Levy's interview on Chessbase about ICGA/rybka

[Rolf]

...
(1) First of all their mathematical foolishness.
If you have 300 programmers (amateurs and pros) and gather 34 in a special ICGA panel and then only 16 voted, then even the result of 16-0 isnt a clear result at all. Levy says if it had been 9-7 then the staff should have taken some serious considerations out of doubt.

However this is against all knowledge coming from stats.

So you are saying instead of assuming a pretty obvious result of 16-0, we have to assume that all the others that did not voted are most likely pro Vas?

No, exactly this wasnt what I meant. I just wanted to mention the until now unknown reasons for their abstination. Dont waste so much time in computerchess. Take the political elections. You know that non voters are usually counted for the negative votes from opposition?

This is completely irrelevant. The motivation of the non-voters do not matter. It is in politics the same thing. When people decide not to vote (and hence have no direct input in the voting), that's their problem and their problem alone.
In the whole Rybka-issue it is even much easier. If a programmer (or hundreds of them) were able to provide reasonable proof that no wrongdoing by Vas was involved, they could have approached the panel and could have presented their evidence, and may have voted. Nobody did (not even Vas himself!).

You are a funny researcher. Of course you must not ber interested in the motivation of these people but if others do care (like me e.g.) then you cannot argue that it does not have to interest other people. You got that?

Next point is the following. I as observer have no insight if Vas did something wrong, so all I care for is if the process is following legal justice and it's not. So, I dont says, Vas is innocent but I say I want to have this decided by a legal justice institution. Like Levy you could state why that would matter if Vas were guilty? The answer to that naivety is simply that there are too many sticking points in private justice.

Take e.g. the not-defending himself of an accused person. Only in the environment of a legal court and with the usual authority of its personal it's possible to leave such a moot point out of the debate or decision. While in real life it will automatically lead to the suspicion that someone might well be guilty just because he doesnt defend himself, "if he were innocent then he would like everybody would do it, defend himself", in other words everaywhere we are following such basic assumptions that could be totally wrong.

Here in Rybka case nobody has a direct proof. Hence these many work arounds. But this is very important: in a legal court not every possible work-around is legitimate. And even if the case is clear, a formal reason might destroy the whole case. If you know what I mean. IMO the panel and ICGA staff laid their interest too little on the formal requirments of the case as such. The primitive assumption of the self-answering clarity of a rule 2 could become a problem. Also the biased practice vs Vas. While tolerating all kind of stuff among the other players.

[noctiferus]

I edited my previous post. Made a difference whether every member was asked to vote: in this case, if the question is : guilty or not, the guilty voters are compared against non-guilty voters ( abstainers or no-voters.)
I mean, in this case there would be an explicit intention of non voting "guilty"
.

[michiguel]

...
(1) First of all their mathematical foolishness.
If you have 300 programmers (amateurs and pros) and gather 34 in a special ICGA panel and then only 16 voted, then even the result of 16-0 isnt a clear result at all. Levy says if it had been 9-7 then the staff should have taken some serious considerations out of doubt.

However this is against all knowledge coming from stats.

So you are saying instead of assuming a pretty obvious result of 16-0, we have to assume that all the others that did not voted are most likely pro Vas?

No, exactly this wasnt what I meant. I just wanted to mention the until now unknown reasons for their abstination. Dont waste so much time in computerchess. Take the political elections. You know that non voters are usually counted for the negative votes from opposition?

This is completely irrelevant. The motivation of the non-voters do not matter. It is in politics the same thing. When people decide not to vote (and hence have no direct input in the voting), that's their problem and their problem alone.
In the whole Rybka-issue it is even much easier. If a programmer (or hundreds of them) were able to provide reasonable proof that no wrongdoing by Vas was involved, they could have approached the panel and could have presented their evidence, and may have voted. Nobody did (not even Vas himself!).

False!

For instance, I did not participate because I could not allow myself to be associated with a process in which 2/3 members of the secretariat should have recused themselves. This was mentioned but they won't listen.
The whole process was flawed from the beginning.

Miguel

[Rolf]

No.
This is much alike a referendum: there are n individuals that have voting rights (those enlisted in the panel). Whether they don't exercise their right, the referendum is won by the majority of effective voters.
It would be different If everybody in the panel would have been asked for voting: in this case, abstainers would actually be counted as negative voters, againts the positive votes.

Of course all were asked in a general expectance having made up their mind.

But I see the problem here. Levy is not entitles to proclaim an absolute clear voting in favor of his later decision because for such a title he didnt have the majority of votes at all.

