Monroe Newborn

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Monty Newborn

Monroe M. (Monty) Newborn,
a Canadian computer scientist, and emeritus professor at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Monty was early computer chess programmer and primary author of the chess program Ostrich, and the pawn endgame program Peasant .

In 1970 Monty Newborn and Ben Mittman initiated, constituted and organized the ACM North American Computer Chess Championship, and together with Ben Mittman and David Levy the World Computer Chess Championship in 1974. Newborn was co-founder of the ICCA in 1977, and served as its president from 1983 until 1986. He has written extensively on computer chess .

Photos

Tournament organizers Monty Newborn and Ben Mittman (front) with ACM president
Sam Matsa and David Slate. Larry Atkin looks on. ACM 1970 .

Chess pioneers in Sacher Hotel Vienna, Austria 1980: Ben Mittman, Monty Newborn, Tony Marsland,
Dave Slate, David Levy, Claude Shannon, Ken Thompson, Betty Shannon, Tom Truscott

A. Reznitskiy, B. Stilman, M. Donskoy, M. Botvinnik, Monty & Amy Newborn

Don Beal, Ken Thompson, Monty Newborn, and Mikhail Botvinnik at the WCCC 1983 in New York City

Biography

Brief Biography of Monty Newborn :

Monty Newborn received his Ph. D. in Electrical Engineering from The Ohio State University in 1967. He was an assistant professor and then associate professor at Columbia University in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from 1967-1975. In 1975, he joined the School of Computer Science at McGill University and has been with the School since then, serving as its director from 1976-1983. He has been an ACM Fellow since 1994.

His research focuses on search problems in artificial intelligence where two areas are of particular interest: chess-playing programs and automated theorem-proving programs. He has published seven books on these subjects and a number of research papers as well. He served as chairman of the ACM Computer Chess Committee from 1981 until 1997. In that capacity he organized the first Kasparov versus Deep Blue match (known as the ACM Chess Challenge) in 1996. The following year he served as head of the officials at the second Kasparov versus Deep Blue match won by Deep Blue. Through the 1970s and 1980s, his chess program Ostrich competed in five world championships, coming close to winning in 1974.

Quotes

Quote from Canadian Chess

• Computer Science Professor, McGill University
• Programmer (originally with George Arnold) of Ostrich (also Ostrich 80, Ostrich 81), a computer chess program which competed in the ACM U.S. Computer Championships (1972-74), ACM North American Computer Championships (1975, 1977-87) and World Computer Championships (1974, 1977, 1980, 1983, 1986)
• 2nd place ACM U.S. Computer Championship 1973 for Ostrich
• Organized first ACM U.S. Computer Championship 1970, as well as many succeeding championships
• President, International Computer Chess Association 1983-86
• Applied results obtained from research on search algorithms in the field of computer chess to the field of internet searching
• Canadian Chess Hall of Fame 2001

See also

• The History of Computer Chess - an AI Perspective - Video

Selected Publications

1973 ...

• Ben Mittman, Monty Newborn (1973). Results of the fourth annual U.S. computer chess tournament. ACM SIGART Bulletin, No. 42 » ACM 1973

1975 ...

• Monroe Newborn (1975). Computer Chess. Academic Press, New York, N.Y. ISBN 0-125-17250-8.

Chapter I. Introduction

Chapter II. The History and Basic Ideas of Computer Chess

Chapter III. The Kotok-McCarthy Chess Program versus the ITEP Chess Program

Chapter IV. The Greenblatt Chess Program

Chapter V. The First United States Computer Chess Championship

Chapter VI. The Second United States Computer Chess Championship

Chapter VII. The Third United States Computer Chess Championship

Chapter VIII. Kaissa

Chapter IX. The Fourth United States Computer Chess Championship

Chapter X. Ostrich: A Description of a Chess-Playing Program

Appendix I. The First World Computer Chess Championship

• Monty Newborn (1977). David vs. 12 Goliaths. The Best of Creative Computing Volume 2, edited by David Ahl, hosted by AtariArchives.org » ACM 1975
• Monty Newborn (1977). Summary of the ACM Sixth U.S. Computer Chess Championship. The Best of Creative Computing Volume 2, edited by David Ahl, hosted by AtariArchives.org » ACM 1975
• Monroe Newborn (1977). PEASANT: An endgame program for kings and pawns. Chess Skill in Man and Machine (Ed. Peter W. Frey), pp. 119-130
• Selim Akl, Monroe Newborn (1977). The Principal Continuation and the Killer Heuristic. 1977 ACM Annual Conference Proceedings, pp. 466-473. ACM, Seattle, WA.
• Monroe Newborn (1978). Computer Chess: Recent Progress and Further Expectations. International Conference on Parallel Processing (ed. J. Moneta). North-Holland, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. ISBN 0-444-85192-5.
• Monroe Newborn (1979). Recent Progress in Computer Chess. Advances in Computers, Vol. 18, pp. 59-117. Academic Press, New York, N.Y. Reprinted (1988) in Computer Games I (ed. David Levy), pp. 226-324, Springer
• Monroe Newborn (1979). Ostrich IV meets the Black Knight. Personal Computing, Vol. 3, No. 10, pp. 74 » ACM 1978, Ostrich, Black Knight

1980 ...

