AI Program Vanquishes Human Players of Go in China
January 05 2017 - 3:02AM
Dow Jones News
BEIJING--A mysterious character named "Master" has swept through
China, defeating many of the world's top players in the ancient
strategy game of Go.
Master played with inhuman speed, barely pausing to think. With
a wide-eyed cartoon fox as an avatar, Master made moves that seemed
foolish but inevitably led to victory this week over the world's
reigning Go champion, Ke Jie of China.
It was clear by then that Master must be a computer. But whose
computer?
Master revealed itself Wednesday as an updated version of
AlphaGo, an artificial-intelligence program designed by the
DeepMind unit of Alphabet Inc.'s Google.
AlphaGo made history in March by beating South Korea's top Go
player in four of five games in Seoul. Now, under the guise of a
friendly fox, it has defeated the world champion.
It was dramatic theater, and the latest sign that artificial
intelligence is peerless in solving complex but defined problems.
AI scientists predict computers will increasingly be able to search
through thickets of alternatives to find patterns and solutions
that elude the human mind.
Master's arrival has shaken China's human Go players, who say it
upended thousands of years of the game's strategic wisdom.
"After humanity spent thousands of years improving our tactics,
computers tell us that humans are completely wrong," Mr. Ke, 19,
wrote on Chinese social media platform Weibo after his defeat. "I
would go as far as to say not a single human has touched the edge
of the truth of Go."
Mr. Ke wrote online that he was told in advance that Master was
AlphaGo but had agreed to keep it a secret until Google's
announcement. The games were played online against players in
China, Japan and Korea.
Go was invented around 2,500 years ago in China and remains
popular across East Asia. The rules are simple: Players take turns
placing black and white stones on a grid, seeking to capture
patches of territory by surrounding them.
Chess became the domain of computers in 1997 when International
Business Machines Corp.'s Deep Blue computer defeated Garry
Kasparov in a historic match. But the possible moves in Go are
near-infinite, making it a game where humans still had the edge
until this year.
Master puzzled its human rivals by placing pieces in
unconventional positions early in the game and changing tactics
from game to game. Sometimes Master skirmished with its opponent
across the whole board, while other times it relinquished territory
with hardly a fight.
Master's record--60 wins, 0 losses over seven days ending
Wednesday--led virtuoso Go player Gu Li to wonder what other
conventional beliefs might be smashed by computers in the
future.
"AlphaGo has completely subverted the control and judgment of us
Go players," Mr. Gu, the final player to be vanquished by Master,
wrote on his Weibo account. "I can't help but ask, one day many
years later, when you find your previous awareness, cognition and
choices are all wrong, will you keep going along the wrong path or
reject yourself?"
DeepMind Chief Executive Demis Hassabis wrote on Twitter that
AlphaGo will return to more official matches this year, after the
anonymous testing of the new version through Master.
"Over the past few days we've played some unofficial online
games at fast time controls with our new prototype version, to
check that it's working as well as we hoped," Mr. Hassabis tweeted.
"We're excited by the results."
Professor Sun Fuchun, a computer science professor at China's
Tsinghua University, said that computers will exceed humans in
increasingly complex skills. Computers will continue to take on
more roles now performed by humans, he predicted, including as
romantic partners, an idea explored in the 2013 movie "Her."
"I believe AI will replace humans in many different ways," he
said, "including medical treatment, the military, teachers and even
intimate relations."
Eva Dou and Olivia Geng
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 05, 2017 02:47 ET (07:47 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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