Essent 06 r2

Excellent comments Mig. Exactly my feelings. (Is that why I think they are excellent? heh)

But it's the reason why I hardly ever have a program running when observing top level chess. Not sure if it adds anything to my bit over 2400+ level of play, but you maintain that artistic human feeling to chess. You compare uncertainties and probabilities and chances of success and such, which are all of course subjective. How many games has GM Morozevich won via objectively worse positions (even lost if you ask Rybka) against 2600-2700 rated GMs? What would Hydra say about the combinations young Tal played?

To be honest, some of the (C) kibitzers on ICC (and elsewhere on the net) have lost their comprehension of this human dimension. And it's bit frustrating at times and the +censor command may come handy.

Will always love chess for this human duel, even if computers are playing at 3000 elo strenght in year 2040. Wasting hours on playing 3 0 r on the net no doubt.

Off-topic:
A new interview with Rublevski and Motilev about the match backstage:
http://e3e5.com/interview/article.html?637

You bring up a really good point, Mig. I was reading the notes put up at Chessbase, and they say this at the critical position:

"Now a normal continuation would be 35...Rxc8 36.Rxc8 Rxd6 37.exd6 Qd2 (but not 37...Qg4, which loses) with a perpetual to follow. We don't know what Topalov had in mind when he played 35...Nf4?"

"Normal continuation"?!?!? I read that and I thought that the position after Qd2 was a standard pattern I should have learned from Fred Reinfeld.

Your comments, Mig, put that variation in perspective.

I agree on all points re: computer evaluations, while objective, not providing the whole picture. Unlike GM evals, which can be very subjective (Topalov or say, Taimanov, or that guy down at the club, always think they are winning), but seem to paint a broader picture of what is happening at the board.

Should people turn off their engines though while watching live GM games? Perhaps, I never watch games with an engine or GM commentary, as I find it immensley satisfying to guess moves on my own. I think it depends on what someone is trying to get out of watching live GM games - which I don't think is improvement of their own chess, because there are much better ways, but simply entertainment, which might include snickering at the GM who just missed a tactic.

Long anti-computer rant from Mig, he is getting old and falling behind the times. I guess that with something similar the crocodiles consolated themselves when they saw the first humans walking on the planet.."Let them get into the marsh we will show them the worth of big jaws over big skulls..No thanks !"

according to this article in Scientific American
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=00010347-101C-14C1-8F9E83414B7F4945

The Expert Mind
Studies of the mental processes of chess grandmasters have revealed clues to how people become experts in other fields as well
By Philip E. Ross

"...the proliferation of chess prodigies in recent years merely reflects the advent of computer-based training methods that let children study far more master games and to play far more frequently against master-strength programs than their forerunners could typically manage. Fischer made a sensation when he achieved the grandmaster title at age 15, in 1958; today's record-holder, Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine, earned it at 12 years, seven months."

I agree on all points re: computer evaluations, while objective, not providing the whole picture. Unlike GM evals, which can be very subjective (Topalov or say, Taimanov, or that guy down at the club, always think they are winning), but seem to paint a broader picture of what is happening at the board.

Should people turn off their engines though while watching live GM games? Perhaps, I never watch games with an engine or GM commentary, as I find it immensley satisfying to guess moves on my own. I think it depends on what someone is trying to get out of watching live GM games - which I don't think is improvement of their own chess, because there are much better ways, but simply entertainment, which might include snickering at the GM who just missed a tactic.

Being a patzer (2100+ in the past), I always run en engine, if the game result really matters for me, like during the recent WC match. When I watch a game just for pleasure, there is no need for an engine, of course.
I have to confess, that since September, I kibitz every Topalov's game with engine, because his loss would bring me much more pleasure than any other fire on board. I hope, this is temporary, but this is truth I can't resist :-(

Looks like he's on -2 again.
Mr Topalov complaining about any toilet issue yet to get a free point ?? :p

Shockingly enough, I find myself agreeing with Mig a lot of late (or maybe Mig agreeing with me :)) - first Elista, then Mexico next year and now this.

I would add that it's not just the comp use by amateurs, I think everyone is using them and that includes GMs giving online commentary in playchess, ICC or Susan's blog. If a deep computerized move is missed by the player, it is classified as a blunder by the GM commentrators and everyone starts parroting the same.

I think amateurs following GMs using computers is as much responsible for this trend as their own use of comps.

Kapalik

Well, I love to see on the computer

that Polgar could have crushed Topalov a first time, missed it OY VEH

then Polgar could have crushed Topalov a second time, missed it again OY VEH OY VEH

then Polgar finally crushed Topalov HOORAY HOORAY HOORAY !!!

Vlad, any chance of getting an English condensation of the highlights from the interview?

Be sure not to miss 19 ... Nxe4!! by Mamedyarov in today's game against Sokolov.

How Mamedyarov managed to calculate through all the complications to see that Sokolov could not avoid losing the exchange is beyond me.

Some kibitzers have said that Mamedyarov was seeing deeper than the chess engines(!), which thought that Sokolov was better after 19 ... Nxe4!!.

And be sure to look at the final position: White c1-rook and e3-knight forked by Black d2-bishop, and White e3-knight and e5-bishop forked by Black e4-rook. A pleasing geometry, like the end of many Capablanca games.

In Polgar-Topalov, anybody take a look at 30...Nf3 instead of ...Rc4 (as played)? I don't know if it saves Black (doubtful), but at least it serves to deflect White's rampaging Q...

I think I just found the answer to my idea: if 30...Nf3, simply 31. Qg3 hits d6 as well as the hapless N. Black's lost no matter what he does, looks like...

Before game 5 in Elista I didn't dislike Topalov at all, but now I have to say it is indeed enjoyable to see Topalov lose.

Those interviews of Kramnik seconds are indeed interesting.

Computer analysis allows one to realize
how full of blunders and missed opportunities
the GM-games really are.

Polgar missed a great chance to crush Topa early on with the exquisite 20.Nf5! sacrifice after Topa's 19..Nc5. (instead she played 20.Bg3)

Ran the "Kramnik seconds" article through babelfish (which is solely responsible for any translation errors).

They say it was an error not to protest the forfeit; that they hadn't read the contract attentively.

On the morning of Game 5, Kramnik thought they were just screwing with him, that they'd run 20 minutes off the clocks and then open the toilet door. Couldn't believe they'd forfeit him.

By games 8-9 they were worn out (esp. Kramnik) from all the off-the-board tension. They were optimistic about Kramnik's chances in general, and esp. his chances in the rapid games.

They couldn't figure out the roles of some of Topalov's team members, unless it was to plan off-the-board trouble.

They survived the stressful time without alcohol.

How soon before Scientific American does an article about how bearing children improves a woman's chess playing skills?

Go, Judit, go!

I think Mig's comments are spot on. But it's not hard to understand the impulse behind patzers with computers. The one reason people seek commentary in the first place is to find out what's "really" going on in the game. GM's used to provide that insight. Nowadays, computers will really *really* tell you what's going on. As Mig points out, this tells you nothing about the difficulty or likelihood of finding the given moves -- nothing of the human drama of the game. For that you need interpretation (and patzers by definition lack this interpretive skill). But the impulse has never changed: people just want to know what's going on. It's difficult to see them giving up on this.

I wonder if an analogy is possible to other forms of (apparently) absolute knowledge -- such as those offered by various medical testing procedures. One big difference between the States and Britain is that in the US there's a culture of running exhaustive tests at the drop of a hat; in Britain, where finances are tighter, medicine is seen as more of an "art".

Now there are all sorts of sociological issues bound up in this analogy, so it can't be pushed too far, but it's worth pointing out that, as far as I know: (a) it's not clear that there are real medical benefits from completely thorough testing: many things are found -- and need to be treated, often invasively -- that might never to be dealt with at all; and (b) someone still needs to interpret the results of all this testing. The information gained has only the appearance of "objective", absolute knowledge.

My opinion on all this is that, no matter how devastatingly accurate the chess computer's analysis might be, and no matter how alluring the idea, we still need sensitive, skilled experts to explain that analysis to us, exactly in the way Mig has suggested. Unfortunately, someone needs to let the ICC patzers in on this...

GM Rublevsky, Kramnik's second:

THE CREW

-After the "boss" lost game 9, which was second loss in a row - and without a fight - have you had any dark thoughts? Be honest.

-I don't know... Still, there was a feeling of confidence that Volodya will win the match. Because before that he played a couple of games just to get over with them, the level was... blah. He played like an average master. And we even thought at the time - "even if he loses a couple, it won't be that bad", because afterwards he would start playing normally, because his back would be against the wall. Was scared not about game 9, but the one before it, game 8, because he lost with white. The situation was, kinda, unclear... But if he lost with white, what's the conclusion? We were scared that he would go into a shell and start playing defensively even with white. But he happened to lose the second game in a row. I can't remember two such games in a row in his career. What was that? I don't know how to call that. As they say, "words cannot express..."

-All the more reason for the team to have dark thoughts. Topalov was moving forward like a tank.
-Well, Topalov only had the only chance from the very beginning! Of course he was going forward like a tank. He did some good work before the match and then started attacking. He does certain things very well at the board. 100% well. But certain other things he could not do before, and he still haven't learned (at least not on Volodya's level)! This is just my own opinion, of course. That is why we were sure that if Volodya got his normal game back, he would win the match.

-In one of my reports I wrote that Rublevsky was the "soul" of the team. After game 9, did you happen to use some non chess methods to cheer up the boss? Maybe tell him a funny joke to get his mind of the match?
-Well, to be honest, he did everything by himself. He pulled himself together. It was clear that those two games were "not real him", and he himself had to understand what was going on with him.

-So, where have the reserves come from? Kramnik looked completely different in game 10.
-He had no other choice.
-Yes.
-He could not just "fire back" and react anymore. He had to become more agressive and tie the score. And we were not afraid of tie-break from the start. We thought, the match will last one more day - and that is it. And I thought Volodya had even better chances in rapid than in classical. Because I knew what Topalov was like in rapid, as I played him a lot. It was important not to psych oneself out and to get into a right mood and that's it. I had not doubted the victory.

According to well-informed sources, Judit Polgar does not use the same toilet with all the other players, instead going to a different one where neither Topalov nor Danailov were allowed to enter while she was there! This is highly suspicious! They should definitely file a complaint about it.

The best example you could take, mig, is from todays Polgar vs. Topalov. On the server some people said Judith wins after 20.Nf5! I was a big surprised since I didn't see it, and both players didn't see it. After that I checked it with the comps, and it was really +3.
I find it sometimes a bit disappointing when people on the server say x or y is winning, but do not mention it is the opinion of their computer.

Theorist, your medical analogy fails to impress.

Judit, you are pretty much the phattest classic ever!

"They survived the stressful time without alcohol."

And what is the momentous impact of that fact, which makes it worth mentioning?

