Humans v Houdini chess engine (Elo 3300)

This is only a conversation if you misunderstand what engines are / how they work.  Obviously they don't give the best move or evaluation for every position.  It's just a tool with very specific parameters.  If you just blindly follow it, it's useless, you might as well not have an chess engine.

So yes, sometimes they are very wrong, but that shoudln't matter if you use it properly e.g. if you have developed your own opinions about the position first.

@danixmt

Have you played over the "ICC Fischer" games? They are highly entertaining! (And are 11 years old) The games GM Short played were not saved but here are the games that are available:

http://www.chessbase.com/games/iccf1.htm

I think it would be an interesting experiment... not too sure what it would prove (if anything).

But I agree, since computers don't have imaginations and creativity and just uses calculations, that's why there are still human-only moves up to now even when houdini was created, so we may never be able to know if a human can beat a supercomputer since most great players in modern time based their moves to computer programs and not on what only the human brain has.

No, that's not what I'm saying. Re-reading my comment I see that the first sentence is very ambiguous. I was just trying to say that Yereslov's assertion that board games are perfectly designed for computers is false. Chess is an example of a game where computers are significantly better than humans, but there are plenty of other examples where this is not the case.

Again, all I meant was that the computers' strength at chess is not because of the fact that chess is a board game.

My reply to you is the same. I don't know what your point is with your sarcasm. If you doubt any of my statements that you quoted even now knowing what I meant to say, then I can easily provide evidence.

Actually it depends on how you use the word better? If you want to watch a game between Capablanca vs. Karpov or computer vs. coomputer, what would you choose? I honestly would choose the creative games of chess geniuses, yes machines win against us hands down but that doesn't mean they play BETTER chess.

Most probably because it's a centaur game so creativity is still present, and YES better doesn't mean stronger, a game can be better than another game even if the players are not as strong, if you get my point. Yes I do accept now(since I felt degraded knowing just a computer can best me, a human, at my FULLEST potential) that chess engines are STRONGER than humans now(unless somehow we humans magically evolved our minds xD) but I believe we are still BETTER at making AWESOME games 

Pardon?

Sorry I am just a chess player !.

Can I just make one fact clear.The computers ( any computer for that matter (Toms 2Gb to NASA to the  biggest super computer )  CAN NOT beat the human intelligece. This is a solid fact. The only thing they can beat is speed in doinig a calculation which again they are told to do by our ( human ) intelligence.

fburton, maybe you can delete the link too - no need to advertise unlawful behaviour...

Done. Thanks for pointing that out.

Smarter does not mean better at chess. No one here thinks that computers can actually think.

Does that even matter? Houdini would win. Question answered. If each side gets 3 days, Houdini gets 3 days straight to think without taking any breaks, with its speed marginally faster as time goes on.

And Pfren is just an engine hater.

That argument has the solidity of wet cardboard.

Actually, I think docjdan is correct on this.  We don't have computers coming close to putting out art that can compare to the Mona Lisa, David, Hamlet or Beethoven's 9th.  The problem is that this doesn't apply so much to chess computers.  In chess certain moves work or don't work depending on the position, and this formula doesn't change over time provided that the rules remain the same, but in the arts this static, extremely processed approach doesn't work.  For example, terrible sounds that have no bassis to go together, which lack any form of logical explanation from music theory, can combine to create a great work of music.

You miss the point completely. Haiku said the argument is unsound, because of what you mentioned. The intelligence doesn't matter, what matters is who wins the game. And since our intellect helps us with the game, the computer effectively defeated our intellect, not with its intellect, but with brute computing power, but still effectively beating our intellect. Since this is a chess/computer thread, I'm going to assume all arguments made relate to this.

Thank you for pointing that out.

I have read most of this thread with utter joy.  Mostly due to the futility of those arguing either side.  I play on here occasionally, but much prefer otb chess as it assures no cheating.  I also quite often play against computers so I have memorized many winning lines and can adapt them to my own play combined with a reasonable positional understanding.  My opinion is that programs generally are better at maintaining an edge and grinding down their human opponents, but they do "overthink" in some cases considering lines which will never occur thereby wasting time and resources.  To illustrate this point here is a game I recently played against houdini 1.5A the free houdini engine...sure it is inferior to 3.0 but is certainly superior to most if not all other engines available.  I am white in this game and you will notice my knight appears stranded at move 15. Na4 Qb5.  I suspect the program saw this as a lost piece for me and decided to attack my queenside.  It made a fatal error after 16. O-O-O by playing Nd7 no doubt heading toward my castled king.  If you look at the position my king is actually quite safe even after castling into the attack so to speak.  You will also notice my piece mobility and space avantage on the kingside is very good while the computer's pieces are almost all constricted on the queenside.  So I quickly played 17. g5 beginning my attack on his king with all my pieces able to move quickly into the attack.  In my opinion the game was already won at this stage if I played correctly.  I did not have to calculate much...just play simple natural moves.  To be fair houdini normally beats me decisively, but this game shows it makes mistakes as well.  Time control was 20/30 btw.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43yR6Rx3ocE

oh cmon sacalot, that game clearly wasn't played by you.

What a ridiculous baseless comment...your opinion in the matter is moot.  I did play that game and I did defeat houdini; facts are facts regardless of ones "opinion" :)