Some engines come to the conclusion there is a mate based on incomplete analysis. Sometimes the incompleteness turns out to be significant later, as the mate gets at least pushed beyond the horizon.
Chess will never be solved, here's why
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DesperateKingWalk wrote:
Optimissed wrote:
Thankyou. Any decent player should understand that 2. Ba6 loses. Not probably but definitely.
<<<People generally mean different things by words according to context. You use the word "know" when "guess" would be the appropriate word in the context of solving chess, so in common with @tygxc fall into @Elroch's "fallacy of proof by (repeated) assertion".
SF doesn't claim to know the result after 1.e4 e5 2.Ba6; it gives an evaluation.>>>
This would be funny if not for the fact that it's totally <<AAARRRRGGGGGGHHHHHH>>
"Fallacy of proof by (repeated) assertion" where it's just a repeated assertion that someone else is committing that supposed fallacy and where that repeated assertion is made simply to try to avoid having ever to think.
The idea that we cannot ever know anything unless we're told we're allowed to by a computer is the first step towards madness. Well, on reflection, maybe more advanced than the first step.
It is not definitely. It is highly likely. Remember some sacs do work. And chess is not won or lost solely on material.
And chess is a two player game. And Stockfish would most likely win the white side against most players. As they are also not playing perfect chess, just like Stockfish.
Stockfish would know this position is a 100% win if Stockfish could show a mate score.
No, it's definite. It's only "highly likely" according to SOME interpretations of evidence from a computer which you said yourself is not programmed to give definite decisions. You argued very well in complete support of my arguments but perhaps you weren't aware of it.
Put it this way. It isn't a sacrifice because it doesn't achieve anything in return for the bishop.
PDX_Axe wrote:
@Optimissed And yet you are still here and adding to the pile. It seems you love arguing about pointless things more than chess. Perhaps a debate team reject?
Haha if I were on any debate team I'd be their star performer, although my glory days are well in the past by now. It seems you love behaving like a child but I have no need to continue to draw your attention to it after this comment.
Dec 11, 2022
0
#6426
Optimissed wrote:
Put it this way. It isn't a sacrifice because it doesn't achieve anything in return for the bishop.
To be accurate:
(a) It's a sacrifice because Black can take the bishop.
(b) You can't see anything that is achieved in return for the bishop so you're willing to use proof by assertion to say it's fact.
(c) You can't prove the sacrifice is not perfect whether or not it achieves anything in return. You can't prove that the position is not, for example, drawn before and after the move (except by assertion, of course).
^^ Very childish. Based on nothing except a determination to be annoying. In other words: drivel. Maybe you were beaten too much as a child. Or not enough.
^^ Not very at all. Seriously, you shouldn't go through life believing everything that seems right to you is right, when there are others who think differently and you refuse to even try to understand them. That's your problem and the problem of some others here.
@6599
"Post your 10/10 wins against SF15. You should have no difficulty if there's no uncertainty."
++ This shows a complete lack of understanding. A position being analytically drawn, won, or lost has nothing to do with that position being empirically drawn, won, or lost in a contest between two human or engine players.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? is analytically lost for white. It is a checkmate in 53. That does not mean a human cannot draw or even lose it as black against an engine, just like a human may even lose a game with queen odds against a grandmaster.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? loses. That is 100% certain and not 99.99% certain. Probalility is inappropriate for deterministic events. You can ask about the probability that player A wins position X against player B. That is empirical, not analytical. Probability is always linked to an experiment, i.e. empirical. The experiment can be coin tosses, or detecting radioactive decays, or playing chess games.
A player may know that KBN vs. K is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves. That is 100% certain. He may however fail to do so in a game against an engine or human. His inability to checkmate does not make it less than 100% certain that the position is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves.
Chess
will never be solved
@6630
is five years away from being weakly solved.
tygxc wrote:
@6630
is five years away from being weakly solved.
haha 
tygxc wrote:
@6599
"Post your 10/10 wins against SF15. You should have no difficulty if there's no uncertainty."
++ This shows a complete lack of understanding. A position being analytically drawn, won, or lost has nothing to do with that position being empirically drawn, won, or lost in a contest between two human or engine players.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? is analytically lost for white. It is a checkmate in 53. That does not mean a human cannot draw or even lose it as black against an engine, just like a human may even lose a game with queen odds against a grandmaster.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? loses. That is 100% certain and not 99.99% certain. Probalility is inappropriate for deterministic events. You can ask about the probability that player A wins position X against player B. That is empirical, not analytical. Probability is always linked to an experiment, i.e. empirical. The experiment can be coin tosses, or detecting radioactive decays, or playing chess games.
