Re: [computer-go] Search = Bad!

["Frank de Groot" <frank@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

From: "Paul Pogonyshev" <pogonyshev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

>From your point of view, chess, Amazons and all other two-player
deterministic board games with full knowledge should be solvable by
``pondering'' on fractals and deriving a ``magical'' mathematical
formula that is easy to compute.  Somehow, I seriously doubt that's
possible.


As a naside, I am firmly convinced that the reason that comp. Go is in a
slump is the ego of the Go players.

You for example, are not interested in the idea of Go as a fractal, because
it is not your own idea.

Therefore you assume that the person coming forward with the idea has a low
intelligence.

Thsi becomes clear from your allegation (confabulation) that I claimed that
there was an "easy to compute" formula. I alledged that there was a formula.
I never said it was "easy to compute".

My guess is that the formula would take infinite - 1 operations to computer
perfectly (accurately), but that, for example, a hundred billion CPU cycles
would be enough to keep withing the path that leads to victory, as long as
you start woth a position that is already won.

And yes, I think all games I know of of full information are fractals and
yes, I as a chess player think that the game of chess has nothing to do with
capturing, king safety, pawn structure, development of pieces etc. but ONLY
with navigating the fractal space.

The fact that Chess is simple enough that a surrogate method works (search
with pruning, using heuristics for an evaluation function), is not proof
that my opinion about this is incorrect.

In comp. Go such a primitive and inefficient method will not work.

I suggest finding & defining the regularity in Go-fractal space by
pre-computing a few small board sizes and analyzing what the fractals have
in common, then to derive a formula (I am bad at mathematics but this
formula will be huge, it will have many variables and recursive or whatever,
in any case it will take a terribly long time to compute).

The really exciting thing about solving small boards is not that it "has
been done" and a record has been broken, (time-wise or size-wise), the real
interest lies in comparing the fractal space of ascending sizes and finding
the regularities so that general rules can be derived for navigating that
fractal space.

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