In message <4b0ad6f5.1010...@snafu.de>, Robert Jasiek <jas...@snafu.de>
writes
GoGod and GoDevil are objective technical terms referring to the game
tree. They were defined roughly on rec.games.go quite some years ago
but I do not recall the definition details by heart. They have nothing
to do with psychology or probabilistic playing.
I believe I first came across the terms before usenet existed. Here is
the story I heard, maybe apocryphal, about their origin.
Someone asked a leading professional whether he thought he could beat
God if given a four-stone handicap. He replied that he thought he could
probably beat God, but would not be able to beat the devil. He
explained what he meant as follows.
Consider an omnipotent being, who sits down to play Go against a mortal,
giving four stones. He assumes perfect play from his opponent, and so
tries to resign. He is told he may not resign, and must play to do as
well as possible. So he chooses randomly among the moves that restrict
his loss to 50 points (or whatever the best he can provably achieve is).
Each time his opponent plays a less-than-perfect move, this number
drops. We call this player "God".
Now consider a more subtle and devious omnipotent being. This one can,
like God, grasp the whole game tree in an instant. But he also knows
that his opponent is fallible, understands exactly where his weaknesses
are, and is willing to use this knowledge. He therefore takes quite a
different view of the game tree: he can read his opponent's mind, so
for him, the tree does not branch at black's moves. We call this played
"the devil": he is far harder to beat than God.
Nick
--
Nick Wedd n...@maproom.co.uk
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