Thanks, Russianbear!

Well, Topalov Fan, I myself would have been sorely tempted.

Before game 5 in Elista I didn't dislike Topalov at all, but now I have to say it is indeed enjoyable to see Topalov lose.

--Posted by: Russianbear at October 23, 2006 13:58

It's hard for me to root for Topalov now because everyone hates him.

20.Nf5!! was a most beautful move but it would have taken a Mikhail Tal kind of mind to think of examining such sac move ( or just 10 sec on my 133 MHz- 32 RAM, 8 years old, laptop).

Well, so much about Topa and Judith.
The only hope left for us is that Kramnik will defeat Fritz 10 with his positional chess style of no risks and no tactics allowed.

That will be the real match to watch. The rest is taking malicious pleasure in pointing out the faulty human mind.

The best example you could take, mig, is from todays Polgar vs. Topalov. On the server some people said Judith wins after 20.Nf5! I was a big surprised since I didn't see it, and both players didn't see it. After that I checked it with the comps, and it was really +3.

--- Posted by: freitag at October 23, 2006 14:48

Could you please post the winning line after 20 Nf5! ? Thanks.

Just curious: what's the point in attaching !! or ! to computer moves? Isn't that a relic of an "old-fashioned" mentality?

the "theorist" needs "translations" from the old mentality to the new :

!! = +3
! = +1.5

both are "+-" of course

Gooo Topa, the best in the world!!!!!!!!!
An amazing comeback is on the way.
Go Topa!

The first (and only) chess event I ever attended, other than one or two little high school things I played in, was the Kasparov-Kramnik world championship match in London 2000. I flew over to watch the last few games. The first game, I wanted to take in the whole experience myself so I didn't even listen to the commentator earphones. I highly recommend it. It was a fabulous experience and very different from hanging onto the coattails of the announcers. Of course, the whole game, Garry's mother Klara (a few seats over) stared/glared mostly at me. I think maybe she thought I was a hypnotist or something, with no knowledge of chess, since I didn't seem to even care enough to wear earphones. She was the only other audience member not wearing earphones, I think.

My understanding is that ! or !! are not conventionally attached to moves that simply change the evaluation of a position, but rather are given to moves that require unusual insight, imagination, brilliance, or thought: none of which a computer possesses.

gmnotyet: It's hard for me to root for Topalov now because everyone hates him.

Well, for me it is the opposite. It will make it really sweeter
if/when he wins. One thing I admire about Topalov is that he has the
heart of a lion and is not afraid to play, lose or win. The sheep
though has no appreciation of such matters and tends to flock
whichever way they point it.

D.

"Could you please post the winning line after 20 Nf5! ? Thanks."

20.Nf5 exf5 21.Bxe5 Bxe5 22.Qxf5 and the rook h7 is lost
If you ask me a grandmaster could (should) see this since it's only three moves.

This tournament may be too short for a Topalov Comeback (TM). With only four rounds to go he can only finish on +1 at best.

..Bxf8?? /Rxg4+ Bg7/ Qc7 +- is only 2 and both Kramnik and Topa missed in game 2 of Elista

"Could you please post the winning line after 20 Nf5! ? Thanks."

20.Nf5 exf5 21.Bxe5 Bxe5 22.Qxf5 and the rook h7 is lost
If you ask me a grandmaster could (should) see this since it's only three moves.

-- Posted by: freitag at October 23, 2006 15:40

Yes, the tactical god Mamedyarov would have seen it. :-)

Continuation of my translation of Rublevsky interview:

OF FREAKS AND MEN

-I cannot avoid the situation surrounding game 5. Probably the situation was seen diferently from here, from the outside than it was seen there, "inside". Quite a few peopl - and what people !- were suggeting packing and leaving ASAP. Karpov gave that advice and so did Korchnoi. People were saying, to hell with this match! If it turned out to be so ugly, one had to leave; health is more important than some title. Why was it decided to continue the struggle?
-The decision was made totally by one man, Volodya. He decided everything himself. Us- we considered the match to be over. We did not even prepare for game 6, for who wants to do useless work?

-Ok.
-And it was our mistake not to file a protest after game 5, I agree. We didn't read the contract carefully enough. But it was a normal human response, if you can put it that way. Because when they treat you like a pig, you forget about everything, of course. Moreover, Volodya was sure that game 5 would happen anyway. And we prepared the normal way. In the morning we were told: yada yada yada, some sort of toilet protest was filed. Volodya said: don't take it seriously, I am not going to play like this, meaning without toilet, they will open it and everything will be ok, so let's prepare calmly. He was sure, they will steal 15-20 minutes from him, and then what? Then they will open the bathroom and the game will continue normally. He did not believe that people would do such a base thing.

-If I understand you correctly, at the time he did not realize that the bathroom thing was a major provocation?
-Yes! That's right! He thought that maybe they won't start the game in time, maybe steal a little of his time. But then everything will be ok.

-It is a very important detail, in my opinion. Because it is clear you were expecting provocations from the other side, but you didn't recognize that this one was the big one?
-No, we didn't recognize it. Noone simple could believe it. Noone believed their eyes. We thought that once Volodya will go, talk to the main arbiter, and say: what are you doing, read the contract, everything is written there, where are you looking at? Open the bathroom and let's play. What's the problem? We just could not believe on the human level that the bathroom thing can be so exagerrated.

"..Bxf8?? /Rxg4+ Bg7/ Qc7 +- is only 2 and both Kramnik and Topa missed in game 2 of Elista"

Yes, Topa is making a lot of mistakes lately. Is he playing blindfold (and opticians here?

Topa is making a lot mistakes lately but this is not the point here as Kramnik too missesd Qc7 (or Polgar now Nf5!!).

The point seems to be that tactical alertness is a big thing in OTB chess.
You almost can build your whole approach to chess on it (as Tal once did) .
It is a bit "mechanical", computer-like (sic!) sterotypical, but practical since there will always be such errors ( and accordingly opportunities) in an OTB game.

Rublevsky: Us- we considered the match to be over. We did not even prepare for game 6, for who wants to do useless work?

This surprises me. It was not a wise decision.

Jeff Sonas: nice story there. You got to be Dr. Zukhar :)

"It is a bit "mechanical", computer-like (sic!) sterotypical, but practical since there will always be such errors ( and accordingly opportunities) in an OTB game."

Those mistakes mainly happen when the position is "unusual". In Elista game 2 the position wasn't unusual but the move Qc7 is because both players were focussing on the king side. This is why they didn't see it.
In today's game the position was unusual with the black rook on h7. Human beings develop some kind of mental structures they tend to use and in this case it happened that the mental structure didn't match with the real situation. Maybe they were thinking the rook is still standing on h8 where it usually is.
This often happens in Fischer Random. I once had my King on f1 and the rooks on g1 and a1. With the king standing so close to the rook I thought it is castled, but then the opponent took a1 and I couldn't take back with rook g1. Bad luck.

We usually name it patterns. And this is the major issue when I try FRC ;-)

By the way, did anybody here manage to survive FRC vs. an engine for at least 15 moves? I usually lose before move 10 (I do not mean checkmate, I mean a hopeless position).

Maybe, but I for one keep missing tactics when I play against computer. Not the trivial ( typical, pattern-like) ones of course [as Bxh7+ followed by Ng5,Qh5 for example] but the rest ones...
and I lose :(

I guess all loses in chess can be explained by the position where the mistake occured being unusual for the loser.

I do not like to play against king's indian. Those structures do not match with my structure. You know the motive Nh5/f5, today played by Shaka, and Sokolov's position started to fell apart after Nf4 was following. Typically king's indian. I hate it.

Russianbear, what did Motylev say?

>typical king indian. I hate it.

Yes Nh5-Nf5 is typical in such structures ( just as Na5-Nc4 in French Defense, which is a KID on white squares, and also with the f5, respectively c5, pawn pushes, f-file, respectively c-file, counterplay, and f4,c4 squares to exploit as black etc.)

We will see, the real match to monitor closely is going to be Kramnik-Fritz 10, not this comedy of errors which is Essent, Topa and Polgar.

For instance Topa played very bad, patzer like, against Polgar. One of first lesson in chess is not to keep the king in the center, uncastled, where it is easy target for direct attack. Polgar just "explained" this Topa once more.

But by move 20 (20.Nf5) Kramnik would have long castled after first meeting 1.e4 with 1..e5 and Petroff ( or first exchanged the Qs if he wanted giving up castling as in Berlin).

We will see if playing correct, classical, chess
and aiming way beyond computer's horizon will make
any difference for Fritz 10 or Kramnik will go down as Adams.

Whatever the result it will be the starting point for a meaningful debate on CPU-chess versus carbon and water based brain.

Sorry, I should also have said 'Thank you, Russianbear!' on my own behalf, and, I am positive, on behalf of the entire audience here. I was just sitting on the edge of my chair reading those translations

I'm visitng the Kramnik match next month. Anyone wants an autograph?
Concerning the castling, this seems to be the new bulgarian school. Wouldn't surprise me if they change the Sofia rules. Not only offering draw is forbidden, also casteling.

I said to Feng (Mr Deep Blue) computers would be the death of chess and begged him to stop (its actually mentioned in his book) in the days when the internet was small. Of course it made no difference because the PCs became so powerful that Deep Blue is pretty much a historical irrelevance (but I think a factor in the reduction of chess sponsorship). It may ruin chess because people keep accusing others of cheating, I think the Topalov San Luis allegations and then the Kramnik Elista allegations are only the start of the sore loser excuses in this area.

I rely as much as anyone on a computer to analyse games these days and it does screw with your mind on the understanding of what's really going on but really does help with the short term tactical stuff (I call it spell checking for chess). It also produces lazy journalism which in part I also plead guilty to.

I said it would ruin the mystery of the game also (about table bases) and I maintain that point. Its really sad you don't have to work this stuff out for yourself.

But I would also add that players have also taken on board the lessons of computers. They see you can take on far more classical disadvantages than expected. They analyse openings and middlegames in advance using computers and that's changed the nature of play. Many, and Topalov is a good example of this, want to play razer sharply in order to lure their opponents into the abyss, but if they're off form the opposite happens.

Having said that Lasker was like that, there's a fantastic piece of analysis of one of the Lasker - Schlechter games in Draw! by Heidenfeld where they both try and lure each over the edge. I think GMs don't play this way against computers but understand because of computers they can try this against humans.

A month ago, Topalov was rated 2813.
Two days ago, 2798.
Yesterday, 2791.
And today, 2784.

"I do care more about being the number one on the rating lists."(Topalov)

Another idiot sentence by Topalov, from an interview just after Elista. It's quite funny to see his overinflated ego hit so violently by the wall of reality.

And justice for them all !!!

From playchess news, has not appeared on chessbase yet(?)

