World Chess Computer Champion?

[mwyoung]

Someone ought to run a match, and post the results here, between the two engines claiming the title of 2013 world champion, Hiarcs and Komodo.

Yeah, and someone should run a Ferrari against a Mercedes to decide who is World Champion Formula I racing.

Fact is the match you are demanding took already place. But Komodo was a 'no-show'.

Yes, there was no rule that prevented Komodo from playing for the 2013 WCCC title. If Komodo wants to claim the title of World Champion. Komodo needs to play for that title.

I clearly don't understand how anyone can claim Komodo has any right to claim the WCCC title under any argument others are using.

1. Komodo has won no tournament claiming to be for the WCCC title official or unofficial.
2. Komodo was not prevented in any way from playing in the ICGA WCCC event for 2013.
3. Komodo testing data suggest Komodo is not the strongest program. Both Houdini 4 and Stockfish are higher rated on most rating list.

I am not sure what some were trying to debate. Komodo says it has seen the error, and will correct the WCCC claim. The most important thing any person or company has is its credibility. So I am sure they will fix this error, or pay the price with their credibility.

[hgm]

Yes, very true. But the suggestions are getting more and more absurd. Why should there be a match between Komodo and HIARCS? What would give Komodo the right to play 1 on 1 for the title? Are they topping the CCRL 40/40 list? Why would it be a good idea to play for the 2013 WC title when 2014 is well underway, with an engine that did not exist yet when the 2013 Championship? Should 'someone' also play a match between Stockfish and Deep Thought to decide who was the 'real World Champion 1989'? And if Komodo wants to play against HIARCS for the 2014 title, why can't it do so in the 2014 WCCC?

All this sounds completely insane to me.

[Laskos]

Yes, very true. But the suggestions are getting more and more absurd. Why should there be a match between Komodo and HIARCS? What would give Komodo the right to play 1 on 1 for the title? Are they topping the CCRL 40/40 list? Why would it be a good idea to play for the 2013 WC title when 2014 is well underway, with an engine that did not exist yet when the 2013 Championship? Should 'someone' also play a match between Stockfish and Deep Thought to decide who was the 'real World Champion 1989'? And if Komodo wants to play against HIARCS for the 2014 title, why can't it do so in the 2014 WCCC?

All this sounds completely insane to me.

In WCCC Komodo meets Hiarcs only in 1-2 games, and the total winning chances of Komodo in the ICGA WCCC 10 crappy games are about ~50%. If Komodo meets directly Hiarcs or Junior in some sort of final of 10 games, it has ~90% chances to win.

[mwyoung]

Why should there be a match between Komodo and HIARCS? What would give Komodo the right to play 1 on 1 for the title? Are they topping the CCRL 40/40 list?

All this sounds completely insane to me.

Komodo obviously has gained that right to play a one on one match with Hiarcs. After Hiarcs has already won the 2013 world championship title fair and square against Komodo. Because Komodo was the only program in the world to lie about being the 2013 world champion.

[bob]

Leagues last months. World Championships and Olympic games etc tend to last a couple of weeks.

Harvey,

Every self respecting sport has a body that is recognized and endorsed by the vast majority of sportsmen / women. What once was since 2011 is no longer. Whatever the reason you have to act.

You keep making that pronouncement - the ICGA is no longer recognized.

Selective reading on your end, see the red above.

There is no reason to involve the Rybka controversy into the discussion. Forget about Rybka, it is what it is and doing nothing won't solve the above problem, the last 2½ year has proven that.

You will remember the days the WCCC and WMCCC were the yearly highlight, the magazins and CC fora exploded. That popularity halted (quite roughly) exactly when?

Circa 1997, to be exact. I assume you realize the significance of that date? Never was the same after that. Suddenly no TV crews showed up, no vendors kicked in tens of thousands of dollars or provided special hardware, etc.

You don't have to be a prophet to predict how this will end, if things already are not irreversable in the meantime by the 2½ year lack of action from David. As if doing nothing ever solved a problem.

Quite often, doing NOTHING is much better than doing something WRONG.

[hgm]

In WCCC Komodo meets Hiarcs only in 1-2 games, and the total winning chances of Komodo in the ICGA WCCC 10 crappy games are about ~50%. If Komodo meets directly Hiarcs or Junior in some sort of final of 10 games, it has ~90% chances to win.

Indeed, that is how it works in championships, and a World Championship is no exception. You'd better win when it counts.

In the 2010 World Cup Soccer Brazil also only got one match against the Netherlands. In the World Championship speed skating you also only get to skate the 10 km once. If you don't run the fastest in the finals of the 100m dash Track&Field you're done. It always is like that. This is what they call 'sport'.

