[AlphaGo’s
victory on Thursday simply reinforced the progress and power of artificial
intelligence to handle specific but highly complex tasks. Because of the sheer
number of possible moves in Go, computer scientists thought until recently that
it would be a decade before a machine could play better than a human master.]
By Paul Mozur
 |
|
The
Chinese Go master Ke Jie during his second game against AlphaGo, an
artificial
intelligence program, in Wuzhen, near Shanghai, on Thursday.
Credit
China Stringer Network, via Reuters
|
HONG
KONG — It’s all over for
humanity — at least in the game of Go.
For the second game in a row, a Google
computer program called AlphaGo beat the world’s best player of what many consider
the world’s most sophisticated board game. AlphaGo is scheduled to play its
human opponent, the 19-year-old Chinese prodigy Ke Jie, one more time on
Saturday in the best-of-three contest.
But with a score of 2-0 heading into that
final game, and earlier victories against other opponents already on the books,
AlphaGo has proved its superiority.
Discussing the contest afterward, Mr. Ke said
a very human element got the better of him: his emotions. In the middle of the
game, when he thought he might have had a chance at winning, he got too keyed
up, he said.
“I was very excited. I could feel my heart
bumping,” Mr. Ke said after the contest, which took place in Wuzhen, near
Shanghai. “Maybe because I was too excited I made some stupid moves.”
“Maybe that’s the weakest part of human
beings,” he added.
AlphaGo’s victory on Thursday simply
reinforced the progress and power of artificial intelligence to handle specific
but highly complex tasks. Because of the sheer number of possible moves in Go,
computer scientists thought until recently that it would be a decade before a
machine could play better than a human master.
A small consolation for Mr. Ke was that he
played a near-perfect game for the first hundred moves, according to the
scientists who designed AlphaGo.
Still, like a sprinter who can at first keep
pace with a train, in the end Mr. Ke was left in the dust by the computer.
Demis Hassabis, a co-founder of DeepMind —
the artificial intelligence arm of Google’s parent, Alphabet Incorporated, that
created the software — said that as he watched how close the game was, his
pulse rate went up as well.
AlphaGo of course has no heart and feels no
nerves, and in the end that may have helped make the difference. Scientists and
futurists have pointed to that cold focus as a major reason artificial
intelligence may someday take over large numbers of white-collar jobs. Still,
that detachment means AlphaGo lacks the human touch required to manage
employees, counsel patients or adequately write flowing newspaper features
about its own dominance over humans.
Tests of the technology in games like Go
still mark an early step. Because the strategy options are limited to moves on
a board, games like Go are particularly suited to the technology.
Computer scientists say that often the best
use of artificial intelligence is not to pit it against humans, but to pair it
with them.
To that end, two Go professionals, each
partnered with AlphaGo, are scheduled to play against each other on Friday. Mr.
Hassabis has said that top amateur Go players, with the help of AlphaGo, can
generally manage to beat the software program in a match. In short, a human
with a computer is still stronger than a computer.
Ke Jie has said that after the third game on
Saturday, he will return to focusing on playing against humans, and is not
likely to take on a computer again, arguing that the technology has become too
formidable.
“After this time, AlphaGo to me is 100
percent perfection, to me AlphaGo is the god of the Go game,” he said after the
game on Thursday.
“For human beings,” he added, “our
understanding of this game is only very limited.”