"Karpov says (in Mexico City!) he is glad that his compatriot Vladimir Kramnik won the world championship title in Elista, and says that he is definitely in favour of finding the world world champion in future in match play only. The knockout tournaments of FIDE must disappear – apparently the FIDE president has realised that we must return to the classical system."

Ok, here is the full version of http://e3e5.com Rublevsky interview:

-Congrtulations on the victory!
-Thanks.

-The match was so difficult and at times disgusting. In the end, it was both believable and unbelievable. How did it feel from the

inside?
-Our team got together for almost two months. First, a month of training camp and a month here in Elista. We got along so well it was

almost suprising. Understandably, we got a little tired of one another, but before, on the very first day we agreed that no matter what

the circumstances we won't take it out on one another. And everything went very smoothly.

-How did you split up the responsibilities? In one of my first reports I tried to guess who is doing what. But I wasn't sure I got

everything right. What was really the case?
-Whatever your job is called, that is what you did. The cook cooks, massage person does his own thing. And we work on chess. And within

the group of seconds, we didn't split the responsibilities; all of us worked on everything together.

-Did you jog together in the morning?
-We didn't even have a chance to play ping pong. No, we didn't jog. However, we did take walks in the evenings.

THE CREW

-After the "boss" lost game 9, which was second loss in a row - and without a fight - have you had any dark thoughts? Be honest.
-I don't know... Still, there was a feeling of confidence that Volodya will win the match. Because before that he played a couple of

games just to get over with them, the level was... blah. He played like an average master. And we even thought at the time - "even if he

loses a couple, it won't be that bad", because afterwards he would start playing normally, because his back would be against the wall.

Was scared not about game 9, but the one before it, game 8, because he lost with white. The situation was, kinda, unclear... But if he

lost with white, what's the conclusion? We were scared that he would go into a shell and start playing defensively even with white. But

he happened to lose the second game in a row. I can't remember two such games in a row in his career. What was that? I don't know how to

call that. As they say, "words cannot express..."

-All the more reason for the team to have dark thoughts. Topalov was moving forward like a tank.
-Well, Topalov only had just one chance from the very beginning! Of course he was going forward like a tank. He did some good work

before the match and then started attacking. He does certain things very well at the board. 100% well. But certain other things he could

not do before, and he still haven't learned (at least not on Volodya's level)! This is just my own opinion, of course. That is why we

were sure that if Volodya start to play on his level again, he would win the match.

-In one of my reports I wrote that Rublevsky was the "soul" of the team. After game 9, did you happen to use some non chess methods to

cheer up the boss? Maybe tell him a funny joke to get his mind off the match?
-Well, to be honest, he did everything by himself. He pulled himself together. It was clear that those two games were "not real him",

and he himself had to understand what was going on with him.

-So, where have the reserves come from? Kramnik looked completely different in game 10.
-He had no other choice.
-Yes.
-He could not just "fire back" and react anymore. He had to become more agressive and tie the score. And we were not afraid of tie-break

from the start. We thought, the match will last one more day - and that is it. And I thought Volodya had even better chances in rapid

than in classical. Because I knew what Topalov was like in rapid, as I played him a lot. It was important not to psych oneself out and

to get into a right mood and that's it. I had not doubted the (eventual) victory.

OF FREAKS AND MEN

-I cannot avoid the situation surrounding game 5. Probably the situation was seen differently from here, from the outside than it was

seen there, "inside". Quite a few people - and what people !- suiggested packing and leaving ASAP. Karpov gave that advice and so did

Korchnoi. People were saying, to hell with this match! If it turned out to be so ugly, one had to leave; health is more important than

some title. Why was it decided to continue the struggle?
-The decision was made totally by one man, Volodya. He decided everything himself. Us- we considered the match to be over. We did not

even prepare for game 6, for who wants to do useless work?

-Ok.
-And it was our mistake not to file a protest after game 5, I agree. We didn't read the contract carefully enough. But it was a normal

human response, if you can put it that way. Because when they treat you like dirt, you forget about everything, of course. Moreover,

Volodya was sure that game 5 would happen anyway. And we prepared the normal way. In the morning we were told: yada yada yada, some sort

of toilet protest was filed. Volodya said: don't take it seriously, I am not going to play like this, meaning without toilet, they will

open it and everything will be ok, so let's prepare calmly. He was sure, they will steal 15-20 minutes from him, and then what? Then

they will open the bathroom and the game will continue normally. He did not believe that people would do such a base thing.

-If I understand you correctly, at the time he did not realize that the bathroom thing was a major provocation?
-Yes! That's right! He thought that maybe they won't start the game in time, maybe steal a little of his time. But then everything will

be ok.

-It is a very important detail, in my opinion. Because it is clear you were expecting provocations from the other side, but you didn't

recognize that this one was the big one?
-No, we didn't recognize it. Noone simply could believe it. Noone believed their eyes. We thought that once Volodya will go, talk to

the main arbiter, and say: what are you doing, read the contract, everything is written there, where are you looking at? Open the

bathroom and let's play. What's the problem? We just could not believe on the human level that the bathroom thing can be so exagerrated.

FACE OFF

-So, game 5 was counted as a loss and the Appeals Comitee's decision was not in your favor. All the more reason for there to be simple

human desire to quit and to tell them off.
-But Volodya decided to continue the match. Probably, it was the right decision.

-Now we can say it was the right one. But what if he lost the match? All the journalists agreed on one thing - that Kramnik would not

prove that he was right in court. There could be some sort of decision in his favor as far as the money, but not the result.
-We understood that also. Noone is stupid. Everyone knew that they will not give him the title back. That is why his decision to stay

was a very brave one. If he lost the match by one point, lawyers would not be able to do anything. Leaving was an option, too. But the

way it turned out was even better.

-And now Kramnik is the main candidate for "Fair Play" award?
-I don't know. But I would really wish the chess world voiced its displeasure to Topalov and his people.

-Well, as you know, the chess world is not homogeneous, to say the least. And it would be naive to wait for consolidated reaction of

some sort.
-Agreed. Even if we will see some reaction, it probably will not last long.

-I will be very suprised if we see a universal reaction, even for a short time.
-I read a lot of books before the match. I read about Korchnoi matches, other scandals in World Championship matches. I thought it would

be useful to have some knowledge of that. But I can honestly say that I haven't come close to collecting as much crap as Danailov

managed to put together. And I want FIDE to finally rid itself of this roster of the Appeals Comitee.

-The one that "lost its face", as Japanese say ("to lose one's face" is a Russian expression that is borrowed from Japanese and it means

"to embarass oneself" -RB).
-I would say it never had it. I mean, there was one, but it always looked like ... that.

Thanks much for the translation, Russianbear. A really cool interview. Actually, in English to "lose face" (but not "lose one's face") means to be humiliated as well. Amazing how some idioms translate. =)

RB--

Thanks!

Why is Topalov playing only one week after a very stressful match? Not even Kasparov played a classical tournament just one week after one of his many matches.

I wonder if they could find a worthy replacement and let him have a rest ... is that possible? Or maybe Danailov needs to collect more money that didn't bother to make an absurd schedule for his player.

It must be very tough mentally to be playing a game and remembering all the tension he experienced one week ago. And especially if the opponents strive for tactical complications on the board, a lot of stamina is needed to hold on (curiously, both Polgar and Mamedyarov have such combinatorial and tactical style). Congratulations to Polgar (I hope to see here in Corus 2007) and well, this time, these losses of Topalov are "excusable" or might be considered atypical, so I hope for him he take a real vacation (or he might be in danger of pulling a Morozevich or Lahno in Corus -05,06 resp.-)...

The next year is going to be tough for Topalov. I remember him in San Luis or Corus pressing opponents in objectively drawn endgames, displaying a lot of energy ... the experience of the WCC match will remind other top GMs that that kind of pressure also affects Topalov and he is vulnerable to it; I imagine in 2007 lots of players will face Topalov with that attitude (like Aronian in the 123 move game in Linares), especially the younger ones.

PS: On Mig's comment about computers in live coverages, I guess is part of chess culture and a rational use of chess programs; as other sophisticated tools, they give people a false impression on how difficult is chess. As Kramnik correctly pointed out, this also has generated some unfair underestimation of the quality of todays players and lack of respect from some chess fans; also this has modified the way a top GM prepares today.

One way to see the lack of understanding of some chess fans who use computers in live coverages is when they start judging that some player is "winning" when the computer eval give a +0.7 advantage, after several moves of known theory... they turn the engines on since the beginning of the game!... I reccomend the earlier discussion on that issue in this blog -the link Mig provided-

Leko was complaining in San Luis that not Topalov plays that well, but the opponents play poorly against him. I can see some sense behind such comments -- it is perfectly likely that the opponents will have more time to understand his style and find effective countermeasures. The only thing going for Topalov is that he couldn't possibly be done as a chess player -- there are some fundamentals in his game that can certainly improve.

I won two school tournaments in the grades -- there was this super aggressive kid that realy stoked me at first and I lost my senses. Once I recovered I didn't drop another game against him. So, we'll see how things go.

On another note -- Topalov's losses will certainly open the apetite of the other super-GMs vis-a-vis Mexico -- perhaps, it is not Kramnik that is so strong, but rather Topalov is weak... I fully expect a soap opera to develop in the next months to an year regarding Mexico and the bearing it has on the title. I am ready to change the actors, seen too much Topalov fo now...

D.

D.

