Re: computer-go: A problem with understanding lookahead

[Vincent Diepeveen <diep@xxxxxxxxx>]

At 03:50 AM 1/19/01 +0100, you wrote:
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: Vincent Diepeveen <diep@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>To: <computer-go@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>Sent: Friday, January 19, 2001 1:24 AM
>Subject: Re: computer-go: A problem with understanding lookahead
>
>
>> At 11:18 PM 1/18/01 +0100, you wrote:
>> >
>> >----- Original Message -----
>> >From: Don Dailey <drd@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> >To: <computer-go@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> >Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2001 10:02 PM
>> >Subject: Re: computer-go: A problem with understanding lookahead
>> >
>> >
>> >>
>> >> You obviously are not familiar  with the computer chess world, because
>> >> "counting  material" is a  horrible evaluation  function and  does not
>> >> lead to "sophisticated positional judgement" in modern programs
>> >
>> >The qualification of 'horrible' is rather relative of course. There's no
>Go
>> >program that has an evaluation that comes even close to the precision of
>> >counting material in Chess, and I don't think there will be for quite
>some
>> >time.
>>
>> I think this is not true Mark, of course you need to burn
>> more system time for evaluation as the board is bigger,
>> but i think the only difference is the branching factor.
>>
>
>Well, we disagree on this point then. I think relatively speaking currently
>all go programs make evaluation errors on a regular basis that misjudge the
>position by a chess-piece or worse. I don't think this discrepancy is
>covered by the deeper search simple-minded chess-programs do.
>
>    Mark

The basic problem is that you look to chess as a beginner,
for me GO is a very simple game. Just throw a few stones on the
board calculate some area and group influences and that's it.
O yeah, of course take care a group doesn't get hung!

So the basic evaluation though burning more system time is
not much difference from GO and chess.

In chess a material only search will lose from any chessplayer
who is playing in a chessclub.

Material is an important factor, but more important is to
develop near the center. Even a piece less in beginnersgames
is not importantthen.

Basically we talk about a real strong approach of go for your
GO program versus a beginners approach for chess, whereas i
have the same for go.

My vision is that making a go program is dead simple, but that
the only problem is the branching factor!

You don't even need to take into account king safety
for example, the most important and hardest to calculate
factor of a chessprogram. In my program it can be worth
30 pawns of compensation!

Some programs nowadays lose games to other programs and to
mankind, BECAUSE they sacrafice a pawn for nothing,
whereas in GO sacraficing a few stones is no big deal
as you have plenty!

Greetings,
Vincent