Re: computer-go: Engineering (was: Most simple Go rules)

[Robert Jasiek <jasiek@xxxxxxxx>]

Mark Boon wrote:
> But I do prefer the Japanese rules in practise (for humans, that is).

Still wondering why:)

> If I somehow always magically had exactly
> 180 stones in my bowl at the start of a game (and not lose any during),
> without needing some weird contraption, I would probably prefer the Ing
> rules.

IIUYC, you seem to consider only exactly such rulesets that are
already in use somewhere? If so, what about New Zealand rules?

> I believe most of the really bad stuff, like point fractions in seki,
> have been fixed.

You like to ignore rules flaws in a way that pretends their
non-existence. I speak of the ko rules in this case. I
understand that you do ignore flaws if the majority of players
using a ruleset also ignores them and also pretends their
non-existence. In case of Ing rules it is easy to do so 
because one simply assumes them to have a superko rule or
instead to have a basic ko rule. However, I do not understand
how you ignore the scoring flaws of Japanese rules. How do
you actually score if you use Japanese rules? Do you use
rules at all if you score Japanese style? IMO, you merely
pretend to use Japanese rules while in fact you use territory
scoring in a way a community's common sense tells you to do.
Is that right?

> These two rule-sets are always highly criticised here for their theoretical
> flaws. But they are used all around the world by millions of people who are
> all not even aware of all their intricacies.

This is the great pretence. It is not the rulesets that are used
but some communities' common senses. It is the beginners who
suffer the most because they neither understand the rulesets nor
the common sense quickly. In the long run, also the communities
suffer because of fewer beginners than might be possible
otherwise.

> And still they manage to bring
> a game of Go to an end, each and every time, without any major problems.

The reason is availability of highly developed common sense.

> Discussing rules in theory is fine by me, but when we're discussing
> practical rules to play by, be it for computers or humans, any theoretically
> sound rule that makes it more complicated to finish a game, even if that
> complication is minor, is useless.

So IIUYC, since you ignore all rule texts, you do not mind to
overrule them by having a protokoll game end handling for all
of them that violates some of them but comes to a solution
where practice often agrees theory, not as far as the game end
methods are concerned but at least as far as the score is
concerned?

> What it all comes down to is a reasonably reliable program to decide which
> stones are dead.

Do you prohibit a program to know life and death better than
your arbiter protocol? In case of Japanese scoring you have to
be careful not to discriminate the programs scoring best.

> Oh, by the way, I don't know what the "pass-for-ko" rule is in the Japanese
> ruling, but I doubt I'll ever need to. It's certainly no reason for me to
> assume the Japanese rules are unusable.

This is some evidence for my remarks above that you do not play
using rules but that you play using communities' common senses.

--
robert jasiek