Motilev:
I am lucky, I did not have to blush!
(Q) What was the toughest moment during the match?
(A) Not that tough.. Just vague. The moment when Vladimir did not appear for game 5. And everything got freezed. Nothing was clear: will the match continue, will not... We still did preparation, but the uncertainty - what will happen? Should we pack bags, because the match is over? But may be, it can be still resolved? But how? And when? And will the game 5 be replayed?
(Q) Or present a point
(A) Well, this possibility was not even being considered. But finally this is what happened. The less possible variant, as it looked. May be, if I looked at the situation not as team Kramnik member, but as a regular fan, chess lover, I'd still insist on replay. Because this for too unfair, that both a point and white color were brought to Topalov without game. We all got tired these days extremely. Seconds, and, first of all, Vladimir. It was evident, Danailov excelled him in behind the stage play.
(Q) You know, it was obcious for all journalists. Danilov tirelessly ran from one negotiations house to another, and Topalov, wearing jeans and t-shirt, relaxed under the sun. And clearly enjoyed the life.
(A) He noted this in one of his interview. He said he was relaxing during these 3 or 4 days, and 'missed chess very much'. And Vlad during these days took so much load... I can say for myself. Me and Cerge Rublevsky were just sort of not being dirctly involved to the conflict. Just seat, do chess preparation - and stll got exhausted mentally. Got so exhausted that days, like nowhere before.
And this exhaust counted in games 8 and 9. It was seen, that Vlad was playing in the dumps. Mcuh below his level. Look at the game 9 opening - just horror! VLad himself can't explain what he had made. But what could he explain? This was result of his fatique, it is obvious.
After game 9 our wealth was really painful. The real essense was not in 2 games lost in a row. The play quality was depressing. It was not clear, how to improve. Very tough moment. It is miracle, Vladimir found his feet to overcome.
(Q) Even if not counting the Topalov's blunder in game10, it was obvous Kramnik is playing in a different mood.
(A) Vlad was playing good. Objectively the game was almost draw, but it required a precise play from black. And Topalov was not even clost to this precision. If comparing this game to 2 previous ones, it is like heaven and earth. It became easier now. But new problems arise: how to play 2 last games, which tactics to choose? The stress was high till the end., honestly
(Q) I already wrote before, that Kramnik chose very decent, honest persons to make his team. But for so lonf time 7 healthe males with personals habits and oddities... Can't believe, that fromd day one till the end everything was so smooth. There were moments for sure, when you'd like to wreck on otheres. How did you mange this?
(A) For me this was the first time. All of us are different, sharinga house, sometimes, there was no time to get out. I can't say I was surprised, but I was really impressed by the fact, that the team ambience was almost ideal. No single occurrence of raising voice. And there were moments with very high pressure on our nerves. It is hard to reproduce, how hetaed it was sometimes. And relationships were still excellent. We just rallied, esecially after all this dirt from the opponent's side. It is safe to say, we just came to believe to a wonder. And wonder happen.
(Q) After 2 losses, did time come for Rublevski to play his tricks?
(A) All the time. And before losses, and after. The main thing, nobody picked on others: what, why, how it happened... On the contrary, every night we took a walk with Vlad: Serge, me, Michel Ilieskas. From a trash bin to our building - was our usual trip. To restore our mental balance, so to say.
(Q) Haven't you walked away to prairie? It was just around the corner, and no trash bins.
(A) No. It was too dark, when we had a walk. It could end dismally. The roadway wa even, and we just made round trips. We are all merry fellows, and the mental atmoshpere during our trips was where it's at.
(Q) Rublevski said, you took alcohol prohibition during the match. I believe him but it is hard to imagine. Healthy males, under so much stress. And even without stress - for a whole month!
(A) Even 2 months if counting one taken for preparation before the match. And so what? For me it was easy, I don't take it seriously, just to bear a company.
And we decided on prohibition before the start. To prevent unforeseen. Somebody could take too much. Therefore, there was an agreement, and I can confirm it was easy to follow. And it was especially pleasant to call it off after the victory.
(Q) What about other usual male desires? Sexual continence?
(A) Even if there was something, I'd resist from disclosing. Team is a team. There are things to keep internal.
(Q) Looks like a friary.
(A) And the soul of this friary was our cook. Just a magician. Extra class expert. Later, during last games we used him like a heavy arm. As a charm. Brought him to games. We said: Victor, you do not have to cook, but shall appear in a playing hall. And he result: a win and two draws from position of strength.
(Q) A masseur. Did he serve only Kramnik, or anybody could ask for help?
(A) Any team member. I had some issues, and he helped me. Mihel also asked him for help, I know. He had never refused to anybody.
(Q) The mode of life was put right...
(A) but very monotonous. It is clear even from our walking trips.
(Q) During almost all games you never appeared in the playing hall, not even mentioning the press-center. Did not want to demonstrate your reactions, or were so busy with work?
(A) No, just tried to use these hours for rest. Because the time for next game preparation is from night till next morning, and we wanted to use the game time to take some rest. Because of this, there was no power to go and watch chess again.
(Q) Have you crossed with opponent's seconds?
(A) It is strange, but never. It looks they also worked hard, and tried to use every free minute for a relaxation. Took a seat, lay down, collect thoughts. And to work again. And this all - during every day.
(Q) Tne match is over. Can you say few words about the Bulgarian team actions, censored?
(A) It is clear, all thyese protests did not come from nowhere. Every single protest was a part of a general and throughly considered course of action. In my opinion, some meber of team Topalov were engaged to this activity only. Otherwise, nobody could get, what else they were doing.
The task was to unbalance Vlad. everybody knows: unlike Kasparov, or some other players, Kramnik does not need to hate an opponent to play good. It is well known, that, for example, Botvinnik could not play if did not feel hostile to an opponent. And when he was losing to Tal in the match (Tal was so excellent personality, it was impossible to be hostile to him), he suffered because could not find what to invent. And when after the match Botvinnik was aked how he treats Tal, Mikhail Moiseevich said "Yes, Tal is very pleasant man, but his uncle..." I.e., he found a way to utilize an anger.
Vladimir does not need this His own mental comfort is more important for him. And opponents did understand this very clearly. And they developed the campaign until it became just intolerable for any regular human, I guess. To some degree, they gained the point. We lost a point, white color, the black games in a row... Mental stability is not even worth mentioning. I have to admit, the bulgarian team did an excellent work.
(Q) And methods?
(A) What about methods? May be, they deemed that in a World Championship match any means to an end. But the justice triumphed, anyway.
(Q) Topalov - maginificent, big chess player. Should we count him as part of this dirty team, or leave him aside? Was it possible that the delegation managers said Veselin: "Folk, we are going to make something here, you do not pay attention and do your job". Or considering him innocent is too much? Danailov's line, and line of those members of Bulgarian delegation who were there for something obscure, is more or less obvious. But the Topalov's role in this case is not clear for me.
(A) I deem, but please note, that this is just my personal opinion, that all members of a delegation take responsibility for actions of any team member. If I was a second there, I'd feel a lack of comfort, and I understand that they did not have a direct relationship to what was happening. I deem, I was lucky to be a member of a team, where I had no case for blush with shame.
Regarding Topalov, may be, Danailov pushed him aside with strong will. But nobody prevented Topalov from voicing his opinion, if he had one, of course, and especially if this opinion was opposite to the Danilov's one. Nobody could prevent him from stepping afront, and saying "Enough!" But he did not do something like this.
I am not one of those who thirst for victory at any price. I am positive, that Kramnik, also, is not one of those. And Danailov's actions do damage first of all to his ward. Thousands of chess fans had respect to Topalov for his brilliant style. As for me, it is hard to believe that the outflow of the fan's love will not start now. If I was at Danailov's place, this would be the thing I'd think about first. Because people were fans of Topalov, not of Danailov. And whom they have to be fans for now?

I just re-read what I wrote. Blunders in every sentence are as brilliant as recent Topalov's games :-)
I'd have to re-read before publishing, of course, and clean the text, but it is too late to scream now ;-)

I teach college classes, and there are some students who have a very hard time writing essays that a) have proper spelling, b) have proper grammar, and c) have phrasing that gives them some sort of flow. Spell check and grammar check only go so far in this regard; it's necessary for them to have someone proofread their papers if they really want them to be of top quality.

The comparison of chess computers to spell checking, then, is quite accurate. There are some things that the computer can point out, but without the eyes of a human expert (not "expert" in the chess sense, BTW), those not in the know can scarcely hope to achieve any good results.

I know,
I usually ask my fellow Americans to review my CV before sending it out. But I am not going to ask Mig to hire me ;-)

Lost in all the pontificating on the virtues of self-improvement w/o computers is the observation that Topalov is getting his just dues for his World Championship shenanigans. Payback is a bitch!

Wow, a great great thanks to Vlad Kosulin as well!

Wow, most most impressive how most most authentic these two interviews (Rublevsky, Motylev) sound!

Wow, these two interviews will certainly appear at chessbase and other chess sites in due time, and what most most disastrous impact they will have on Topalov/Danailov and FIDE!

Don't worry about the language, Vlad, it's entirely understandable. Thanks again!

Mig, I agree with your on using computers while kibitzing. I call it Kifritzing.

Mig's opening riff on the judgments we too easily attach to certain moves with benefit of computer hindsight, had an odd kind of deja vu for me.

Not long ago I wrote an article whose main game is a famous contemporary brilliancy (Tate-Yudasin, Chicago 1997). It may appear in the December issue of Chess Life.

Computer-aided analysis unveiled numerous flaws in the notes that accompanied the game's original publication back in 1997. That's hardly a surprise. Most of the original annotator's errors involved overlooking resources that were available to the defending side (Black). Of course the defender had also overlooked those moves at the board -- even though he was not just a GM, but a world-class GM at the time.

So, in re-annotating that game for current publication some 9 years after the fact, I found myself assigning a "?" and a "(?)" and a "?!" to one move after another that Yudasin made: starting with his decision to decline Tate's novelty bishop-sac on move 11.

I had to wonder, who am I, a mere woodpusher, to issue such judgments on a top pro? -- and not only that, to issue them for publication in "the world's most widely read chess magazine"?

Moreover, by scorching the losing defender's choices under the merciless glare of engine-bred objectivity, the question marks and semi-question marks also seemed to cast an undeserved pall over even the WINNER's brilliant sacrificial play.

The superior defenses that Yudasin missed were hardly simple, nor were his mistakes obvious blunders. And the refutations that Tate uncorked at the board were stunningly difficult to see. So I found myself using my text comments to counter the impression given by the symbols ("?" etc.) -- the false impression that Yudasin went down without putting up much of a fight.

I agree with Mig that some tweaking of the conventions of annotation is needed, that would make it possible for objective judgments to be leavened by some sense of what is realistic for (super-strong) humans to find over the board. Perhaps 5 years from now there will be an entirely new set of symbols for such concepts, that future annotators will regularly employ in place of (or in addition to) the symbols we now apply to chess moves.

I for one welcome our new kibitzing overlords. To me chess has become much more fun to watch since having a silicon 2600-assistant never tiering of telling me who it thinks is better and by how much. I would need to gain 1000 elo points in playing strength just to be close to understanding the game at the level of GM's, and that's not an option for me. Without computer lines and evaluations, I'm often at loss to even see why the hell white resigned in move 43, or why black just didn't capture that hanging knight in move 25. The computer helps me understand all that. And watching the evaluations change during the game is also exiting and fun. Sure, I don't appreciate the game at the same "level" as GMs, but, well, what else is new. I have more fun now then I had, anyway.

If chess should ever become a TV-spectator sport, I'm sure displaying computer-evaluations on the screen could help make the games more interesting and exiting to watch for millions of people who barely know the chess rules. In 2010, when there's a match between some local hope and the title-holder, I can see people who don't even know the rules go down to the pub afterwards and tell about how exiting it was to watch chess for 6 hours straight with the local hope first being down -1.5, but fighting his way back to a +0.1, and then crushing the Champion in move 39 in time trouble where the champ blundered and had to resign being -5.5 down. The evals give people like me something simple to follow.

If you only watch chess to improve your own game, using engines is probably bad. But if you follow the games simply because it's exiting to watch to see who is winning, the engines are really great for patzers like me.

