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One small step backward for humanity(?)… One giant leap forward for A.I.!
June 20, 2022 by GuyHeilenman · Leave a Comment
Dystopian movies featuring A.I. as the antagonist abound. The thought of a world in which a soulless “entity” is in the lead role with humanity at its behest is terrifying. How will the relationship between A.I. and humans play out over time is anyone’s guess, but with all the benefits artificial intelligence brings to the table, I feel a little like “a moth to a flame”, and it bugs me.
Why the angst? We recently came across a Los Angeles Times dated May 12, 1997, which had coverage of the historic(?) chess match between Gary Kasparov, the reigning world champion at the time, and “Deep Blue”, an IBM supercomputer. The strings of o’s and 1’s ruled the day, defeating Kasparov in the deciding game in 19 moves. I wonder if many moons from now, when/if A.I. decides to write its own developmental timeline, if this achievement will be listed as one of significance?
Note: In case anyone is wondering, upon its victory, “Deep Blue” was NOT crowned the new World Champion of Chess.
A gem from the American Antiquarian Society…
August 11, 2014 by TimHughes · Leave a Comment
In celebration of its 20oth anniversary the American Antiquarian Society published a beautiful exhibition catalog titled “In Pursuit Of A Vision – Two Centuries of Collecting at the American Antiquarian Society”. Featured are a fascinating array of books, documents, maps & other paper ephemera, as well as several very rare & unusual newspapers we felt worthy of sharing with our collectors (with permission from the A.A.S.).
172. “The Chess Monthly“, New York, February, 1859
It has been common practice when binding periodicals — whether by publishers in order to sell cumulative volumes, or by libraries and private owners for purposes of convenience and preservation — to remove the outer wrappers and advertisement leaves from individual issues, leaving only the main body of text. However, periodical wrappers and advertisement leaves often contain important material which scholars (and bibliographers) are increasingly finding vital to their research. In recent years AAS has made it a priority to collect early American periodical issues with wrappers intact, even going so far as to acquire second, wrappered copies to complement a set bound without wrappers. In many instances, wrappered copies prove to be exceptionally rare survivals.
This issue of The Chess Monthly is a good example. The journal’s editor was Daniel W. Fiske (1831-1904), then chess champion of the New York Chess Club and later Cornell University’s first librarian. For a time, American chess prodigy and unofficial world champion Paul Morphy (1837-1884) held the title of co-editor, lending the magazine his marquee name. Only on the wrappers, however, are their editorial roles mentioned. The wrappers also contain publication information not available elsewhere, an advertisement for a set of Morphy- endorsed chessmen made of cast iron and — perhaps most important of all — the answers to chess problems published in the previous issue.