Will computers ever solve chess?

   Did not even mention that the main problem is the inability to ngle out a perfect move. Not playing it by accident.

  It is the action of labeling one specific move as perfect that is a speculation, not a fact—that was the discussion.

 In your reasoning you moved from one speculation to another, in order to vaguely point that one of those 20 moves must be perfect.

  Speculation 1: White wins with best play. Then of 20 opening Bkack moves, one is perfect.

 If speculation 1 is false, then speculation two is that Bkack wins by force. However, here it may not win in all the lines, so it may not win after most White’s first moves, in case it’s a draw, since speculation 1 was false, but in some it may win. I’m not sure 1. g3 h6 has been played, or 1. Nc3 h5. But anything’s possible.

  The main point is that it still needs a speculation in order to say ‘one of these twenty moves is perfect.’ I need to speculate about the final outcome.

 Back where we started.

  And to label the sequence 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 or 3. d4 ‘ perfect’ is not a fact, but a speculation.

  A wild speculation. It is meaningless to play a perfect move on your 25th move, if you already played 24 imperfect moves.

 After playing one imperfect move, the notion of perfect loses its meaning. Strong engines may play strong moves, maybe even perfect, but nobody knows they don’t commit blunders galore where we see ‘perfect’... We can speculate but we don’t know. Only a supercomputer would know, which was the whole point here.

troy You equate your lack of chess knowledge with the lack of chess knowledge of ALL chess players. Did you ever stop and think some other players know a lot more about chess than you do???

troy it is a logical fallacy to consider the game of chess could end in a draw or in a loss or in a win and that means that since there are 3 possibilities that means each possibility has a 33% chance of happening...Ludic logical fallacy

troy here is one of your quotes "a confused, slow, aging brain has

 difficulties understanding this. So I will not hold my breath."

This is the logical fallacy called "Ad hominem" which you use quite often. 

troy here is another of your quotes:"This is already too much for a simpleton to understand" 

This is a logical fallacy called "Ad hominem"

 You use this logical fallacy quite often.

You also use the logical fallacy of "strawman" quite often. 

That was a realistic conclusion, after seeing you repeatedly failing to understand much simpler notions. Like a simple ‘or’, instead of three ‘or’s. How can I expect you to understand either/or three times, when you failed to grasp the first one?

 Where is the strawmen argument in my repeating the same questions, for which you have no answer? 

  Question no. one: how Is your prediction that ‘a perfect game ends in a draw’ not a speculation? 

  Question no. two: how is your statement that 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 is a perfect game not a speculation?

  Question no. Three: how do you know that Ruy Lopez doesn’t lose by force? You just acted surprised when I said that, and asked me how come I don’t know that it doesn’t lose by force.

 I don’t know because nobody knows that, at present. That doesn’t prevent me from playing it regularly, but unlike you, I see the distinction. It’s a very instructive opening to master, containing many things to learn. But who knows? In the future, a computer might show me I was an idiot and it can, after all, be refuted by force. 

  I can do both: I can play it regularly, while at the same time acknowledge the possibility of being completely wrong, which the fact of ‘I don’t know’ implies.

  But conceited simpletons cannot do that. They insist they know and all they offer is ‘ I just know.’ The simpleton is not simpleton enough until they’re not conceited as well.

  Question no. Four: how do you know that 1...e5 doesn’t lose by force in 136 best moves, as was suggested, thus changing the other speculation of yours, about the draw outcome? 

 Changing the outcome, it’s not a perfect game anymore, despite moronically stated by you that it is perfect.

You haven’t answered any of these questions. When asked direct, specific questions you are hiding behind generalities that have nothing to do with the questions being asked.

 I’m asking about apples , you are responding with descriptions of oranges.

So any answers to those questions?

You can NOT know the outcome of a move without examining ALL responses to that move, and all responses to those responses, and so on. 

There are more possible game variations than there are atoms in the universe. Knowing ALL the possible branches and branches of branches of every move is impossible for any human or current computer. 

