On 28, Oct 2008, at 11:23 AM, Richard Brown wrote:
... if there is someone who can explain to me why I have the nagging suspicion that a differential equation is involved here, ...
I cannot tell why you have this nagging suspicion, but I can say that if you wish to look into it deeper you can look up computer methods for dealing with dif Eqs on a discrete lattice. It may give you a better feeling one way or the other. Personally, in this case I do not see it, I only see continuous parameters on a discrete lattice. But I can add that SlugGo uses a modified version of the common Go Proverb "The Enemy's Key Point Is My Own" as part of its evaluation function. My experiments do show that this helps improve play in many cases, and leads to amazing blunders in others. It is worth pointing out that this proverb is too exact, and that it is far better to realize that if implemented in a program as it is stated you get the pathological behavior you mention. The truth is closer to: "Look near your opponent's best move to find things that are interesting" or possibly "when my good moves are near their good moves, that area may be more urgent that a big play elsewhere." Cheers, David _______________________________________________ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/