Chess will never be solved, here's why

Helloio

Even if your evidence compels my mind to accept that chess is a draw.....is this what you believe "solvable" means...... convincing by compelling evidence?  To me, solving chess means 100%, not >99%.  There is a huge difference between those two, even if 99% is enough for most things. I feel pretty good if there's a 99% chance I'll survive my surgery, but it's far from being sure. But solving chess (or checkers) means removing the last scintilla of doubt....at least that's what it means to me....that we're no longer dealing in probabilities or statistics, but that we have a move for EVERY possible position that would guarantee a path to a draw.....with 100% certainty.....not >99%. 

testioio

I'm very precise. I even know precisely what "compels the mind" means. I also know what deduction is and, even more importantly. what premises are and how they may be obtained. You're mistaken to think that your semantic precision means that your methodology and, most importantly, your premises, which you call axioms, in order to imply that they are unassailable, are just that. I'm so precise that I know that nothing you can say or write can alter the meaning of "compels the mind".

It's what we think must be true and correct, to the best of our ability. The ability may vary between people but, most importantly, the methodology doesn't alter. What does alter are the groundings of our deductions.

@5616
"Isn't it possible to be sure and wrong at the same time?"
++ That is why the assistants need to be good.
That is why they need to be (ICCF) (grand)masters.
If they are not 100% sure that they are not wrong, then they should let the engine analyse on.

Almost all others.

We need a tygxc-normal dictionary.

Some entries:

know...guess

solve....guess

perfect player...Stockfish

perfect play...draw a winning KPvK position

legal position....position in KRPP v KRP

illegal position....legal position with ply count > 0

calculation...method for arriving at ludicrous figures

order of magnitude...add 10 (or subtract if you think no one will notice)

proof...what I tell you three times

blasphemy...verification of calculation (see above)

inspection ..... three GMs with umbrellas raised, staring into a goldfish bowl and wondering where the fish went. (courtesy @Optimissed.)

right...wrong (courtesy @tygxc)

deduction...first daft thing that springs into @tygxc's head. (courtesy @Optimissed.)

Uturn...carry on in the wrong direction in the face of all evidence (courtesy of @NervesofButter)

... further entries invited.

Botvinnick wasn't amazingly dynamic and we can be pretty sure it was all analysed, so he took few chances. Similarly with Fischer. But then, there was also the era of Petrosian and a similarly dull era further towards the beginning of the previous century. Also the Staunton era might be considered similar. Generally chess is becoming more technically precise, which is understandable, because technical precision increases, players know that they can't combat it by taking undue risks, so the game evolves and always away from allowing known risks that don't give significant winning chances against sound play.

inspection ..... three GMs with umbrellas raised, staring into a goldfish bowl and wondering where the fish went.

@5620
"Even if your evidence compels my mind to accept that chess is a draw.....
is this what you believe "solvable" means...... convincing by compelling evidence?"
++ 'ultra-weakly solved means
that the game-theoretic value of the initial position has been determined'
determine = to fix conclusively or authoritatively - Webster
To me Chess is ultra-weakly solved to be a draw, 100% sure though not yet formally proven.

'weakly solved means that for the initial position a strategy has been determined to achieve the game-theoretic value against any opposition'
This thus means to determine how black can draw against any tries by white to win.
The best strategy so far is to follow an ICCF WC Finals drawn game as long as possible.

"To me, solving chess means 100%, not >99%."
++ Do not confuse the weak solution of Chess and arguments about it.

We have 1469 ICCF WC Finals games, 1177 of which are draws and 1104 of which are perfect games with optimal play from both sides. We do not know which of the 1177 are the 1104 perfect games and which 73 contain 2 errors that undo each other, mostly from earlier years.

"solving chess (or checkers) means removing the last scintilla of doubt"
++ Checkers was solved with only 19 of the 300 possible openings.
Connect Four was solved with only 9 knowledge rules.

"we're no longer dealing in probabilities or statistics"
++ Weakly solving Chess is determining how to draw as black.
The statistics are only used in arguments about it e.g. to show that for 32 to 7 men the table base exact move is among the top 4 engine moves if the billion positions/s engine runs for 17 s (or a desktop runs for 4.7 h) with 1 error in 10^20 positions > the number of 10^17 relevant positions.

"that we have a move for EVERY possible position that would guarantee a path to a draw"
++ Yes. That path can be a series of moves, but also a more general strategy.
E.g. after 1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? it is 100% sure that white loses (it is checkmate in 82),
but we do not need a whole tree to prove that.
A more general strategy: trade pieces, create a passed pawn, queen it, checkmate is enough.

My mother always used to tell me, "six wrongs don't make a right".

@5628
"six wrongs don't make a right"
++ But six rights leave no doubt.

They still could be wrong. I'm worried about "three". Four is better because it reduces the chances of confirmation bias.

Funny you should mention that.

No show yet for your calculation of the theoretical result and error rates in my games here. Are you still working on it?

Once you've done that we can stop discussing your proposal.

It doesn't work.

You don't have to wait for my KRPPvKRP runs. Your calculation should work for any material.

These responses are less than compelling to my mind.  Relying on humans to be "good" just doesn't seem to fit with what you're trying to prove. 

"Little doubt".....sure.   "No doubt"......troublesome. 

Less compelling than a Messerschmitt 109's tracers arcing towards your cockpit.
More compelling than cold rice pudding on a colder day.
Somewhere in that interval.

We're witnessing a clash between the old way of "doing science" and the new. Although my heart is with the older way, I believe tygxc needs to adjust his wording to reflect that difference, particularly regarding the proper meaning of deduction. Then all should be well.

@5632
"Relying on humans to be "good" just doesn't seem to fit with what you're trying to prove."
++ Here is an example. https://www.iccf.com/game?id=1164259 
The 2 ICCF grandmasters agree to a draw as neither side can win.
An engine might continue a long time before reaching a 3-fold repetition in all variations.

Good point. I'll add it to my dictionary.