100 Years of Shannon: Chess, Computing and Botvinik

Iryna Andriyanova

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Iryna Andriyanova. 100 Years of Shannon: Chess, Computing and Botvinik. Doctoral. United States.
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 CLAUDE E. SHANNON
1916—2001

• 1936 : Bachelor in EE and Mathematics

from U.Michigan

• 1937 : Master in EE from MIT

• 1940 : PhD in EE from MIT

• 1940 : Research fellow at Princeton

• 1940-1956 : Researcher at Bell Labs

• 1948 : “A Mathematical Theory of

Communication”, Bell System Technical
Journal

• 1956-1978 : Professor at MIT

 100 YEARS OF SHANNON

SHANNON, BOTVINNIK
AND COMPUTER CHESS
Iryna Andriyanova
ETIS Lab, UMR 8051,
ENSEA/Université de Cergy-Pontoise/CNRS

54TH ALLERTON CONFERENCE

 SHORT HISTORY OF

CHESS/COMPUTER CHESS
 CHESS AND COMPUTER CHESS
T WO PARALLELS

W. Steinitz M. Botvinnik A. Karpov

1886 1894 1921 1948 1963 1975 1985 2006*

E. Lasker G. Kasparov

W. Steinitz: simplicity and rationality

E. Lasker: more risky play
M. Botvinnik: complicated, very original positions
A. Karpov, G. Kasparov: Botvinnik’s school
 CHESS AND COMPUTER CHESS
T WO PARALLELS

W. Steinitz M. Botvinnik A. Karpov

1886 1894 1921 1948 1963 1975 1985 2006*

E. Lasker G. Kasparov

A.Turing
1914 1948 1957 1974 1989 1997
L. Torres y Quevedo 1950 M-M
 Deep Blue
C. Shannon match

A. Turing: TurboChamp algorithm

C. Shannon: “Programming a Computer for Playing Chess”
1957, MANIAC: first simple chess machine
1974, first chess machine world championship
 CHESS AND COMPUTER CHESS
T WO PARALLELS

W. Steinitz M. Botvinnik A. Karpov

1886 1894 1921 1948 1963 1975 1985 2006*

E. Lasker G. Kasparov

A.Turing
1914 1948 1965 1974 1989 1997
L. Torres y Quevedo 1950 M-M
 Deep Blue
C. Shannon match

- Match between Shannon and Botvinnik in 1965

- “An Algorithm for Chess” by Botvinnik in 1968
 INSIDE A

COMPUTER CHESS PROGRAM

WHAT A MODERN CHESS PROGRAMM HAS INSIDE?

• Board representation

• Move generator

• Database of openings

• Tree searching
techniques

• Positional evaluation

• Transposition tables
WHAT A MODERN CHESS PROGRAMM HAS INSIDE?

• Board representation

• Move generator

• Database of openings

• Tree searching
techniques
materialScore = kingWt * (wK-bK)
• Positional evaluation + queenWt * (wQ-bQ)
+ rookWt * (wR-bR)
+ knightWt* (wN-bN)
• Transposition tables + bishopWt* (wB-bB)
+ pawnWt * (wP-bP)
 
mobilityScore = mobilityWt * (wMobility-bMobility)
WHAT A MODERN CHESS PROGRAMM HAS INSIDE?

• Board representation

• Move generator

• Database of openings

• Tree searching
techniques

• Positional evaluation

• Transposition tables
 STRATEGIES BY C. SHANNON (1950)
FIRS T FORMALISM OF COMPUTER C HESS

• Sum-zero utility function


f(p) 
 = 200(K-K')
+ 9(Q-Q')

 + 5(R-R')

 + 3(B-B' + N-N')
+ 1(P-P')

 - 0.5(D-D' + S-S' + I-I')
+ 0.1(M-M') + ...
  

KQRBNP 
 = number of kings, queens,
rooks, bishops, knights and pawns


D,S,I = doubled, blocked and
isolated 
 pawns


M = Mobility (the number of
legal moves)

• Minimax evaluation
[vonNeuman’47]
 be evaluated grows exponentially in the de

considered intractable, that is computers a

STRATEGIES BY C. SHANNON (1950)
T YPES A AND B
smallest inputs. When dealing with expon

• Type A strategy

search over all possible
variations

- exponential explosion

- horizon effect

• Type B strategy

consideration of carefully
chosen better moves (human-
like)

- “plausible move generators”

- successive learning

- the search depth is
unlimited
Position 1: White has a trivial win, but because it
requires a 10 move maneuver a trivial type A
strategy will not find it.
COMPUTER CHESS EVOLUTION

= COMPUTERS EVOLUTION
 COMPUTER CHESS EVOLUTION
= COMPUTERS EVOLUTION

Toy example:

White give a checkmate

in 3 moves:
1. Fxh7+ Rf8
2.Cg6+ fxg6
3.Tf4×
 COMPUTER CHESS EVOLUTION
FROM 1970’S TILL NOWADAYS

• Improved Type-A
algorithms

- alpha-beta pruning

- killer heuristic

no need for very good
plausible move generators

• Improved computers

- parallelized processing

- special chess hardware

- memory volume

- cheap disk storage Kasparov against Deep Blue

Deep Blue chess machine : 30 parallel processors + 480 custom chess

chips, 10 years of development
STRATEGY OF TYPE B
 TYPE-B STRATEGY
BY C. SHANNON

(1)Examine forceful variations out as 


far as possible and evaluate only 

at reasonable positions, where some 

quasi-stability has been established.


(2) Select the variations to be explored 


by some process so that the machine
does not waste its time in totally 

pointless variations.

Example from [Shannon’50]:

g(P) = 1 if any piece is attacked by a

piece of lower value or by more pieces
than defences or if any check exists
on a square controlled by the opponent
g(P) = 0 otherwise
 for finding the “weaknesses” in the opponent’

TYPE-B STRATEGY
these. He spectacularly demonstrated his appro
BY M. BOT VINNIK
In

• “An Algorithm in Chess” 1968 b

a
• Pioneer project 1970s-1980s:


 se
- notion of attack maps

- notion of trajectories and
 o
adversary counter-trajectories
 m


- endgame library with base 
 fi
positions, nodal positions 

th
and scores
Position 3: Botvinnik-Capablanca 1938. By playing
su
1.Ba3!! White starts a remarkable combination which
gives it a victory 12 moves later. This position was
used by Botvinnik as a test case for his chess [B
algorithms.
fa
CONCLUSION
I never considered Deep Blue intelligent in any way.
It’s just an excellent problem solver in this very
specific domain.
— M. Campbell, Deep Blue team member

Brute-force alpha-beta may have done as much

damage to the process and credibility of computer-
chess research as it has given chess programs high
ratings.
— Donskoy, KAISSA developer
 MESSAGE TO TAKE HOME

• B-type strategy

- by Shannon

- by Botvinnik

- machine learning

• Contribution of computer chess to science


- alpha-beta pruning

- transposition tables 

- artificial intelligence