The Grandfather of Computer chess: Alan Turing (1952)

[Nathanael Russell]

Background to this computer program:
www.wikipedia.com
In 1948, Turing, working with his former undergraduate colleague, D. G. Champernowne, began writing a chess program for a computer that did not yet exist.

On March 9, 1949, Claude Shannon (1916-2001), a research worker at Bell Telephone Laboratories in New Jersey, presented a paper called "Programming a Digital Computer for Playing Chess." The paper was presented at the National Institute for Radio Engineers Convention in New York. He described how to program a computer to play chess based on position scoring and move selection. He proposed basic strategies for restricting the number of possibilities to be considered in a game of chess.

In 1950, Alan Turing (1912-1954) wrote the first computer chess program. The same year he proposed the Turing Test that in time, a computer could be programmed (such as playing chess) to acquire abilities rivaling human intelligence. If a human did not see the other human or computer during an imitation game such as chess, he/she would not know the difference between the human and the computer.

In 1951, Turing tried to implement his "Turbochamp" program on the Ferranti Mark I computer at Manchester University. He never completed the task. However, his colleague, Dr. Dietrich Prinz (born in 1903), wrote a chess playing computer program
for the Ferranti computer that solved simple mates-in-two moves. The first program ran in November 1951. The program would examine every possible move until a solution was found. It took about 15 minutes to solve a mate in two moves.

In 1952, lacking a computer powerful enough to execute the program, Turing played a game in which he simulated the computer, taking about half an hour per move. The game was recorded.[73] The program lost to Turing's colleague Alick Glennie, although it is said that it won a game against Champernowne's wife. His Turing test was a significant and characteristically provocative and lasting contribution to the debate regarding artificial intelligence, which continues after more than half a century.

Turing fundamental questions:
1. Could one make a machine that could obey the rules of chess?
2. Could one make a machine that could solve problems?
3. Could one make a machine that could play a reasonably good game of chess (ordinary positions)?
4. Could one make a machine that could play chess to improve its game through experience?
5. Could one make a machine that would answer questions asked it unique from human influence?
6. Could one make a machine that would have feelings like you and I?

[pgn][Event "Friendly game"]
[Site "Manchester, England"]
[Date "1952.??.??"]
[EventDate "?"]
[Round "?"]
[Result "0-1"]
[White "Alan Turing"]
[Black "Alick Glennie"]
[ECO "C26"]
[WhiteElo "?"]
[BlackElo "?"]
[PlyCount "58"]

1.e4 {This game is of considerable historical interest since
it is arguably the first computer chess game. The British
mathematician and computer pioneer Alan Turing devised a chess
playing program which, for lack of a computer to program, was
operated with paper and pencil. This was the result when the
program played Alick Glennie, a colleague of Turing's.} e5
2.Nc3 Nf6 3.d4 Bb4 4.Nf3 d6 5.Bd2 Nc6 6.d5 Nd4 7.h4 Bg4 8.a4
Nxf3+ 9.gxf3 Bh5 10.Bb5+ c6 11.dxc6 O-O 12.cxb7 Rb8 13.Ba6 Qa5
14.Qe2 Nd7 15.Rg1 Nc5 16.Rg5 Bg6 17.Bb5 Nxb7 18.O-O-O Nc5
19.Bc6 Rfc8 20.Bd5 Bxc3 21.Bxc3 Qxa4 22.Kd2 Ne6 23.Rg4 Nd4
24.Qd3 Nb5 25.Bb3 Qa6 26.Bc4 Bh5 27.Rg3 Qa4 28.Bxb5 Qxb5
29.Qxd6 Rd8 0-1[/pgn]

[PaulieD]

You must see the movie "The Imitation Game" It is about Turing's cracking of the German "Enigma" code during World War II.

[RolandoFurioso]

Background to this computer program:
www.wikipedia.com
In 1948, Turing, working with his former undergraduate colleague, D. G. Champernowne, began writing a chess program for a computer that did not yet exist.

[...]

In 1951, Turing tried to implement his "Turbochamp" program on the Ferranti Mark I computer at Manchester University. He never completed the task.

[...]

The name of their "paper machine" was Turochamp (reflecting the names of the two creators) rather than Turbochamp (which would of course be sort of an exaggeration): https://chessprogramming.wikispaces.com/Turochamp