[FOM] Checkers is a draw

[Bob Wolf]

     I don't understand, or perhaps more frankly I
don't believe, your statement that "I can very easily
and quickly find a way to beat them if I am allowed to
backtrack and they are committed to playing the same
move when they get the same position." Would you
please explain/justify this claim? Thanks.

               Bob Wolf

*************

--- joeshipman at aol.com wrote:

> The idea is not to convince the GM that Chinook is
> perfect, it is to 
> convince the GM that checkers is a draw, and
> backtracking is what makes 
> this possible. The best chess computers have rating
> of 3000 (meaning 
> they would beat the world champion 3 times out of
> 4),  but I can very 
> easily and quickly find a way to beat them if I am
> allowed to backtrack 
> and they are committed to playing the same move when
> they get the same 
> position. The interactivity is a tremendous
> advantage for the 
> backtracking player, and a GM who could never find a
> way to win with 
> either color with any amount of backtracking would
> develop a firm 
> conviction that the game was a draw.
> 
> -- JS
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> 
> 
> > This is a good example of a kind of interactive
> proof not typically
> > treated formally -- although the database itself
> can be converted to 
> a
> > real formal proof whose size is probably measured
> in hundreds of
> > terabytes, and so is not "humanly feasible" to
> check, the applet 
> which
> > allows you to play against the database is a sort
> of interactive 
> proof
> > that would convince a world-class grandmaster in a
> humanly feasible
> > amount of time, but would not convince an ordinary
> checker player.
> 
> It would convince a world-class grandmaster that
> Chinook is an 
> extremely
> strong player, but it would not necessarily convince
> said grandmaster 
> that
> Chinook is a *perfect* player.
> 
> 
>
________________________________________________________________________
> AOL now offers free email to everyone.  Find out
> more about what's free 
> from AOL at AOL.com.
> _______________________________________________
> FOM mailing list
> FOM at cs.nyu.edu
> http://www.cs.nyu.edu/mailman/listinfo/fom
> 



       
____________________________________________________________________________________
Be a better Globetrotter. Get better travel answers from someone who knows. Yahoo! Answers - Check it out.
http://answers.yahoo.com/dir/?link=list&sid=396545469