I commented about "Programs have as much chance evolving beyond their programmers as faucets do.", not about intelligence.
Yeah, I suppose so. My stupid analogy still holds.
We're not saying computers will never be able to do anything that their programmers already do, but that they will never do anything that their programmers did not think they could do.
As long as you can switch sides on a computer program humans will always win! 
(It's not quiet serious ... *smile*)
There is an other aspect of chess programs. Opening books and the perfect ending were not allowed for players in a tournament game. Why are they allowed for programs? It would be a lot more challenging to programmers to develop chess programs where only the algorithm counts ... (Also strategically there is still a lot of work to do.)
Of course chess programs (as they are today) are still a lot stronger than any human player. The right question was: "So what?" 
definitely
Oh Yes!
LongIslandMark, you are right, it was silly to talk to people who could not understand any word from my part. Especially to provoke to tell me some rude words like "crap" or proofs that God is not all-mighty like a puzzle with ten white-square bishops against a king.
I left this site quite a year ago just because it provoked me to fall into discussions with absolutely different people. It contains a lot of possibilities like taking part to forums directly from the start page or a lot of vote chess. Many other sites do not contain such features.
"Yes, of course" - I would give such answer at eighteen. Sorry, cannot continue here.
I think Ray Kurzweil's prediction is way off, but I think eventually the technological singularity could arive. The estimations on when computing power will surpass a rat, man, and all of mankind are estimations, not certainties. We can't exactly easily convert brain power to MIPS.
Even if these estimations were exactly correct, software just isn't there yet. People don't seem to be much closer to general AI than they ever have been.
Fast != smart. They could increase computing power by 1,000,000 times and computers do "stupid" 1,000,000 times faster. There needs to be dramatic improvements in software.
Who says that humans won't be able to come up with ways to improve ourselves before this happens anyway?
I left this site quite a year ago just because it provoked me to fall into discussions with absolutely different people.
I guess all is said.
EDIT : oh, yes, this is out of context, so go and see #81.
If everybody could shut up about religion for a second, this is a good question.
Ubik, if you block God, you'll die immediately. Fortunately, He is all-mighty, and He doesn't give you the first possibility (though the second one always threats us). He thinks about you and directs your mind even if you don't believe it. Finally, you can feel that He exists and helps you exactly as you feel pleasure or headache.
Sorry to let you feel some headache, as talkings about God often sound bad in Occident. Occidental preachers often feel the subject of their suggestions poorly and make people only to dislike God.
For concluning my suggestions, I think that, though computers are, in fact, already able to beat any human, there is still no human chess player able to beat any computer. But this doesn't mean that such player hasn't to be ever born. This is by this way that te question of the topic must be answered, in my opinion.
I am going to have to call POE on this one.
I will track this topic no more. Still, I will not delete anything of written. What is said is said. I cannot understand why religion is a personal thing for you. If not, I hadn't to listen to such derisions. I come back to simply playing.
AI, just saying.
What do you mean by my cryonic experience, tryst?
Has houdini3 played in a competition against GMs? Has houdini3 played itself, and when it does, does white always win?
How does a OP with such an obviously false premise get 5 pages of responses (not including mine, which does not count)?
What do you mean by my cryonic experience, tryst?
Oops! didn't see this. I meant that you must have been frozen in time and reawakened, because computers can already beat all humans in chess.
Yeah, where have you been since the 90's.
Calling computers as they are now smart is like turning a faucet, watching water come out, and calling that smart.
Programs have as much chance evolving beyond their programmers as faucets do.
The programmers can construct an efficient algorithm for solving chess problems that a computer can do easily, but the programmer himself being unable do to by hand.
Huh ?
You miss the point.
A human cannot flow water at a steady rate either. Does that make the faucet intelligent ?