I'm not sure if there's anything particular triggering this comic, or if Randall is just now hearing about some of the computer go developments of the last few years. I do believe that computers will eventually reach professional level, but I think it's probably still between 5 and 50 years away.

You beat me to it.

I'm wondering, too, if there's some new development I'm unaware of. I hate being unaware.

Whether computers will get to that point probably depends on another conceptual breakthrough. It's not simply more powerful computers as brute force doesn't work well with go. Before the non-obvious MCTS method was developed go playing AIs were at about 6 kyu and they might be as good as 4 kyu now. The big, rapid advance was a conceptual breakthrough that with a little bit of help, "if following move A a higher percentage of random games is won than following move B then move A is better than move B" is enough to play a rather good game of go.

So now the strongest programs are playing about amateur 5 dan on powerful computers. Bumping that up to super computers might add a stone. The problem is that already into the region of diminishing returns for this approach as above a certain point the reliability of the percentages increases very slowly as the sample population is increased.

Another conceptual breakthrough is unpredictable. We may not have yet reached the limits of MCTS but I expect any serious improvement will be concpetual (some clever discovery about pruning, etc.).

BTW -- there is a great deal that computers aren't even close on. Try this, suppose you know 10,000 jokes. Somebody tells you a joke and you can select one from your list that is closely related in terms of "why is it funny". The difficulty with this problem is that one's total database of knowledge is involved. For example, the statement "the peas are ready to eat" and "the chickens are ready to eat" differ in the that the second is ambiguous and the first isn't in spite of no syntactic difference <<has to do with the properties of peas vs the properties of chickens -- note that we could add a third statement "the horses are ready to eat" and now whether seen as ambiguous has a strong cultural component>>

Yeah, I think there are still a few years before computers really are stronger than the best humans at go.

However computers are now clearly pro strength at shogi, as proven by this year's denousen tournament but even there they still need to beat the current title holders. But it could happen soon.

I guess humans are not entirely obsolete yet.

Isn't a few years 'soon'?

I doubt it will happen in the next few years. Unless there is another huge conceptual breakthrough, we are really just waiting for MCTS to be able to outread pros, which won't happen anytime soon.

What about the underlying message of the comic? Regardless of when it happens, it seems clear that computers will someday outplay humans at Go. Does that mean Go players everywhere face the same crisis that hit the Chess world? Does it even matter except insofar as it means we humans have another studying tool? Isn't the point of Go to engage in a contest against another human, after all?

Damn, beat me to it as well

I totally agree with Tim's post, computers are just a tool whether or not they're better than us at whatever it is they do. What would be really scary about AI would be if they could actually reach a point of self consciosness!

Computers are better at checkers, chess, shogi, it will probably happen to go too. Computers couldn't have this discussion about how it sucks that computers are beating us at everything though

We shouldn't forget that after all it's human intelligence that makes the computer be able to beat us. So it's still a battle human vs. human, but on another level.

The point of the comic isn't about go, which is just a benchmark against which to measure computer intelligence. It is about the rise if the machines. SkyNet is coming.

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- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

I used to play chess a long time ago, but I'm not really privy to Internet chess competition... Do chess servers have issues with people using computers for assistance?

I suppose people could make use of joseki dictionaries, etc., already in go online, but maybe with strong computer go programs, we'll suddenly have many more 9d players online...?


Edit: I guess a google search was called for before asking this question:



So maybe it's feasible for the go servers of the future to implement methods to detect cheating with computer pgorams.

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be immersed

Computer aided cheating is a serious problem. There have even been instances of it in organised live tournament play. Some live chess servers have programs running on your PC that keep track of what processes are on the machine whilst you're logged into their server. Like MMOs do for catching bots. It's rather controversial.

I play for fun at a level far below what could be considered competitive. If anybody wants to let a computer play in their stead to pretend that they are champions, I don't care. They are only hurting themselves.

