via an example (olympics -- machines can perform many of these feats better than humans).

    reductio ad absurdum?
  • Reply 31 of 63
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    sog35 wrote: »
    The day a computer can win in Jepoardy is the day I will stop watching Jepoardy.

    If you watched the show with Watson IBM vs the Jepoardy champions.  So obvious it was rigged for Watson.  None of the questions required the use of word play (Before and After) or creative thinking (puns, word combinations, ect).  Plus Watson was not using voice recognition to hear the questions but rather was getting fed a digital code.  Any Jepoardy champ can tell you they know 90% of the answers but the trick is the first to ring in.  Watson had an unfair advantage because he was getting the questions immediately while the contestants had to listen for the entire question first.

    Jeopardy with only computers might be fun though. Surely Samsung and or Google have a Watson copy in the wings?
  • Reply 32 of 63
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    And that's why I play poker.
  • Reply 33 of 63
    dasanman69 wrote: »
    And that's why I play poker.


    1000
  • Reply 34 of 63
    slurpyslurpy Posts: 5,382member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    Not on this level.  As a game, fine.  As a profession?  That's just silly.  When some of the best players in the world can be beaten by a 99 cent App on your phone I think its time to move on.  This is like having professional arthimetic competitions.  


     

    Sorry, completely disagree. Don't know what the hell a computer's chess performance has to do with human competition. The entire point is strategy and human skill. The fact that a computer can make billions of calculations per second has no bearing on that. 

  • Reply 35 of 63
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    yup.  Not even the greatest computers in the world can beat poker champs consistently




    Because poker is a game of chance, not because humans have some kind of enhanced problem solving.

  • Reply 36 of 63
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    yup.  Not even the greatest computers in the world can beat poker champs consistently


     

    Maybe because poker is a game of chance, and chess is a game of strategy? 

     

     

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    IMO Chess tournements are up there with Spelling Bee's and Arthmetic competitions.  




    "Spelling Bee's and Arthmetic"

  • Reply 37 of 63
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    LOL.  Spoken like someone who does not play Poker much.  Tell poker pro's who rake in millions a year that its just a game of chance.  Poker is a game of chance, probability, instinct, intuition, and guts.  A human player would be able to crush a computer in poker because the computer won't know how to bluff or know how to read a players patters/tells/style of play.


     

    That's a perfectly legitimate argument, but it doesn't change the fact that poker is a game of chance. Scott Seiver can play the game perfectly and still bust if the deck gives up the wrong card at the wrong time.

  • Reply 38 of 63
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    bobjohnson wrote: »
    Maybe because poker is a game of chance, and chess is a game of strategy? 

    Yet the one with the best chance of winning can be strategically made to forfeit that chance.
  • Reply 39 of 63
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    If poker is just a game of chance how come we have poker pro's who make hundreds of thousands of dollars every year for decades?  Are they just super lucky individuals?  


     

    No, they're just better at thinking analytically and logically (two things a computer excels at, by the by) than the majority of their opponents. Let's not forget that a foundational component of poker strategy is mentally calculating the odds of the draw (something else that computers excel at.) 

  • Reply 40 of 63
    Quote:



    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    I just played another 10 hands against this so called poker supercomputer.  I won again.

     

    http://poker-play.srv.ualberta.ca/

     

    I'm sorry but even as a novice I can read what the computer is doing.  I don't even think the computer even knows how or when to bluff.  And it has no idea when I'm bluffing.


     

    I don't really understand what point you're trying to make.

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