-----Original Message----- From: math-fun-bounces+andy.latto=pobox.com@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:math-fun-bounces+andy.latto=pobox.com@mailman.xmission.com]On Behalf Of Daniel Asimov Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 10:23 PM To: math-fun Subject: [math-fun] A.I. question re ongoing chess championship match

Right now there is an ongoing chess championship, which (as followers of the sport will know) has been accepted by both major camps as the determiner of the next "world champion".

(The match is to be 12 games, and is played in Elista, located close to the middle of nowhere. After 4 games, Topalov has 1 point and Kramnik has 3 points -- 2 wins & 2 draws.)

Topalov has just signed a complaint saying that Kramnik is averaging 50 bathroom breaks per game -- and the private, players' bathroom is not monitored in any way. Topalov wants monitoring. (Cf. < http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/29/crosswords/chess/29chess.html >.) Evidently Topalov is concerned Kramnik may be accessing a chess computer for advice.

A.I. QUESTION: Is there a reasonable way, based on Kramnik's play in previous games, to distinguish moves that he conceived solely on his own from ones that are so brilliant that they were probably computer-aided ?

I don't think so. There could be evidence that Kramnik is *not* using computer assistance, if he's making fatal mistakes that a computer would not make. But if Kramnik were using a computer, and he knows there's a chance of getting caught, and he's smart, he won't just do whatever the computer recommends, because that might risk detection. Instead, he could just play his own game except in situations in which he felt that he had a close decision between two alternatives. In such a case, he could let the computer decide which play was better, and make that play. This would result in play indistinguishable to any human from Kramnik's play, that would nonetheless gain an advantage from use of the computer. Andy Latto andy.latto@pobox.com