The psychological reason for the zero votes against could be of a group zwang NOT to out oneself as the lonely troublemaker in a group with loudmouthed anti Vas votes. The pro votes are much easier to explain because the panel was organised to prove the guilt of Vas. So it would have been insane if the secretariat would have abstained. Here you can also see the fatal flaw of the whole event. The candidates for any task didnt come from both sides equally but only from the killer side. All that wouldnt exist in a legal court case.

[Rolf]

I edited my previous post. Made a difference whether every member was asked to vote: in this case, if the question is : guilty or not, the guilty voters are compared against non-guilty voters ( abstainers or no-voters.)
I mean, in this case there would be an explicit intention of non voting "guilty"
.

Please be precise. You mean in this case you assumed or do you think that we can well conclude that these nonvoters wanted to abstan from calling Vas guilty?

+2

[Don]

The second part of Levy's interview is here:
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7908

Damn, this is a smear campaign by CB/Rybka against ICGA. They want a passionate mob justice of their own (for CB readers an buyers), as though all the forums (CCC included) are not enough. Was that the only way for Vas? Pretty ugly. Anyway, Levy should have not entered into these dirty CB tricks. What is generally left (for not very informed) is the first question (the following are similar):

ChessBase: Critics of the ICGA say that at least some of the members of the panel that led the investigation harboured deep personal animosity towards Vasik Rajlich and had been attacking him for years. This can be easily proved by citing many thousands of forum postings before, during and after the investigation process. Was it wise of the ICGA to rely on such members and in fact elect them to lead the investigation and draft the final report? In civil or criminal court this would have lead to an immediate mistrial.


Kai

One of my favorite quotations from this interview, which really resonates with me is this one:

One important attraction of competition is to compete with your own skills, against others using their own skills. And from the sporting perspective it is not as intellectually honest and stimulating to take bits and pieces from the work of others, as opposed to developing your skills yourself. Then, winning actually means something.

Aside from whether Vas is guilty or not (which is really more the to point) a lot of people pretend to not agree with this concept, and yet they still want to heap kudo's on authors who do this kind of copying.

I see computer chess tournaments as a sporting contest, not a scientific endeavor. And I see chess programs as works of art, not scientific papers. Although a great deal of science is involved, it's still a contest.

[noctiferus]

No, I meant an expressed abtension.

[Dr. Axel Schumacher]

...
(1) First of all their mathematical foolishness.
If you have 300 programmers (amateurs and pros) and gather 34 in a special ICGA panel and then only 16 voted, then even the result of 16-0 isnt a clear result at all. Levy says if it had been 9-7 then the staff should have taken some serious considerations out of doubt.

However this is against all knowledge coming from stats.

So you are saying instead of assuming a pretty obvious result of 16-0, we have to assume that all the others that did not voted are most likely pro Vas?

No, exactly this wasnt what I meant. I just wanted to mention the until now unknown reasons for their abstination. Dont waste so much time in computerchess. Take the political elections. You know that non voters are usually counted for the negative votes from opposition?

This is completely irrelevant. The motivation of the non-voters do not matter. It is in politics the same thing. When people decide not to vote (and hence have no direct input in the voting), that's their problem and their problem alone.
In the whole Rybka-issue it is even much easier. If a programmer (or hundreds of them) were able to provide reasonable proof that no wrongdoing by Vas was involved, they could have approached the panel and could have presented their evidence, and may have voted. Nobody did (not even Vas himself!).

False!

For instance, I did not participate because I could not allow myself to be associated with a process in which 2/3 members of the secretariat should have recused themselves. This was mentioned but they won't listen.
The whole process was flawed from the beginning.

Miguel

No, not false.

The motivation is irrelevant for the outcome. The fact that the process was flawed (which is to be expected in such a small and minor 'club') is irrelevant and should not affect participation. If you don't vote you don't vote and this makes it even worse. This is how it works. If somebody is not satisfied with the process, he/she can or better should still vote with their best intention in mind. Not to vote is no solution in this case. Non-voting is inextricably connected to issues of moral responsibility, especially because fewer voters mean less valid statistics. The chess-community would have much more agreed with whatever the outcome of the ICGA voting by attending the flawed process and voting. Of course, it is your freedom to stay away from the case and do something else rather than doing something that you regard as useless.
In the end it was just a poll within a small subset of chesscomputer geeks. Nothing more. If Vas wants a flawless procedure he is free to sue.

Axel

[Graham Banks]

......If you have 300 programmers (amateurs and pros) and gather 34 in a special ICGA panel and then only 16 voted, then even the result of 16-0 isnt a clear result at all.........

Funny how 14 people voting has suddenly become 16.

[Rebel]

......If you have 300 programmers (amateurs and pros) and gather 34 in a special ICGA panel and then only 16 voted, then even the result of 16-0 isnt a clear result at all.........

Funny how 14 people voting has suddenly become 16.

2 people voted secretly.