It seems to me you believe a World Championship is no good, unless it is absolutely sure in advance who will win it. And if it is not absolutly sure you will win yourself, you just don't participate, and proclaim yourself World Champion anyway.

If Komodo is not so much better than the other participants that it 'only' has a 50% chance to win, I don't see why it should win at all, and I certainly don't see why the rules than would have to be doctored to enhance its chances.

Also note that finals over excessively many games are actually a quite poor way to determine who is best. If Komodo beats Stockfish in a 100-game finals match, it does not prove at all that it is objectively better than Stockfish. It could be that Stockfish just happens to have problems with the style of Komodo, but that it still performs better against a varied set of opponents. Of course if it also played 100 games against every other opponent in a round robin you will get a good impression which one is objectively better (except for the programs at the top, of course, as they have not been tested against as many weaker as stronger opponents...), but tourney schemes with excessively long finals usually don't have that, and the length of the finals goes at the expense of the number of other games, to keep the total number of games manageable. Thus degrading the accuracy of the result. In a scheme with finals and semi-finals with three nearly-equally strong participants, sticking out above the rest of the field, the influence of luck will always be large, as the pairing will have far more effect on the chances than the number of games per pairing.

[bob]

That popularity halted (quite roughly) exactly when?

When the Ippolyt source was published?

No, after the ICGA Rybka verdict, June 2011. See the lack of interest for Tilburg 2011 and Japan 2013 for instance here at CCC, still the beating heart of CC.

Sorry, but that is simply wrong. MANY of us have discussed the slow demise of ICGA events over the years. It STARTED in 1997 when the world concluded that "computer chess has been solved, the world champion was beaten by a computer, time to move on to other applications of AI." You can find r.g.c.c AND CCC postings on this very topic repeated over the years.

Hardly anyone even knows about Rybka. Even fewer care. One simple example. When Apollo 11 launched, the TV stations covered the mission 24/7 until the astronauts touched down. By the last Apollo mission, there was no coverage at all, except for a 15 second note on the local news. "Going to the moon has been solved." Ditto for the first few Space Shuttle launches. Then "that's about as exciting as watching a 747 take off at the local airport... back and forth into space has been solved."

There's a trend there, and it has nada to do with Rybka, regardless of what you wish were the case.

It is easy to diagnose the disease. It is easy to blame others for not having a cure. But do you have one?

The (new) CSVN board is doing fine. They have recognized there is a problem and are determined to do something about it. All David has done is ostrich politics.

How so? He tackled a claim of cheating head-on, formed a group to gather evidence, and then acted. This has happened multiple times over the past 20 years or so.

[bob]

"The whole point about claiming titles or pseudo titles that you really did not win. Is to DECEIVE PEOPLE into buying their products."

Same is true for 'legal' World Champions. They deveive people into buying their comparatively very weak engines. Not their fault and perfectly legal but nonetheless very misleading by factual circumstances.

If someone chooses to not compete, so what? In any given track and field event, there is usually at least one athlete that did not participate for various reasons. In any given football game, there is usually at least one key player that doesn't participate due to injuries or illness. Does that render the competition irrelevant and the winner meaningless?

You'd have to ask Larry/Mark/etc why they did not participate in the ICGA event. Or Tord/et. al. regarding Stockfish. I do not believe Houdini would be allowed, since it is clearly non-original, but robolito/etc is an interesting question. I presume NONE of those enter because the pseudo-authors know they can't pass originality muster. I remember WCCCs with no Fritz. No Rebel. No you-name-it. It happens. Do you REALLY think that one or two authors can totally invalidate a WCCC event just by not participating? I doubt the olympics have the top athletes in every sport from every country participating. But they had the opportunity. Sometimes people take the approach "I am perceived as being way up here near the top, do I really want to take a chance on getting beat by one of those lower-level entrants and lose a little lustre in the process?"

[poet]

Surely there's enough room for 2 world champions?
Just like we all got on fine when there was the FIDE and PCA.

There's the TCEC event for the worlds strongest engines.
And the ICGA for the rest.

I don't see any problem?

[hgm]

Apparently you think there are two Worlds. Quite laughable, actually. Just as the FIDE / PCA situation was quite laughable.

And of course it would not solve anything at all. Because the reasons for not participating in a World Championship would apply for World Championship #2 just as much as for World Championship #1.

Why not immediately make 20 World Championships? Then at least you would have a chance to solve it. There aren't more than 20 top engines. So you can have one World Championship for Houdini, one for Stockfish, one for Komodo, one for Critter.... Each engine could have a 100% guaranteed win. And you would not need very many games either to achieve that. Think of the electricity that would save!