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© Copyright 1998, Jim Loy
Gary Kasparov, the World Chess Champ (one of two of them, actually), was beaten by Deep Blue, a computer. Kasparov folded under the pressure, something we would never expect from him. And the match was too short to be a valid test, in my opinion.
Let's pretend that it was a valid test. Let's pretend that Deep Blue is now better than Kasparov. Is this the end of the human race? Is it the beginning of the end? Is it the end of chess?
I don't see how this interesting event should affect the way that you and I play chess. So what if a computer can beat Kasparov? For all I know, Kasparov himself was a computer. How does this match affect chess? Maybe there will be more public interest in chess, maybe not. But, you won't see Deep Blue invading your local tournaments.
A machine that can "think" is a blow to the human ego. Maybe "thinking" will be a specialty of the computers. Maybe we humans will have to find some new job, like watching MTV.
This most recent stage in the evolution of chess-playing computers (when the desktop computers starting beating you and me) has emphasized a deep truth about humans and computers: Computer "thinking" is different from human thinking. Humans think better than computers, in some ways. Computers "think" better in other ways. Chess programs really improved, when the programmers stopped trying to copy the way that humans play chess. Chess programs now go their own way. They calculate an enormous number of chess positions, and "see" many many moves ahead. They "see" more, and understand less. Sometimes they play better than humans, sometimes they do not.
I personally think that, if we can turn to computers to help us with some of the thinking, it can enrich our civilization.
Is anyone worried that computers will start to take over the world, and make slaves of us? Do they want to do that? How is that any different from having some group of humans (like Microsoft or Congress or the FBI) taking over the world, with or without computers? I am paranoid about power-hungry people, not computers.