tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post6140268790133246673..comments2023-11-03T06:32:28.410-04:00Comments on Staring At Empty Pages: Noughts and crossesBarry Leibahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14205294935881991457noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-66356090967872756822007-03-06T23:21:00.000-05:002007-03-06T23:21:00.000-05:00Well, looky there — so you can. I've fixed ...Well, looky there — so you can. I've fixed the spelling, with acknowledgments to the both of you.Barry Leibahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14205294935881991457noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-12592464950644174792007-03-06T21:53:00.000-05:002007-03-06T21:53:00.000-05:00Actually, you can change the name of a post withou...Actually, you can change the name of a post without the permalink messing up. I've done it; the permalink stays the same even if the title changes completely.The Ridger, FCDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01538111197270563075noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-9600287244246618232007-03-05T16:26:00.000-05:002007-03-05T16:26:00.000-05:00Staying out of the "perfect" conversation... :-) (...Staying out of the "perfect" conversation... :-) (It depends on your goal, but tic-tac-toe does seem an awfully easy game to practice with machine learning on. Okay, I didn't quite stay out.)<BR/><BR/>It's also interesting to read/see stories with plots that rely on technology *not* being there, like the Leaphorn/Chee novels by Hillerman. I think we were explaining it to our girls when we were watching an old Columbo episode or something. <BR/><BR/>It opens up an interesting sort of character (and probably some clever author has written a character like this) -- one who refuses to use technology. The old-timer who won't have a cell phone, e.g. I have a friend who refused to have an answering machine for years (she just got one this year), and it was so annoying to call her and have the phone ring and ring! You get used to being able to communicate with people that way.Maggiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16681883169121834569noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-64622329111160879452007-03-05T14:29:00.000-05:002007-03-05T14:29:00.000-05:00Right, but in this case "perfect" modified "play",...Right, but in this case "perfect" modified "play", not "program".Barry Leibahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14205294935881991457noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-30767176601693056822007-03-05T13:54:00.000-05:002007-03-05T13:54:00.000-05:00Barry: In order for "learning" to be of any value,...<B>Barry:</B> <I>In order for "learning" to be of any value, the program would have to be imperfect to start with.</I><BR/><BR/>That depends on what you mean by imperfect. Since this particular program was written so as to learn by its mistakes, and would eventually (quite quickly, really) become unbeatable, I would say it was a perfect program that did precisely what it was designed to do.Rayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15198072683770155918noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-68055313046152735592007-03-05T13:10:00.000-05:002007-03-05T13:10:00.000-05:00"Dang!", as they would say in The Far Side. I act..."Dang!", as they would say in <I>The Far Side</I>. I actually looked up the spelling to be sure, and I <I>still</I> messed it up. Ah, well. Nothing for it now; if I change it, the permalink will go wrong.<BR/><BR/>In order for "learning" to be of any value, the program would have to be imperfect to start with. It was so easy to write it to play perfectly the first time that no sort of machine learning was useful.<BR/><BR/>We did try to write a machine-learning program to play <A HREF="http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/1917" REL="nofollow">Stratego</A>, but we hadn't studied machine learning at all, and it was a huge flop.<BR/><BR/>Maggie, the cell-phone vs pay-phone thing is particularly amusing when I think of all the movies now whose plots require cell phones. In <A HREF="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0407887/" REL="nofollow">The Departed</A>, for instance, the whole thing centers around using cell phones for communication.Barry Leibahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14205294935881991457noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-9216738431890110722007-03-05T12:46:00.000-05:002007-03-05T12:46:00.000-05:00Since you point out that the name of the game is B...Since you point out that the name of the game is British, I thought that I, in turn, should point out that we spell it "noughts", not "naughts".<BR/><BR/>In my very first job, when our department acquired a PDP-8 computer, our manager wrote a noughts and crosses program, too, which I thought was exceedingly clever. Better still, this was a program that <I>learned</I> from its mistakes so that, even if you succeeded in beating it once, you would never beat it the same way again. This would have been a really interesting feature to add to your program before inviting your friend to play it! "I've beaten it before. I <I>know</I> I can beat it again."Rayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15198072683770155918noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21503568.post-39350047645238774292007-03-05T09:56:00.000-05:002007-03-05T09:56:00.000-05:00When I was an undergrad, I got a Mac. It was befo...When I was an undergrad, I got a Mac. It was before any of my friends had a Mac, and before there was a Mac lab on campus (by a semester, I think). My friends came over my house and they stayed all night, mostly playing with MacPaint. I remember them, drawing things and then selecting them with the lasso and cutting them apart, laughing like it was the funniest thing ever.<BR/><BR/>Is there anything like that now? I feel so numb to new technology. My children are accustomed to computer and cell phone technology, and my husband and I sound like old-timers, explaining how you needed to find a pay phone when we were young.<BR/><BR/>I wonder what the next great leap will be, the next technology that's so cool, people will find it amazing and won't be able to tear themselves away.Maggiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16681883169121834569noreply@blogger.com