Answers.Body: <p>The best computers are much better than the best humans, and if I had to make up numbers I'd guess that they're improving at least ten times as fast as humans are (it's a wild approximation but, more or less, humans are improving by around 2 Elo points a year and computers are improving by around 20 points a year). There's no way humans will catch up.</p>
  
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Answers.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T23:58:11.247Z
Answers.Text: and I believe as in any sport, there is a curve that we will get stuck eventually, and records will not be improved unless by _very_ small difference
Answers.UserDisplayName: ajax333221
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Answers.UserDisplayName: dfan
Answers.Body: <p>Humans will never again be able to defeat computers at chess.  We're finding the limits of humans while computers and algorithms are only getting better and better.</p>
  
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Answers.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T03:05:31.390Z
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Answers.UserDisplayName: Tony Ennis
Answers.Body: <p>Generally speaking, humans have already lost the battle against computers. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endgame_tablebase" rel="nofollow">Tablebases</a> have "guaranteed" optimal play by computers in the endgame. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening_book_%28computers%29" rel="nofollow">Opening books</a> have removed much of the computational burden in the opening. (It's MUCH easier to generate move or position lists for the first ten moves and index them than it is to compute them on the fly.) Computer hardware <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law" rel="nofollow">continues to get better</a>.</p>
  
  <p>Any situation that involves straight memorization is one that humans are going to lose to computers. With the opening and endgame "thoroughly optimized", the middlegame is the only place that humans really have a chance. Computers are deterministic. Compare these two situations with White to move:</p>
  
  <pre><code>[FEN "rn4rk/pp4pp/2bN4/q7/8/8/Q5PP/2BR3K w - - 5 10"]
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>And</p>
  
  <pre><code>[FEN "6rk/6pp/3N4/8/8/8/6PP/7K w - - 5 10"]
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Ignore for a moment how contrived they are. In both cases, the correct move is the same, <code>Nf7#</code>. However, even though a computer will pick up on the correct move, these positions are totally different from a computer's perspective. A human will look at this and recognize intuitively that the left half of the board is totally superfluous. A computer will have to compute that the positions are functionally equivalent.</p>
  
  <p>However, as storage capacity increases, the number of these positions that aren't indexed slowly gets smaller. With the pasing of time, more and more of the middlegame approaches determinicity.</p>
  
  <p>Consider also that it is much easier for computers to "learn" than for humans. It is trival (for given values of "trivial") to plug chess libraries in and give a computer access to all the accumulated knowledge therein. Humans cannot do that. We have to study for years to impress that upon ourselves.</p>
  
  <p>TL;DR: <strong>As chess moves more toward exhaustive electronic storage and indexing of positions, humans will continue falling behind computers. Unless there is a breakthrough in our understanding of how memory and the brain work, there will be no reversing this trend.</strong></p>
  
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Answers.CreationDate: 2013-10-19T00:04:41.903Z
Answers.Text: allowing computers to use any stored information while forbidding it to humans in a match is unfair, but well, since humans have some sort of small stored openings it would be unfair to computers too, so I think fairness is a bit hard to get, unless we cut part of the brains of a chess player so he need to recalculate the opening lol
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Answers.Text: @ajax333221: I'm not sure what you mean. The main reason computers are as dominant as they are is their ability to index positions. Without that, it's just a matter of throwing processing power at it, and that isn't efficient.
Answers.UserDisplayName: Jonathan Garber
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Answers.Text: Storage hasn't been the driving factor in ratings improvement of modern chess engines... in fact is has been effective aggressive pruning techniques and search ordering which has driven improvement.  If you had computers play against the best grandmasters in Chess 960 (no opening books, random starting positions) I bet computers would wipe the floor with the GMs, much worse than in traditional chess
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Answers.UserDisplayName: Jonathan Garber
Body: <p>Are human ratings also progressing, could humans catch up with computers? (maybe playing against strong computers makes us strong)</p>
  
  <p>Are team of humans able to defeat computers? Is any competition like this going on?</p>
  
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T00:37:45.507Z
Comments.Text: a human alone can't possibly win against a computer anymore (even with 2 pawn advantage and white) is never going to happen, not anymore... But collectively maybe we stand a chance if the time control is really small (like no more than 2 minutes per move)
Comments.UserDisplayName: ajax333221
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T01:23:23.957Z
Comments.Text: I thought small time control was good for computers, not the other way round.
Comments.UserDisplayName: Quora Feans
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T02:43:39.203Z
Comments.Text: if you let a super computer finish brute force every line chances are we stand zero chances, but if we collectively look into many lines maybe we can outsource computers, but again, in small time control
Comments.UserDisplayName: ajax333221
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2013-10-18T22:12:18.873Z
Comments.Text: @ajax333221, I don't believe you are right at this one. Computers can't analyze any ramification of a position. Chess has not been completely solved. But, that's the topic of another question.
Comments.UserDisplayName: Quora Feans
Tags: <engines><tournament><human-versus-machine>
Title: Humans against computers
ThreadText: # Humans against computers
  
  (Asked by: username_0 on 2013-10-18)
  
  Are human ratings also progressing, could humans catch up with computers? (maybe playing against strong computers makes us strong)
  
  Are team of humans able to defeat computers? Is any competition like this going on?
  