If you feel you have proven to know the result of a perfect game, why haven’t you written a thesis of your proof and submitted it for peer review?  You would win the Nobel prize! 😀

  The reason you are slow and obtuse is irrelevant. I offered some suggestions. Regardless of the reasons, which I may have rightly suggested or not, the fact remains: you are slow, obtuse, and do not seem to understand the questions, because your responses have nothing to do with what was being asked.

  And I said, observing the fact that you are slow to grasp these questions—since your responses reveal this lack of understanding of the questions—I announced that I won’t hold my breath. It is not part of a logical demonstration that you are slow to grasp. It is a consequence of the observation that you are slow to grasp, based on confused answers.

  It is this observation of your answers that make you slow, not my tongue in cheek reply about not holding my breath. 

 It could be one of three options. So the chances you are correct by picking any one of them are 33.33%. If there were more options to choose from, the percentage being much smaller, the impulse to speculate would be even more futile.

  But one chance in three to be right? Speculate if you feel you must: just don’t pretend it’s not a speculation, ultimately.

 After all, 33% or 99% —same difference: they’re both not a fact.

  Of course, your coming up with the actual number of 99% has no mathematical basis, whereas 33% has.

  I already addressed that: all the accumulated chess knowledge, by all the humans and computers together, not just one simpleton’s brain, but all the brains that ever played chess—you put that together and it’s garbage, compared to the amount of knowledge we don’t know, given by the huge number of games that can be played.

 But try to tell that to a national champion: they feel they know so, so much. And the poor fellow’s knowledge is nothing compared to a GM. But invoking the playing strength is not in question here, which is why I didn’t invoke my rank to impose authority on another.

  This has to do with simple logic, not with chess knowledge. That’s a completely different subject.

Your diagram isn’t loading.

Edit. Okay, it’s loading on the app. What about it?

The only logical and rhetorical weakness here is Ponz111's insistence on the "perfect game," which opens the door to any number of objections from logical positivist pinheads.

The conjecture that a "well played game" by experts (or by futuristic quantum computers) will end in a draw is an entirely reasonable one, given the history and record of GM games, and all research to date.

As for "facts.," et. al., -- In a nutshell, the Rhetorical Tetrad includes Facts, Logic, Metaphors (models), and STORIES, too.  Only pinheads (with idiotic verve) from an 100 year old philosophical movement (logical positivism) would pursue this issue with a former USCF Correspondent Champion.  But hey, it's the inter-web, a marketplace of ideas, and essentially a free-for-all discussion.

As an aside, it's fascinating because Ponz111 won so many games using the black pieces (and Center Counter Defense), that "chess experts" could take seriously the conjecture -- "white might be in zugzwang," at the start of the game.

Yes it remains and open question, whether Chess, with best play, is a draw.  But the same is (most likely) true that nothing can exceed the speed of light.  Neither proposition can be "'proved" (in peer reviewed journals, or whatever), because there are NO outside, objective, observers in the logical positivist framework.  There is only SCIENCE, and it's METHOD.  The humans have altogether disappeared from this framework, which is one of it's weaknesses.

And that's why (roughly speaking) this thread (endlessly) talks past itself.

But who cares?  Onward Christian Soldiers...   

Glad you’re on my side. 👍

I also think it’s (probably) a draw. The only contention here is pawn111’s claim to KNOW it’s a draw.

marching as to war. With the cross of Jesus going on before! [that is all i can remember]

Do you agree or disagree with zborg‘s assertion that perfect chess being a draw is conjecture? That it’s an “open question” that hasn’t been proven?

You're a Christian Soldier (US Army guy), I'm a mostly secular, former Catholic.  Our area of agreement is rather limited.

Besides, I'm a fan of Ponz111, as should be obvious from my prior comments in this 5000+ crazy- arse-thread.

I have written the same essential summary (c.f. posts above) at least once every 1000 posts, but people don't actually read what comes earlier in these threads.  Webheads don't read, they just cherry pick. 

So Knock Yourselves Out, as you drive this circular discussion round and round.

It proves that your statement--per that one sentence--was incorrect.

I will give another diagram to also prove your statement was not correct.