Mark Thompson wrote on Tue, Feb 22, 2005 01:19 AM UTC:
Greg Strong wrote: 'When exact refutations to every single opening can be
calculated, and are published, then professional Chess will no longer be a
game of Chess skill, but rather just a game of memorization. Ok, you could
still try to substitute Chess skill, but a person with a fantastic memory
will probalby clean your clock.'
Indeed, I feel we have already witnessed the Scrabble-ization of Chess:
the step from amateur to tournament player already requires loads of rote
memorization. However, if we switch to Grand Chess the number of openings
will be far greater and hence harder to learn, for any human being
(without cyborg cortical implants); if we switch to any variant with a
large number of variable opening setups, I think it will be impossible.
The objection someone made to Mercenary Chess that whatever makes the
'best' army and opening setup would be soon discovered misses one of the
points: the best army and opening setup for White would depend on the army
and opening setup Black is using, and vice versa; hence if they choose
them one piece at a time it would be unlikely that the same one would
always be used. Also, remember that there's a 'catalog' of pieces with
prices: I should have stipulated that the catalog offerings and prices
would continually be reviewed by the World Mercenary Chess Federation,
which would periodically raise the prices of pieces in the greatest demand
and lower the prices of pieces no one wants to hire. Also the WMCF might
introduce new pieces from time to time. Hence, I don't believe exhaustion
could ever happen.
Computers may play better than humans. But we're still a long way from
building a machine that can enjoy the game as much as we can.