In the days when I used to play tournaments, I had a friend who would consistently enter all of his games into his database (he's a Class A, mind you) and analyze them with whatever the latest version of Fritz happened to be. Thus, we got such insightful commentary from him as this: "A mistake! [Insert computer analysis here] is 0.25 points better!" Of course, we all belittled him for this foolishness, but it seems to have been to no avail.

Sandorchess,

Topalov is playing one week after such a tiring match is because he (or Danailov) does not respect his opposition. He thinks he is so much better that he does not need to prepare against them.

I hope these losses keep his feet firmly on the ground. He should not burn himself out. If Danailov convinced him to play in this tournament, then someone must interfere and exorcise Danailov now before ruining such a gifted player.

Duncan

If Topalov continues like this, pretty soon he won't be able to lay claim to being the #1 (highest rated) player. It's kind of shocking that Topalov can be flat busted after 20 moves. I'm glad that Judit stuck with 1. e4!

Hopefully, she'll be on the road to put the San Luis disappointment fully behind her. She's always bounced back from her bouts of poor form, and come back even stronger.

It is likely that Topalov will make his patented 2nd half comeback. But Essent is only 6 rounds...

here is the statement that the mexico organizers made to susan polgar:

"We have a contract with FIDE to host the 2007 World Championship in Mexico City next fall. We will not permit FIDE to change the format of the World Championship from what that has been agreed to.

We already transferred 100% of the prize funds to FIDE's account and we have spent a significant amount of money and effort to promote this World Championship. We expect FIDE to stand by their words and honor the contract that we signed.

The people in Mexico are looking forward to an incredibly exciting event. The world will witness one of the most spectacular chess events in history next year in Mexico City."

To the organizers: I'm sorry guys. You can call your event whatever you want. It is NOT the chess world championship. That would be equivalent of awarding the Stanley Cup to the team with the best regular season record. I wonder what hockey fans would think of that idea. The real chess world championship is decided in a match between the defending champion and the challenger. Traditions are what makes sports great, and I fear that it could very well be the end of the line for the match tradition if Kramnik plays in Mexico.

I think some GMs frequently use computer analysis to pull out new opening moves. A good example is Cheparinov, second of Topalov. In nearly every game he comes up with a novelty. Some work, some are just fire on the board to force errors by the opponent.
This is a new development in professional chess. You only need several computers and type in a move that you think is interesting. Then you wait what happens. You only make a deeper analysis if the move seems to be okay.
In amateur chess this takes too much time. You mainly use the computer for post analysis. This is also much better than in former times where you needed several hours to discover the errors that you now see in minutes.

Mark Crowther wrote :

>I said it would ruin the mystery of the game also (about table bases) and I maintain that point. Its really sad you don't have to work this stuff out for yourself.>

Yes, the bad news is that computer chess has damaged the respectability of chess players,
it has punctured the usual awe in which the mind of the "great chess player" has been held.

You can not feel otherwise when you see world champions defeated by a commercial laptop running of few MB of software.

>But I would also add that players have also taken on board the lessons of computers. They see you can take on far more classical disadvantages than expected. They analyse openings and middlegames in advance using computers and that's changed the nature of play. Many, and Topalov is a good example of this, want to play razer sharply in order to lure their opponents into the abyss, but if they're off form the opposite happens.>

Yes you are right here too and this is the good news of the computer chess.

It has altered the chess theory itself and our understanding and approch to chess and this is why nowdays even GMs give computer analyses as their comments on ICC.

It has proved by mere force how rich in hidden resources a position really is ( either in attack or in defense) and this as opposed to the esoteric comments, conclusions and divinations of the would be "in the know" grandmasters.

By the way of Emanuel Lasker. He gets the last laugh with advent of the computers.
The philosopher knew what we discover today with help of comps, he wouln't be surprised but would smile approvingly.
If you are familiar with his writings and opinions you will remember that he taught skepticism on chess theory and "experts" explanations on the why and how all happenes on the chessboard ( and life by the way).

Can someone please explain how the white blocks the the threat 35. ..., Kd3 instead of the played 35. ..., b4
Thanks in advance

Can someone please explain how the white blocks the threat 35. ..., Nd3 instead of the played 35. ..., b4
Thanks in advance

Bad results for Topa. Should cost him some rating points, shouldn't it?

Any data about this?

Seems Vishy Anand is on the best way to number one spot.

>Can someone please explain how the white blocks the threat 35. ..., Nd3 instead of the played 35. ..., b4
Thanks in advance

Fritz proudly says "mate in 5"

35.. Nd3

36.Nb7+ Kb4 37.Rxf4+ Qc4

[37..Nxf4 38.Rd4+ Qc4 39.Qc5+ Ka4 40.b3#]

38.Rxd3 Rc8

[38..Qxf4 40.Qd4+! Qxd4 41.Rxd4#..nice one]

39. a3+ (or 39.Rb3+) Ka4 40.Qxa6#

Well, thanks Ovidiu, this is really good one. I didn't see it coming, but suppose top GM know better and that's why Toppy chose b4 ... to no avail :-(

On a more general note, I think its quite easy now to criticise Topalov. However, that guy deserves also some kudos for his fighting chess. No doubt for me that after a period of slump (plateau...) he'll come again to claim his own.

Go Topalov!

I don't play this opening but I can hardly imagine this position is good for black. Look at the position after move 13. White has developed every single piece and has castled whereas black only moved pawns and the two knights.

freitag wrote

>I don't play this opening but I can hardly imagine this position is good for black. Look at the position after move 13. White has developed every single piece and has castled whereas black only moved pawns and the two knights.>

well yes, it is a disaster by the canons of the classical chess and what happened ( Polgar's attack of the vulnerable Black king left in the center in a open position) was exactly what the classical school would have predicted ( actually 20. Nf5! and 1-0 would have been even faster and more to the point to tax this serious break of the laws of development, Morphy would have been quick on finishing this).

That's why I said that I keenly wait for the Kramnik-Fritz 10 match : to see if it makes any difference if you play "by the rules".

But I am not sure of the outcome.

Actually it is the other way around. It is mostly because of the comp analysis that GMs have discovered that they can play anti-postional chess, break the rules, and still surivve and win, it is not of course that Topalov doesn't know the basics of chess strategy.

Set the position on your Fritz at the move 13 or 19 and try to play a serious game against Balck.
See how you do with such would be "big positional advanage" with White. Good luck.

Topa in shape again?
After move 20 he only used 5 minutes (!) of time, whereas Sokolov is down with one hour and his position is ready to be taken over by Topa.

If Topa couldn't beat even Sokolov, it would be a proper time to consider becoming CHeparinov's second.

By the way, Sokolov has 3 minutes per move left. Exactly like Kramnik during the match. And while visually Topa dominates, Rybka evaluates position as =. I hope a blunder will not decide the game.

From the official Essent tournament web site: Topalov's performance rating so far is 1984, lol

Topalov expected to play only by white color on the tournament ;-)

Well, it looks like with the white pieces he has managed to draw against Sokolov. Certainly an achievement for Topalov to put himself on the scoreboard in such a strong tournament.

Give Topalov a little slack here, seriously. It isn't surprising if he is burned out right now. Like him or not, he is human.

Perhaps Topalov is showing remorse for
his bad behaviour at the Championship and
is subconsciously allowing losses?

Was there a bit of history yesterday? Was Judit's win over Topalov the first time ever that a woman beat the world's no. 1 player in a standard time control game? I know Judit beat Garry only once, but that was rapid. Did she make history yesterday?

What is the computer take on Topalov game?

=

I like the picture of Mamedyarov on TWIC. - Was this photo taken by Gormally? ;)

Topalov seems to be addicted to chess, he even plays the draw endgame till the curtains fall.

freitag: I'm not sure about the curtains, but ratings, titles, etc. can fall in two weeks time. Somebody made a comment about being hyper-active. I got tired just so much watching chess, can't see how this guy has the energy to play...

D.

it looks that Sokolov went wrong with 51..b3 (51..Kb5 first) now Topa may win with the h pawn after both rooks get sacrified to stop b and e pawns and black king is away

I'm pretty sure Top is not happy to play in the moment, but he signed the contract long ago, so he has to play.

Seems as if Topalov is struggling in a very strong tournament instead of going inactive for 4-5 months in order to make it sure his ELO will be OK ...
Being tired because of Elista would be a perfect excuse for all these ...
There are certain aspects of this guy you can only admire of.

I guess I am a lone voice but a want to disagree with Mig about computers and analysis. Mig was talking about computer evaluation of 0.00 during the Mamydarov- Topolav game. I guess he is talking about the evaluation after Bg5 before that the omputer was showing the position as clearly better for white BUT could not give any way to make progress - never came close to finding the h4 bg5 idea. After the sac some comps showed that white should take the draw but when you drill down with the comp then it becomes clear that Toppy 's Ng6 was better than the obvious be8 defence. My point is that using the comp evaluation alone
is not much use - the evaluation chnages as the analysis proceeds and very often the reality of the position emerges further along. I think some GM's would have found the Rxd6 Qd2 idea AT THE BOARD especially if they had analysed the positon after Rxc8.

I agree with some opinions out there about computer analysis. Looking all the time at a chess program screen while watching live games is certainly making Fritz manufacturing company happy, but your chess is certainly deteriorating and you are most likely to have a distorted view of the games..
Guys, try to analyze the positions with your own brain : you will become better players just by watching a top-game...

George,
I don't know about you, but I don't admire Topalov's obstinacy and overinflated ego one bit. The only reason he is playing in this tournament is that he thought he would easily beat Kramnik and then come to Essent and have enough energy to win this one, too. He was so sure of beating Kramnik, in fact, that he was already conducting talks with Radjabov about his next match. One can just hope that Topalov will learn from this experience and understand that he is not as omnipotent as he imagines himself to be.

Maybe he's just semi-omnipotent.

Topa's ego got deflated by Kramnik and now it gets further holes from which much hot air comes out.
Topa played out today some home preparation in Slav but, just as Kramnik pointed out in the press conference, his novelties are of poor quality and can be defused on board.

At some point Sokolov had spent +1h while Topa had only 3 min !...but the result was perfect equality.

"but when you drill down with the comp then it becomes clear that Toppy 's Ng6 was better than the obvious be8 defence. My point is that using the comp evaluation alone
is not much use - the evaluation chnages as the analysis proceeds and very often the reality of the position emerges further along. I think some GM's would have found the Rxd6 Qd2 idea AT THE BOARD especially if they had analysed the positon after Rxc8."

I think Ng6 was not the problem, but Nf4. Nxe5 was the way to go (after exchanging a pair of rooks)

On the Kramnik vs Deep Fritz match, what hardware will Deep Fritz run on? Anyone knows? It does not seem to have been published anywhere, but I may be wrong.

Anyway, if Deep Fritz runs on superduper multi-processor hardware, then we may witness another Adams' style of defeat.