  **Tags:** engines, tournament, human-versus-machine
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: a human alone can't possibly win against a computer anymore (even with 2 pawn advantage and white) is never going to happen, not anymore... But collectively maybe we stand a chance if the time control is really small (like no more than 2 minutes per move)  
  > **username_0**: I thought small time control was good for computers, not the other way round.  
  > **username_1**: if you let a super computer finish brute force every line chances are we stand zero chances, but if we collectively look into many lines maybe we can outsource computers, but again, in small time control  
  > **username_0**: @username_1, I don't believe you are right at this one. Computers can't analyze any ramification of a position. Chess has not been completely solved. But, that's the topic of another question.  
  
  ---
  
  ## 3 answers
  
  ### Answer by username_2 on 2013-10-18. Score: 6
  
  The best computers are much better than the best humans, and if I had to make up numbers I'd guess that they're improving at least ten times as fast as humans are (it's a wild approximation but, more or less, humans are improving by around 2 Elo points a year and computers are improving by around 20 points a year). There's no way humans will catch up.
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: and I believe as in any sport, there is a curve that we will get stuck eventually, and records will not be improved unless by _very_ small difference  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_3 on 2013-10-18. Score: 2
  
  Humans will never again be able to defeat computers at chess. We're finding the limits of humans while computers and algorithms are only getting better and better.
  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_4 on 2013-10-18. Score: 2
  
  Generally speaking, humans have already lost the battle against computers. [Tablebases](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endgame_tablebase) have "guaranteed" optimal play by computers in the endgame. [Opening books](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening_book_%28computers%29) have removed much of the computational burden in the opening. (It's MUCH easier to generate move or position lists for the first ten moves and index them than it is to compute them on the fly.) Computer hardware [continues to get better](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law).
  
  Any situation that involves straight memorization is one that humans are going to lose to computers. With the opening and endgame "thoroughly optimized", the middlegame is the only place that humans really have a chance. Computers are deterministic. Compare these two situations with White to move:
  
  ```
  [FEN "rn4rk/pp4pp/2bN4/q7/8/8/Q5PP/2BR3K w - - 5 10"]
  
  ```
  
  And
  
  ```
  [FEN "6rk/6pp/3N4/8/8/8/6PP/7K w - - 5 10"]
  
  ```
  
  Ignore for a moment how contrived they are. In both cases, the correct move is the same, `Nf7#`. However, even though a computer will pick up on the correct move, these positions are totally different from a computer's perspective. A human will look at this and recognize intuitively that the left half of the board is totally superfluous. A computer will have to compute that the positions are functionally equivalent.
  
  However, as storage capacity increases, the number of these positions that aren't indexed slowly gets smaller. With the pasing of time, more and more of the middlegame approaches determinicity.
  
  Consider also that it is much easier for computers to "learn" than for humans. It is trival (for given values of "trivial") to plug chess libraries in and give a computer access to all the accumulated knowledge therein. Humans cannot do that. We have to study for years to impress that upon ourselves.
  
  TL;DR: **As chess moves more toward exhaustive electronic storage and indexing of positions, humans will continue falling behind computers. Unless there is a breakthrough in our understanding of how memory and the brain work, there will be no reversing this trend.**
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: allowing computers to use any stored information while forbidding it to humans in a match is unfair, but well, since humans have some sort of small stored openings it would be unfair to computers too, so I think fairness is a bit hard to get, unless we cut part of the brains of a chess player so he need to recalculate the opening lol  
  > **username_4**: @username_1: I'm not sure what you mean. The main reason computers are as dominant as they are is their ability to index positions. Without that, it's just a matter of throwing processing power at it, and that isn't efficient.  
  > **username_5**: Storage hasn't been the driving factor in ratings improvement of modern chess engines... in fact is has been effective aggressive pruning techniques and search ordering which has driven improvement.  If you had computers play against the best grandmasters in Chess 960 (no opening books, random starting positions) I bet computers would wipe the floor with the GMs, much worse than in traditional chess  
  
  ---
  
  