I think this relies on various chess engines being (mostly?) deterministic. If MCTS programs ever reach that point, you could compare a player's moves against the computer, but otherwise, it would be very tricky.

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Occupy Babel!

ROFLOL I bet "controversial". Pity the poor folks among us who would keep trying to convince the rest that is would be USELESS except to catch ignorant/naive cheaters.

You don't understand? Precisely how does ANY server know what is or is not running on that powerful second computer sitting next to me that has no connection to the outside world?

Yup. This has been pointed out so, so many times. Especially since on one of the servers you can play on your iPad/Android tablet...

We haven't identified here what we're afraid of, inherently. I believe the issue at hand is the end of human contribution.

At the amateur level, it matters little what one is doing to pump their ranking or cheat. If money isn't involved, if the level isn't extremely high, the art remains unfazed.

At the professional level, there are two main reasons why money is exchanged for performance. The player provides entertainment first, then progress in their field. As our 'athletes' strive to go one step further than the competition, they end up adding to the theory of the game as a whole. The art progresses.

The problem with Chess AI beating top players is that we feel that the progress of the art is no longer up to us as creative, intelligent individuals. Find a good move in a position and the computer will (most often) match or exceed it. It scares us that computers can contribute to a field which was (is?) believed to require wholly human qualities. Creativity, adaptability, strategy.

The professional Chess scene marches on because the people have spoken. It still retains its entertainment value despite the drastic changes that Chess-playing AI have brought.

Go, as we understand it, is much more complex than Chess. We humans have learned to cope with heuristics, selective reading and theory. Up to four thousand years of trial-and-error. Go retains its nigh-mystical image of a game for which many different qualities, most very human, are necessary for high-level play. How would you play like a top pro without fighting spirit, patience, imagination and a sense of balance, among other things?

Well as it turns out, Go-playing AI are catching up wayyyyy fast.

Does this mean that these so-human qualities which distinguish us from animals, trees, bacteria, rock, air, are nothing more than heuristics of their own? Can they be explained in a simple, surgical manner as science links up one neuron to another, while computer programs learn to emulate and excel at being human?

Scary thoughts. In ten years, Go programs could point out dozens of flawed moves in each of Iyama Yuta's games and condemn us for opening anywhere but on tengen. In the process they would slacken and ultimately remove our failing grasp of a game of our own creation that we've been striving to master for millennia. What could we then claim as our own, as a species?

And in two decades, supercomputers will prove to us, conclusively, that we have no souls and will immediately proceed to devour our insides.

I know this is (more or less) offtopic, but this seems like a perfect thread to ask: I'm reasonably aware of the current status of poker playing software (in short: heads-up limit texas is pretty much "solved", HU NL texas is quite close, others not so much), but does anyone know of the situation regarding open-face chinese poker (2, 3 or 4-handed)? In contrast to traditional poker there is no betting involved, and the game (despite it's name) is purely logical and of complete information. Therefore it seems "easy" to implement a program that plays better than humans.

The game is rapidly gaining interest, and some small gambling sites are already offering it, with rumors about the big ones starting to offer it soon. However, AFAIK e.g. backgammon is totally dead as a game played with money over the internet, due to the fact that computers beat any human any time. So, my question is whether this will happen to OFC as well (probably it will, but how soon)? Does anyone on this forum have any insight on OFC playing software and their capabilities against humans?

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If a 10p Go playing program proves the above, so does an ELO 3000+ Chess playing program. Chess players believed, not so long ago, that computers would never pose a challenge because of these unique human qualities and were proven wrong. No point claiming the same for Go. No further proof is required, as it's a difference of degree, no kind. We could always devise a 38x38 Go game or a 3 level chess game and claim computers are not strong at it yet (neither would we) but the challenge has moved to the things we're still good at. Pattern recognition problems, mostly. I think few people still believe that we'll outmatch the silicon mind for more than about a generation.

Dudoso