Does the chess world really need that? Everyone knows already that a screwdriver is better than a human finger nail

George,
Topalov said in an interview, that he played Kramnik first of all for money. My bet is, he plays in Essent just for money. Nothing wrong, of course, he is a pro, but don'd let illuzions to lead your mind.

I agree with those who believe Topalov expected Essent to be a pleasant amusement after the match. He was not ready for so dense play.

Good one, Greg.

Kramnik has much better chances than Adams because he has special rules, for example the game is drawn when a table base position is reached, he can watch the computer moves on a display as long as the computer is in the book and he could test the program before.

Nothing significant on Deep Fritz at
the official website.

http://www.rag.de/microsite_chess_com/

..
There are certain aspects of this guy you can only admire of.

-- Posted by: george at October 24, 2006 12:26

Absolutely. Does anyone in chess work harder than Topalov? I doubt it.

Kramnik vs Deep Fritz:

"Rules:
DATES
Six games will be played on the days 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 where day 1 is 25 day of November 2006. The games commence at 3.00 pm and end at 9.00 pm at which time Mr Kramnik will have the right either to continue with the game or to adjourn it to the next day.

TIME CONTROL
In each game the Players shall each have to make 40 moves in two hours followed by 16 moves per hour thereafter provided that in the event that a game has not been completed within six hours it may be adjourned to the following day at Mr Kramniks discretion when play will continue at the rate of 16 moves per hour for a further six hours.

Mr. Kramnik shall have the right to adjourn any game after 56 moves even if six hours of play have not been completed. Should this right be exercised, play shall continue on the following rest day at the rate of 16 moves per hour.

THE WINNER
The winner of the match will be the first Player to score more than 3 points. It is intended to award the winner the World Chess Challenge Trophy.

In the event that the match is decided before the six games set out in paragraph “Dates” have been played, Mr Kramnik will continue to play until the conclusion of the sixth game or offer his services in any way agreeable to both Parties.

ARBITER AND MATCH DIRECTOR
The match will be ruled and officiated by one arbiter. His decision regarding any interpretation of any of the rules of chess pertaining to this match shall be final and binding. The arbiter shall be selected by UEP and UEP shall inform Mr. Kramnik and Chessbase (CB) about the name of the arbiter as soon as possible but in no event later than 1 October 2006. UEP informs about its intention to contract Mr. Albert Vasse (Netherlands) being the arbiter of the WCC.

UEP shall have the right to announce a WCC Match Director who will be responsible for all necessary communication and administration during the match (with the Players, the Arbiter, the sponsors, the press, the local organisation at venue and other parties involved). For the avoidance of doubt: The Match Director has no influence or responsibility on the Arbiter’s decisions and shall have no influence regarding any interpretation of any rules of chess and any rules of the WCC which is solely a responsibility of the Arbiter.

THE COMPUTER OPERATOR
The CB Team will designate an Operator and up to two Reserve Operators. The Operator is the only person who may interact with Deep Fritz during the game. The Operator may not interact with Deep Fritz while Mr. Kramnik’s clock is running. The Operator may adjust the clock times used by Deep Fritz only within 15 seconds of Deep Fritz’s clock being activated.

During the game, the Operator may be replaced by a Reserve Operator should the Operator be unable to perform for any extended period of time. Any replacement of Operator must be authorized by one of the Arbiters.

The Operator will take all reasonable measures to insure that their activities do not distract Mr. Kramnik.

OPENING BOOKS
The computer will consult an opening book during the game. During the match, the opening book may not be modified, except that up to 10 ply of additional moves may be added in the opening variation of the game which has most recently been played (not counting adjournment sessions) and the weightings of specific moves may be modified so that the different variations, already present in the opening book, will be preferred by the program. All opening book modifications will be entered by the Arbiters before the game according to the material confidentially provided to them by the Deep Fritz Team. A member of the Deep Fritz Team will be present and if necessary guide the Arbiter through the necessary steps of operation.

At the conclusion of each game the Arbiter will attempt to replicate the opening of the game on a computer which has the opening book and program as delivered to the Kramnik Team and the Arbiter. If they find any discrepancies, the Deep Fritz Team is required to explain these to the satisfaction of the arbiter.

If a violation of this rule is determined by the Arbiter, the penalty may include loss of the game.

As long as Deep Fritz is “in book”, that is playing moves from memory and not calculating variations, Mr. Kramnik sees the display of the Deep Fritz opening book. For the current board position he sees all moves, including all statistics (number of games, ELO performance, score) from grandmaster games and the move weighting of Deep Fritz. To this purpose, Mr. Kramnik uses his own computer screen showing the screen of the Deep Fritz machine with book display activated.

As soon as Deep Fritz starts calculating variations during the game the operator informs the arbiter. The arbiter confirms this on the screen of the playing machine and then shuts down the second screen.

ENDGAME TABLEBASES
The use of a database of endgame positions (“Tablebase”) is permitted only if the tablebase contains positions with a total five total pieces or less, including kings.

When Deep Fritz identifies the board position in a tablebase, it must inform the Arbiter, who will then stop the clocks.

In the presence of the Arbiter, the Operator will inform Mr. Kramnik that the position has been located in the tablebase.

If the position is evaluated by the tablebase as winning for the side played by Deep Fritz, the Operator will inform Mr. Kramnik of that fact in the presence of the Arbiter. The game will continue, unless Mr. Kramnik chooses to resign.

If the position is evaluated by the tablebase as winning for the side played by Mr. Kramnik, the Operator will inform Mr. Kramnik of that fact in the presence of the Arbiter. The game will continue unless the Deep Fritz Operator chooses to resign.

If the position is evaluated by the tablebase as a draw, the Operator will inform Mr. Kramnik of that fact in the presence of the Arbiter. This will constitute an offer of a draw. The game will continue, unless the offer is accepted prior to the completion of Mr. Kramnik’s next move.

It is recognized that the program will access tablebases in its calculations. The above rules apply only when the position on the board is present in the tablebase.

DRAW OFFERS
Mr. Kramnik may offer a draw at any time, regardless of whose turn it is. The Operator is authorized to accept or decline the draw on behalf of Deep Fritz.

The Operator may offer a draw on behalf of Deep Fritz, however a draw may not be offered unless a previous offer by Mr. Kramnik has been declined.

If Mr. Kramnik feels that the position is clearly drawn, he may notify the Arbiter and the Operator that he is making a claim of “technical draw”. The Arbiter will stop the clock. Mr. Kramnik will then explain his reasoning, and the Operator is obliged to accept the draw unless Deep Fritz can demonstrate that in the previous ten moves progress has been made.

The Arbiter will determine the validity of the claim, and his decision shall be final and binding. Should the uphold the claim, the game will be declared drawn. If he rejects the claim, then the game continues.

During the deliberations regarding a technical draw, the clocks will remain stopped. In the event the Arbiters reject the claim, the penalty will be deduction of the lesser of 5 minutes, or 10% percent of Mr. Kramnik’s remaining time. In the event a second claim of a technical draw is rejected in the same game, a 25% penalty will be assessed.

SOFTWARE OR HARDWARE FAILURE
Software or hardware failure is defined as the inability of the program to deliver a legal chess move to the operator.

In the event of an obvious software or hardware failure, an arbiter will stop the clock and give the Deep Fritz Team 5 minutes to decide whether to resume with the same machine or replace it.

After 5 minutes have elapsed, an arbiter will reactivate the clock.

Before making a move, the Deep Fritz Team will indicate to an arbiter that they are ready to resume play. The arbiter will immediately inform Mr. Kramnik.

After the Deep Fritz team informs an arbiter, any move made by the machine must be accepted as part of the game.

Should the Deep Fritz Team decide that hardware repairs cannot be made, they may substitute a machine which is either configured exactly the same as the designated playing hardware, or may switch to a dual-processor or single processor machine. The Arbiter must approve any hardware modification or substitution, and may carry out tests to determine whether the provisions of this article are being met.

POST-GAME CONFIRMATIONS
After the conclusion of each game, the Deep Fritz Team shall provide a printout of the computer analysis of the game to the Arbiters and the Kramnik Team. This printout includes evaluation, search depth, expected move and thinking time.

After each game, the Arbiters will be provided with an opportunity to compare the opening book used in the game with the opening book used in previous games.

DISCLOSURE OF MATCH ENGINE
By October 1, 2006, Mr. Kramnik and the arbiter will receive the final match version of Deep Fritz. After this date only bug fixes are done on the engine, for example obvious crashes or obvious positional errors. No positional knowledge will be added. Should the engine be modified in any way after 1 October 2006 Chessbase will notify Mr. Kramnik’s team and the Arbiter in writing about this specific change and demonstrate its effect on a test position. In any case Chessbase guarantees that any change after October 1, 2006, will not influence general playing style and tactical strength and confirms that the engine code remains practically unchanged after October 1, 2006.

From 1 October 2006 on, the Deep Fritz team will be ready on the request of the Kramnik team to install the final match version on Mr Kramnik’s trainings machine. The Deep Fritz team shall inform Mr. Kramnik and the organizer (UEP) by no later than 1 October 2006 about the specifications of the hardware which will be used during the WCC. In co-operation with a possible hardware sponsor and CB the organizer (UEP) will make their best endeavours to provide Mr. Kramnik a trainings machine being similar with the machine during the WCC.

At any stage in the match, the Kramnik team may copy the exact playing engine directly from the tournament machine under supervision of the arbiter. The Deep Fritz Team is not required to disclose the exact hash table size for the match. It is understood that hash table size does not influence playing style but rather introduces a small element of non-determinism into the move selection process. The Deep Fritz Team has to notify the Arbiter Committee of the Hash table size so that they can reproduce the programs calculations."

Kramnik said that Fritz he is going to play with, evaluates 4 million positions per second. Compare to your copy of Fritz, and you can get an approximation of what hardware will be in use. I can't, because I don't have Fritz.

Forgot the link:

http://www.rag.de/microsite_chess_com/iframe/regeln_wcc.html

Ovidiu: "Topa played out today some home preparation in Slav but, just as Kramnik pointed out in the press conference, his novelties are of poor quality and can be defused on board."

So let me get this straight, Topalov's recent novelties are poor quality because they don't change eval from + 0.25 to + 1.10 in a couple of moves? Hmmm, maybe he should just play 27 moves of main-line QGD with White and offer a draw.

It's not every game that you're going to have Nxf7 against Anand in MTel, or Rxe4 against Aronian in Corus. At least the guy TRIES.

And as for the post-Elista hating, it's probably time to lay off of Topalov. Yeah, we've heard it all for the umpteenth time these past few weeks: what a cocky guy, classless accuser, possible Rybka user, blah-blah-blah. OK, so the "classy gentleman" Kramnik saved chess - what a hero. Regarding the scheduling of Essent on his playing calendar, call Topalov what you will at the moment, "over-inflated ego," "not as omnipotent as he imagines himself to be," etc., but he's just staying active and honoring a commitment made long ago. There are worse things I can think of for a top GM these days. Ivanchuk burns through tournaments like a madman and I don't see anyone accusing him of having a massive ego.