A player may know that KBN vs. K is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves. That is 100% certain. He may however fail to do so in a game against an engine or human. His inability to checkmate does not make it less than 100% certain that the position is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves.
Yes, this pretty much explains it all, accurately.
Take a small, crystal glass and place it on an anvil. Take a blacksmith with unerring aim and a 20 pound hammer. The blacksmith takes a swing at the glass and when his hammer is half an inch from hitting the glass square on, we have to decide whether the glass will be broken or not. At such a stage perhaps only the application of a magnetic force so immense that we can have no conception of its origin and nature, would be capable of preventing damage to the glass. The fact that 2. Ba6 loses is completely sure, because it's analytic. It is, indeed, a surer fact than the fact that the glass will be smashed.
Dec 12, 2022
0
#6437
tygxc wrote:
-
@6599
"Post your 10/10 wins against SF15. You should have no difficulty if there's no uncertainty."
++ This shows a complete lack of understanding. A position being analytically drawn, won, or lost has nothing to do with that position being empirically drawn, won, or lost in a contest between two human or engine players.Totally agree with the second sentence. That's why neither you nor @Optimissed will venture to demonstrate against SF - you don't have an analysis.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? is analytically lost for white. It is a checkmate in 53.
Yes - a joke.
That does not mean a human cannot draw or even lose it as black against an engine, just like a human may even lose a game with queen odds against a grandmaster.
Another one you haven't analysed.
1 e4 e5 2 Ba6? loses. That is 100% certain and not 99.99% certain.
Or 100% certain that it doesn't lose. You don't know which. Like @Optimissed you guess. So do I, but I don't claim to know on that basis. Neither have I attempted to assign a probability to any outcome.
Probalility is inappropriate for deterministic events.
Not if the calculation of the outcome is impracticable owing to lack of sufficiently accurate measurement of the factors that determine the event or insufficient resources or lack of a suitable method to calculate the outcome. It's widely used and useful .
But what is the relevance? Both you and @Optimissed are claiming certainty (without anything to back up the claim). Which point of view are you trying to argue?
You can ask about the probability that player A wins position X against player B. That is empirical, not analytical. Probability is always linked to an experiment, i.e. empirical. The experiment can be coin tosses, or detecting radioactive decays, or playing chess games.
A player may know that KBN vs. K is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves. That is 100% certain. He may however fail to do so in a game against an engine or human. His inability to checkmate does not make it less than 100% certain that the position is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves.
More of what passes for analysis in your eyes.
Players don't know that KBN vs. K is a forced checkmate in less than 50 moves. They may believe it because they've been told in the same way that they "know" there was a battle in the vicinity of Hastings, England in 1066 A.D. That's not analytical knowledge and useless as a guide to playing the endgame.
A correct analysis shows it isn't necessarily so. Mostly false if the 50 move and triple repetition rules are in force. E.g.
White to play, any ply count > 39Black ro play
Black to play
Black to play
Black to play
Either side to play
Either side to play
Nobody has ever published a complete analysis of this endgame for positions in which there have been prior repeated positions considered the same for the purposes of FIDE art.9.2 with the same material and I don't expect any soon. (KRvK might be feasible.)
As for 1.e4 e5 2.Ba6 you have got just as far with solving that as you have with solving the starting position, Nowhere.
It should be obvious that tygxc is his own worst enemy, posting things like "mate in 52", which is very difficult to support. However, that doesn't alter the real thrust of the comment, which is that a competent person would know when analysis is necessary and when it isn't.
Here, analysis isn't necessary. A half decent player knows that white has negative compensation for the lost bishop, so it isn't a sacrifice in the correct sense of the word.
Dec 12, 2022
0
#6439
Optimissed wrote:
It should be obvious that tygxc is his own worst enemy, posting things like "mate in 52", which is very difficult to support. However, that doesn't alter the real thrust of the comment, which is that a competent person would know when analysis is necessary and when it isn't.
There is currently no way of judging the absolute competence of players, only competence relative to other players. Except (partially) when players play positions with material covered by tablebases or admit a practicable analysis. The exceptional case would suggest there are no competent players and never have been.
Actually he said 53, but I think he's also said 82.
Fair enough on both counts although I still think you and Elroch need to accept that human judgement isn't dictated to by computers. At least, not yet. Computers have no judgement faculties except by weighing scores they attribute, in the case of chess, to future positions. You keep raising the point about solving chess and if chess were solved, then we could probably accept those "mechanised weighings" with, at least, some small degree of confidence.
Interesting idea. I've only seen it happen without tablebase access (but then I don't have Syzygy tablebases so I wouldn't see it any other way).
So far as I know SF uses only Syzygy tablebases and they don't give a mate length.
Why don't they announce "M?" instead of "152.xx"?