This is a beautiful thread, with a wealth of thoughtful contributions.
Observations, no particular order:
1. I'm dying to see results of the tourney envisioned by Mike Watters:
http://www.chesscomputeruk.com/html/strong.html
2. I want more detail from Ivengo about this, and I want to see games:
Im at least equal vs Mephisto Atlanta, but Novag Star Diamond made me loose a lot with very few wins/draws, so I think I score about 15% against it...
3. I agree with M. Plastique about this:
My feeling (unfortunately not substantiated in any way) is that humans today are significantly stronger than similarly rated humans in years gone by when the influences of computer strength upon human play was not a significant factor - at least for club level players and higher (obviously not novices)
I don't think he has to substantiate. Computers teach discipline. They remind us to sweat the small stuff. They've taught us to be more vigilant about mid-level tactical forays. They've taught us how to manage the horizon effect. That's why I also agree with this point:
I myself admit to exploiting computer weakness to win (in fact just in the game I played last week where I left a pawn en prise knowing that if the computer took it, the resulting combination was outside of it's selective search horizon).
You know what? Winning is winning. If Tarrasch overvalued the two bishops and certain types of moves, Lasker was right to exploit it. It's not the *human's* fault that the dedicated never learns. Purity arguments on this front are bs. Winning is winning.
4. I agree with Steve on this matter:
Well 600 games seems a bit harsh to me
to this day the SSDF rating lists are one of the most highly respected rating lists in the world(not to mention the longest continuously published list)..many of their rating's are based upon less then 600 games
if you review their lists you can see that Generally speaking ...
600 games will produce a standard rating deviation of about +-30 Elo
200 games will produce a standard rating deviation of about +-50 Elo
for me...knowing that a dedicated chess computer has a rating that is accurate within 50 Elo pts is more then sufficient
5. Steve is also dead right on this bit - you can't track cheaters:
my guess is a high percentage of the losses were to players cheating with chess engines resulting in a lower overall rating for the dedicateds
keep in mind that a player does not have to use an engine for the entire match or even for an entire game
he can start out on his own then switch to an engine during crucial or highly tactical moments of the game ..have the engine make some moves then switch back
even some of the draws might be suspect
i have seen players start out a game playing on their own and then switch to an engine when way behind on material thereby getting a draw
if you can not verify that every one of the games the dedicated computers played were all against humans then you have an invalid result
you have a study with a mix of human/computer opponents
its for this reason that i never thought online play was a good idea for dedicated computers
the incidence of cheating on the servers is just too high
- R.
"You have, let us say, a promising politician, a rising artist that you wish to destroy. Dagger or bomb are archaic and unreliable - but teach him, inoculate him with chess."
– H.G. Wells