>Compare to your copy of Fritz, and you can get an approximation of what hardware will be in use. I can't, because I don't have Fritz.

Kosulin, at the official website they say that it analyzes 1.5 million per second on a 2GHz notebook

how the heck you can infer the hardware ?

"Ivanchuk burns through tournaments like a madman and I don't see anyone accusing him of having a massive ego."

Only because he truly is a madman...

Just a word for "millions per second evaluation" by computer programs : Since the average number of legal moves is about 40 (correct me if wrong), and the computers are using the "min-max with extra prune" algorithm (I know all about this stuff) this means : if a computer in 1 GHz can calculate, say, 100 moves ahead, we need a computer between 1-40 GHz (be sure this number is much nearer to 40 than in 1!) to calculate 101 moves ahead.

This, in addition to the fact that the function which evaluates the "final" positions - which is of course far from perfect - means that is much more important to improve the efficiency of algorithms than to give extra CPU processing power.
If you remember Kasparov matches and most recent matches against programs you can easily verify this ... Deep Blue was monster but mediocre chess - Fritz mediocre h/w but very good chess.

In my humble opinion, it's also STUPID to give all opening and endgame databases to a computer (all human knowledge on those subjects ready in binary code) and then say that the program REALLY outplayed the best human. It's silly !

I wished a computer programmer could comment on this ! It would be perfect.

my fritz9 on a 2.4 Ghz machine runs about 650 K nodes/sec on Chessbase 7. but it depends on the position and maybe on background software. I always am connected to the internet and it seems impossible today to run the computer without some background software at least in memory. I have 1 gig of memory.

Any suggestions on getting it to run faster.

Improve your RAM quantity.
Pruning algorithms work better with larger RAM, man ! (anyway, perhaps 1 Gb is OK).

Get the best opening and ending databases. The best chess program.

Well, go to Task Manager and see if chess is taking almost 100% of CPU time. If it does, there is nothing more to do.

Can you really beat your computer after this ? 8-))

Ivanchuk burns through tournaments like a madman and I don't see anyone accusing him of having a massive ego."

Only because he truly is a madman...
-- Posted by: Censor at October 24, 2006 14:40

LOL

At least Chucky is going close to 2760 now!

When kasparov lost to Deep Blue I felt sad for a moment. But ultimately the human will always beat the computer -- the computer is an idiot who dopesn't even know where the power switch is. The computer is a tool, so the struggle will always remain man vs. man, just with different tools.

But until CPU power reaches as far as to deem the game finite, it is interesting to see whether man with computer help will prevail over a computer with human help.

D.

In reply to George:

Endgame tablebases have nothing to do with human end game expertise. In fact, they contradicted numerous century old beliefs of human grandmasters. Tablebases are the saved result of enormous computer calculation. The following comparison is in order:

Computer opening books: stale opening knowledge interpreted by non-world class player.

tablebases: God could not play better once a tablebase positions is reached. 100% perfection.

george, I may be wrong, but the way I understand it is you don't need to have a processor 40 times faster to search one ply deeper. First off, I don't think 40 is average # of moves. I would say 25-30 is closer to the real average.

Min-max algorithm is not the best algorithm, anyway. It examines ALL possibilities, which is not good enough, even given the super fast machines we now have. As strange as it seems, computers don't examine ALL possibilities. Even if we take 25 to be an average move number in a position, multiply it by itself 7 times and you get over 6 billion positions to evaluate. At the rate of 1 million positions per second, it would take over 100 minutes to evaluate that. Clearly, the machines would be quite weak if that was the case. So instead of min-max they use alpha/beta. Alpha beta allows to remove a large part of the search tree.

Alpha beta works like this: lets say you can play 25 moves and you evaluate your first move , let's say, 1.e4 (out of those 25) to 7 ply and you come up with some sort of score , for example +1.00 in your favor, if both sides make the best moves. Next, you examine the second of the 25 moves/option in the initial position - 1.d4. And let's say the very reply by your opponent to your second move (1. ... d5 after 1.d4) scores +0.66. So right there you drop evaluation the second move/option altogether, without examining other 24 replys for your opponent's reply to 1.d4, because the fact is that you already know 1.d4 is inferior to 1.e4, because you opponent has at least +0.66, and maybe even better in 1.d4 line. In more simple words, if one of your moves is refuted in one way (compared to some other line), you don't need to know if it can be refuted in 10 other ways, you just drop the move and move on. This can save a lot of time, and cut the search tree down in size considerably, especially if you view the best moves first (And good programs know what moves to look at first - promotions, captures, checks will likely be first on their list).

So, you don't need to examine ALL posibilities. And alpha-beta is just one thing. There are more things that make computers search deeper - like, forced variation search or null moves, etc. Rybka is using some new revolutionary approach and it only examines a few positions, compared to Fritz and the like. And so on...

The point is, you don't need an exponential increase in computing power to look a ply deeper. And it is hard to predict how increase in computing power will affect calculation depth.

Computer chess is a plague which has set artificial intelligence back by 20 years -- there is no innovation really on the programming side, just running the search on ever-faster processors. Hopefully, when Fritz defeats Kramnik we will start seeing less of that, and some of these programming skills getting diverted to more search-proof games, which would have a real contribution to the development of AI algorithms. All the money poured in it right now is just a waste.

brute force,

What money are we talking about? I don't think anyone has been investing a lot into chess engines. Besides, have you read about how Rybka supposedly works? From what I heard, Rybka is a lot more intelligent than other top programs and it uses a much more human approach. I think a lot of programs will follow Rybka and some are already following. Computer chess has been kinda stuck for a while, but now that Rybka is here, it is almost like a revolutioned happened in computer chess. So now is not a good time to complain about computer chess, as it is as exciting as it has been in a while.

to vxqtl : ending database is technically a knowledge base where you know the actual game outcome. In more complex positions, you also need to know the full variations tree, isn't it ?
Eg. king vs king = null. Can this be calculate by a computer algorithm ?
Eg. king vs bishop = null.
Eg. king and pawn vs king, 2 knights. This is a very complex one. Sometimes, knights win ! People KNEW this before computers, isn't it ? Computers aided the complete vaiations' calculation anyway.
There is a part of ending knowledge that is pure chess experience, this cannot be calculated, for a human it seems obvious but for a computer king vs king and bishop IS NOT obvious a null.
You are rather referring to tablebases which are a number of computer-calculated positions of certain positions. This is also artificial for a chess program and it cannot calculate all this knowledge in game time.

At least Chucky is going close to 2760 now!

-- Posted by: freitag at October 24, 2006 16:02

What a mess the top of the FIDE list is going to be on Jan 1! Topalov, Anand, and Kramnik all bunched together with Ivanchuk and Mamedyarov both charging hard.

to Russianbear : your alpha-beta algorithm is my "min-max with pruning". We are talking about the same thing. The idea is that you take advantage of the fact that each player will only consider the best move once found.

Forced variation search or null moves are clearly heuristic algorithms. The main idea is min-max with pruning (or alpha-beta).

In your opinion, the quantity is much closer to 1 than to 40 ! We should have a chess programmer to answer to this !

to brute force search : the very first programs were :
1% ability, 99% calculation.
Then 1 began to grow and 99 to lessen.
This is much closer to Artificial Intelligence (although means you need GMs to program computer!)
Question : how do human think about moves ?
Perhaps, 50% 50% ?
Any opinions ?

I think one of the most interesting, if not necessarily useful, things tablebases taught us was that K+2B vs. K+N is always a win.

You cannot always win. It's ups and downs. Following Chuckys appearance in Madrigas it is ambivalent. He lost the first game against Korneev with White (!), then won four games in a row (one out of a completely drawn position). Today he drew against a 2550 player (was forced because he would have lost a pawn if not doing the repitition). Ivanchuk will cash the check as the winner, and Topa might not even make half of the points.
Business as usual.

george, if you know alpha/beta, I am suprised you think one needs to need a processor 40 times faster to look 1 ply deeper. And no, I don't think it is anywhere close to 1 move per position. But in many cases, machines can discard a large number os useless moves. How much depth would 4 million nodes per second mean? I have no idea. Only Fritz programmers can answer that, but they won't for obvious reasons. And I don't think there is a simple answer, like 4 000 000 nps corresponds to 10 ply. I think the algorithms will ensure that more relevant lines are searched deeper most of the time.

As for the ability vs. calculation, it depends on what you mean by ability. Also, good calculation can transfer into ability and vice versa.

Chucky is the kind of madman chess needs. He'll never challenge for a world title because he has the nerves of a fawn, and this makes him the best sideshow there is.

He was the only GM unafraid of Kasparov, being something of an chess autistic, but in match play he went down quicker than Seka (Jussupow, Nisipeanu, Seirawan, Ponomariov, yikes!). However, he's probably the most gifted player alive, so his tournament games will be instructive long after he vanishes in a mist of lithium.

For example, check out his crazy dismantling of Ruck in the EU Cup a few weeks ago. Yeah baby yeah.

Essent, round 3.
Today, Topalov managed to increase his rating performance up to 2430, proving able to get a draw against Sokolov, rated 2670.
You should notice that his performance in this tournament is 250 points lower than in Elista, where he played at a solid 2700.

So gooooood... after everything he did, after his declarations about the 60 points difference, after his world about Leko being a nobody, it's good to see him loosing 60 points in a few weeks, becoming a nobody and being deservingly bashed by his destiny.

God, I love you !!! You gave us justice.

If I can recall, prunning is about 40% less variations calculated (good stuff!)

So, If we follow your formula for average # of moves = 30, then,
Nodes = (30 ^ Ahead) * 0,6
Example :
3 moves Ahead = (30 ^ 3) * 0,6 ~ 16200 nodes.
4 moves Ahead = (30 ^ 4) * 0,6 ~ 486000 nodes.
It's easy to see that reaching one move ahead required 30 times stronger processor !
(0,6 is about the constant processing power of the machine : when you divide it disappears).

This is the reason why human use their experience and perception instead of pure calculation.
(Irrelevant : I think the quickest of all times in pure calculating was R.J. Fischer).

Ruslan:

I just want to clarify Topalov's statement about Leko. The interviewer asked a question about the effectiveness of rapid and blitz tiebreaks vis-a-vis draw odds. Topalov replied that even though Leko didn't lose to Kramnik ( he finished the match even) , he finished like a nobody whereas Kramnik remained champion. In this context, rapid and blitz tiebreaks are better than draw odds.

