A recent XKCD comic charted the difficulty of various games for computers, from
Tic Tac Toe and
Nim being solved for all positions, to computers mastering the physical game of
Beirut and mental game of
chess (
the 2006 Deep Fritz vs Vladimir Kramnikin games, previously). There are other games that are basic on the face, but whose potentials for move combinations is so vast as to be beyond the scope of computers.
Marion Tinsley was the last great human checkers player, matching off against
Chinook in the last 6 games of his life, each ending in a draw (
previously).
Checkers was finally solved in 2007 (Google quickview;
original PDF), and is largest game that has been solved to date, at 8x8.
Solving Othello might be possible, if the decision tree were truncated, as
the 10x10 board game tree complexity is very huge.
The 19x19 Go board is is often noted as one of the primary reasons why a strong program is hard to create, though
some programs are
getting better at
optimizing move evaluations. More:
computerized gaming solutions previously, and
the Wikipedia page for solved games.
posted by filthy light thief
on Jan 11, 2012 -
57 comments
Forecast calls for cold and warm. On January 22, 1943 in Spearfish, SD: The temperature rose 49 degrees in two minutes, from – 4 to 45; later the same morning, it dropped 60 degrees in 27 minutes, from 56° to - 4°. Plate glass windows cracked as a result of the wild fluctuation in temperatures caused by Chinook winds. The greatest 24- hour U.S. temperature difference in one place was set January 23- 24, 1916, in Browning, MT, at 100 degrees when it went from a low of -56° to a high of 44°.*
Snow eating is one way it's been described,
old tales too.. It's a seasonal wind, like the Mistral.
There is some overlap in the definitions but the Chinook can safely be labeled a Foehn wind. A Foehn wind is "a generic term for warm strong and often very dry downslope wind(s) that descend in the lee of a mountain barrier". That is the one illustrated above. My favorite wind though, is the katabatic. A downhill wind.
Cold and dense it blows here on
Earth especially in the
Antarctic, and there on
Mars too. (page 9 of 14.)
[more inside]
posted by vapidave
on Dec 5, 2009 -
33 comments
Stunning pictures by Michael Yon show what happens when helicopters land in dust storms:
The Kopp-Etchells Effect is thought to be the result of static electricity created by friction as materials of dissimilar material strike against each other, in this case titanium/nickel blades moving through the air and dust, but a precise definition is as of now not known.
[more inside]
posted by krautland
on Nov 21, 2009 -
33 comments
Above Enemy Lines (youtube
1,
2,
3,
4,
5) is a BBC Documentary about a
RAF Chinook crew on their tour of duty in Afghanistan. Part 4 and 5 of the film deal with the crew attempting to rescue a wounded 19 year-old soldier from a combat zone.
posted by krautland
on Sep 8, 2008 -
7 comments
Who was the most dominant athlete of all time? If athletes include
draughts players then
Marion Tinsley makes a good candidate, losing but 7 games plus 2 more to a computer over the course of a 45 year career. [more inside]
posted by Chuckly
on Dec 19, 2006 -
42 comments