I just don't want Topalov's words taken out of context to imply that he was denigrating Leko. Topalov has the highest respect for Leko. Prior to San Luis, Topalov called Leko his toughest rival.

ruslan wrote :

God, I love you !!! You gave us justice.

perhaps, but is it justice to have as FIDE president Kirsan ? A criminal, see Larisa Yudian case, that taxes the kalmykian people so as he can organize chess matches (??)in Elista and make himself known.

true justice in Topa's case would be for Danailov to be run over by car when he crosses the street tomorrow and thus Topa set free from this psychological bondage to a thug.

Talking about Kirsan and justice, etc., this Mamedyarov guy sure looks like a boxing champ in the chessbase pictures

Ivanchuk the only GM unafraid of Kasparov? He - almost literally - considered GK god.
I suggest Kramnik or even Topalov instead. (I won't bother citing the few players with a plus score against him.)

How about awarding a portion of the Daily Dirt prize fund to the person who "discovers" the best interview with the Topalov seconds and shares it with us?

Greg, the Topalov seconds are wailing and gnashing their teeth while muttering strange oaths.
I doubt they'll give interviews.

"For example, check out his crazy dismantling of Ruck in the EU Cup a few weeks ago. Yeah baby yeah."

Chucky eats people like Ruck on a daily basis. He is a Professional.

George, Russianbear knows what he is talking about. The actual fan out in modern chess engines is about three. You can see this by letting your favorite engine analyze a position: You'll see that the average time to go one ply deeper is about a factor of three, but with a large variation.

Those of you who think the improvements in engines is mostly due to the increasing speed of computers are wrong. Over the last five years most of the change has been due to better programs, and this would even be true without Rybka.

"For example, check out his crazy dismantling of Ruck in the EU Cup a few weeks ago. Yeah baby yeah."

Chucky eats people like Ruck on a daily basis. He is a Professional.

george:

where did you get the number that alpha-beta give 40% less variations calculated? I never did any mathematical analysis of this, but I have two points to make:

1) How did you (or whoever) arrive that 40% number? Is that some sort of average? Then average of what is it? It seems to me that alpha-beta can differ in performance depnding on the order of moves that the program evaluates. If we always consider moves in sequence from the worst to the best, it means the algorithm will be as ineffective as brute force. But if we always conosider the moves in the order from best to worst, we can save loads of time. So I am a bit confused as to what that 40% number is.

2) and even if I were to agree that pruning saves us 40% of variations calculated, why would that mean

(30^2)*0.6=540
(30^3)*0.6=16200
(30^4)*0.6=486000

and not

((30*0.6)^2) = 324 (36% of the whole tree)
((30*0.6)^3) = 5832 (21.6% of the tree)
((30*0.6)^4) = 104976 (12.96% of the tree)

etc. ? It seems that it would make sense that if the number of variations grew exponentially, then the number of positioons we can prune should grow like I suggested. If we looked at 60% of positions at ply 2 and discarded 40%, then at next ply both 60% and 40% are multiplied by 30, so the percentage remains the same, but we can also prune some other part of the new ply.

But like I said, I don't know where 40% comes from. I would say that it is possible that the real numbers are even better than I suggested and that it prunes much more than 40% of the tree per ply.

George, I also think alpha-beta cutoff relaxes the exponential nature of chess search-tree growth quite a bit, like Howdoesthehorsiemove pointed.
For some good lecture notes on general board-game programming, see:
http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/180a/s97.html

"Those of you who think the improvements in engines is mostly due to the increasing speed of computers are wrong. Over the last five years most of the change has been due to better programs, and this would even be true without Rybka."

Well before Rybka, the hot engine was "fruit", and fruit achieved his successes mostly by throwing away "chess knownledge" slow-dows, and focus on search, that is pure tactical strength.

Fruit could have been written decades ago.

George, when chess-programmers talk about pruning, they usually mean in addition to alpha-beta. While you could technically call alpha-beta pruning, an alpha-beta algorithm ends up finding exactly the same moves that a pure min-max would, only faster, and is therefore just considered a standard optimization for chess programs. Alpha-beta with optimal move-ordering will change a branch factor n for a min-max into the square root of n for alpha-beta instead. This means that instead of needing 35-40 times the processing power to go one ply deeper, you now need around 6. So you can search twice as deep compared to min-max, but still not miss anything min-max would have found.

On the other hand, many common pruning techniques work by discarding branches that might be good, but usually aren't. This leads to an engine that might play slightly worse in certain kinds of situations compared to an engine without that specific pruning technique, but the speed increase makes it play that much better in other situations that it's worth it. I don't have any statistics on how much these pruning techniques improve performance for good chess engines, but the 40% you suggest might be the right number. In that case, that performance increase comes after alpha-beta, and the branching factor drops again, this time from 6 to around 4.

So yes, it is actually closer to 1 than 40. :-)

>fruit achieved his successes mostly by throwing away "chess knownledge" slow-dows, and focus on search, that is pure tactical strength.>

Isn't this "chess knowledge" more about the human mind than about the objective truth in chess ?

Computers show that many positional judgements are false in the absolute sense but we know from practice that we win ( or lose) in such positons against a human since our mind can not find the solutions in some positions, even if they are there.

The classical "chess theory" has mixed up the properties of the human mind (what is god or bad for it) with the objective truth in chess.

It only because the chess comps have appeared on the stage that we got another "mind" to contrast with our own and thus to become able to differentiate what is objectively true in the theory of chess and what we have put there because of the peculiarities of our minds.

Ovidiu, very interesting point of view. Though I mostly disagree.
Computers do not show that some positional judgements are false. They just show that very sophisticated search combined with very little knowledge is at least as good as deepest knowledge combined with human-specific slow and very selective search.
To show that some kind of chess knowledge is non-objective, you should remove it from an engine and test it against the earlier version...while preserving that both analyze at same speed! Otherwise, you cannot assert anything.

The past few comments seem to be addressing the wrong questions.

Human "knowledge" in engines is reflected primarily in evaluation functions. Evaluation is trivial when a sustainable material imbalance exists (i.e. the inferior side has no mating possibilities or forced means of regaining material). But until programmers get much nearer to the holy grail -- the so-called "32-man tablebase" -- the majority of non-trivial terminal positions reached at the end of any search from an equal position, will still have equal material. So the final evaluation of each branch must rest largely on positional principles -- i.e., human knowledge.

In other words, the only purpose of computers' superior "tactical calculation" that you guys are talking about, is to calculate its way to some desired final position. Since searches from some starting positions with 9 or more men must by definition end somewhere short of checkmate (I think the biggest tablebases at this point are 8-man), it follows that the evaluation of the final position, rather than the calculation itself, is what drives the engine's ultimate move choice. Assuming there is no forced mate or win of material from the starting position within the search depth horizon, that evaluation must rely in large part on positional factors.

It's been widely reported that that is the area where Rybka and Hydra improved on their predecessors.

To sum up, various pruning strategies succeeded in enhancing engines' calculation speeds -- simulating a hardware boost, akin to virtual memory -- but at the cost of a modest but sometimes significant loss of accuracy. That is the point made by zarghev and PlayJunior, above.

But this factor is independent of the "knowledge-based" improvements mentioned in other comments. The latter have more to do with fine-tuning the engines' evaluation functions.

One particular facet that appears to have received a lot of recent programming attention is king safety.

From the dawn of computer chess, engines were notoriously materialistic -- sometimes suicidally so, when matched up with very strong humans. As recently as two years ago, it was possible to say with authority that even the strongest engines could not fathom long-range, positional sacrifices. Because the ultimate justification for the sacrifice lay beyond their horizon (but fell within the intuitive "horizon" of human GMs), the engines simply valued the material imbalance more highly than whatever strategic compensation they could see.

As a result, the strongest engines would not sac material to compromise the enemy king position if they couldn't calculate all the way out to checkmate; nor would they even organize their pieces and pawns to attack the enemy king (such as launching a pawn storm), if it meant taking on weaknesses of their own. The benefits from such strategies were simply beyond their horizon, while the material or positional costs were in plain sight.

Of course, the same blind spots applied when the engines were defending. They would too easily dismiss a human opponent's dangerous attacking possibilities. True, exhaustive searches did prove many fearsome-looking human-launched attacks unsound -- many, but by no means all.

It is precisely these kinds of engine weaknesses that Hydra, Rybka, and the latest versions of Shredder and Junior are said to have addressed -- principally by greatly increasing the sophistication of the treatment of king safety within their respective evaluation functions. Assigning greater weight to open lines and the health of pawn formations near either side's king, is the main thing that gives the newer programs their "human-like" quality that is so widely praised by reviewers.

I just thought of a handy aphorism to sum up the above: calculation is simply a means to an end. Short of having a 32-man tablebase, human knowledge is required to define the "end" toward which the means are directed.

Lacking that, an engine operates like Melville's Captain Ahab: "All of my means are sane. Only my end is mad."

Think about that the next time you see an engine flail around for 300 moves in a dead-drawn fortress position and never change its evaluation from "+11.0"

"Chucky eats people like Ruck on a daily basis. He is a professional"

Freitag, please try to post only when you have something to say.

Hi Mig,

I enjoy your articles. I don't make comments often.

In watching the World Series (Go Cards!!), and
thinking about your observations regarding second
guessing with chess programs, I could not help but
see a clear parallel in baseball. Every night we
see constant replays of pitches and clearly see the ball was, e.g., low and outside, and yet the
bum swung at it and missed of course.

In our electronic age, these kinds of things become accepted facts of life as it will in chess.

I agree with you of course about all the rest, how
it is foolish to expect mortals, etc. and how a
crutch can produce a permanent limp,etc., etc.

Thanks for your service. It brightens my day.

SneakyRed, I agree with everything in your post save one flaw...you see, it's just not in the Cards.

Tigers Tigers Tigers.

Go Tigers.

If 64 years ago I bet a dollar to win a dollar that the cubs woould win the world series, and when I lost I doubled my bet so that I would still be a dollar ahead when I win. How much money do I have to bet next year to win the dollar?

or how much money have I lost so far?

Is Ivanchuk wrong about Topalov?

"A researcher has come up with some simple math that sucks the life out of the vampire myth, proving that these highly popular creatures can't exist.

On Jan 1, 1600, the human population was 536,870,911. If the first vampire came into existence that day and bit one person a month, there would have been two vampires by Feb. 1, 1600. A month later there would have been four, and so on. In just two-and-a-half years the original human population would all have become vampires with nobody left to feed on."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20061025/sc_space/vampiresamathematicalimpossibilityscientistsays

Greg Koster's post is very relevant to our topics...

Well, guys, thanks for all your comments. I just said my opinion - maybe not 100% correct, but, things are more or less like that.. Maybe the results are more impressive than one could suspect (naturally, I am not a chess programmer myself).

However, let's all admit that nowadays, you need a strong group of excellent chess players in order to improve the chess programs any more..
This means that more human chess ability is incorporated into chess programs.

george--

I'm heartily sorry for for disrupting this thread, and for having offended thee. My old eyes mistook "Essent" for "Elista". Won't happen again.