• Ben Mittman, Monroe Newborn (1980). Computer chess at ACM 79: the tournament and the man vs. man and machine match. Communications of the ACM, Vol. 23, Issue 1, pdf from The Computer History Museum
• David Levy, Ben Mittman, Monroe Newborn (1980). 3rd World Computer Chess Championship. ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 3, No. 3 » WCCC 1980
• Tony Marsland, Monty Newborn (1981). A brighter future for Soviet computer chess? ICCA Newsletter, Vol. 4, No. 1, pdf
• Ben Mittman, Tony Marsland, Monroe Newborn, Kathe Spracklen, Ken Thompson (1981). Computer chess: Master level play in 1981? ACM 81: Proceedings of the ACM '81 conference
• David Levy, Monroe Newborn (1981). More Chess and Computers, The Microcomputer Revolution, The Challenge Match. Computer Science Press, Inc., Potomac, Maryland. ISBN 0-914894-07-2
• Monroe Newborn (1982). OSTRICH/P - a parallel search chess program, SOCS-82.3, McGill University, School of Computer Science, Montreal.
• David Levy, Monroe Newborn (1982, 1983). All About Chess and Computers. Springer, amazon, 2nd edition
• Monroe Newborn (1984). The Fourth World Microcomputer Chess Championship. ICCA Journal, Vol. 7, No. 4 » WMCCC 1984

1985 ...

• Danny Kopec, Monroe Newborn (1985). ACM's Fifteenth North American Computer Chess Championship. Communications of the ACM, Vol. 28, No. 7, reprinted in The Sixteenth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship, Denver Colorado, October 13-15, 1985, pdf from The Computer History Museum
• Monroe Newborn (1985). A Hypothesis Concerning the Strength of Chess Programs. ICCA Journal, Vol. 8, No. 4
• Monroe Newborn (1985). A Parallel Search Chess Program. Proceedings of the ACM Annual Conference, pp. 272-277. Denver, Co.
• Danny Kopec, Monroe Newborn, Winston Yu (1986). Experiments in Chess Cognition. Advances in Computer Chess 4
• Danny Kopec, Monty Newborn (1986). Belle and Mephisto Dallas Capture Computer Chess Title at the FJCC. reprinted in The ACM's Eighteenth North American Computer Chess Championship from The Computer History Museum, pdf
• Monty Newborn, Danny Kopec (1988). Results of ACM's Eighteenth Computer Chess Championship. Communications of the ACM, Vol. 31, No. 8, pdf
• Monroe Newborn (1988). Unsynchronized Iterative Deepening Parallel Alpha-Beta Search. IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, PAMI, Vol. 10, No. 5, pp. 687-694. ISSN 0162-8828.
• Monroe Newborn (1989). A Theorem Proving Program that Looks Like a Chess Program. Workshop on New Directions in Game-Tree Search
• Monty Newborn, Danny Kopec (1989). Results of The Nineteenth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship. Communications of the ACM, Vol. 32, No. 10, pdf, reprinted in The Twentieth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship from The Computer History Museum, pdf » ACM 1988

1990 ...

• Monroe Newborn, Danny Kopec (1990). The Twentieth ACM North American Computer Chess Championship, in The 21st Annual ACM North American Computer Chess Championship from The Computer History Museum, pdf
• Monroe Newborn, David Levy (1991). How Computers Play Chess. W.H. Freeman & Co
• Danny Kopec, Monroe Newborn, Michael Valvo (1992). The 22d Annual ACM International Chess Championship, in The 23rd ACM International Computer Chess Championship from The Computer History Museum, pdf
• Monty Newborn, Danny Kopec (1991). The 21st ACM North American Computer Chess Championship. Communications of the ACM, Vol. 34, No. 11, online » ACM 1990
• Danny Kopec, Monroe Newborn, Michael Valvo (1994). The 23rd ACM NACCC in Indianapolis. The 24th ACM International Computer Chess Championship from The Computer History Museum, pdf » ACM 1993
• Monroe Newborn (1994). The 24th ACM International Computer-Chess Championship. ICCA Journal, Vol. 17, No. 3 » ACM 1994

1995 ...

• Monroe Newborn (1995). A Eulogy for Mikhail Moiseivich Botvinnik. ICCA Journal, Vol. 18, No. 2 » Mikhail Botvinnik
• Monroe Newborn (1997). Kasparov versus Deep Blue: Computer Chess Comes of Age. Springer
• Robert Hyatt, Monroe Newborn (1997). CRAFTY Goes Deep. ICCA Journal, Vol. 20, No. 2 » Crafty

2000 ...

• Monty Newborn (2000). Automated Theorem Proving: Theory and Practice. Springer, amazon

2005 ...

• David Levy, Monty Newborn (2009). How Computers Play Chess. Ishi Press, amazon

2010 ...

• Monty Newborn (2011). Beyond Deep Blue: Chess in the Stratosphere. Springer, ISBN-13: 978-0857293404, amazon

• Monroe Newborn, Robert Hyatt (2014). Computer Chess Endgame Play with Pawns: Then and Now. ICGA Journal, Vol. 37, No. 4 » Peasant, Crafty

2020 ...

• Monty Newborn (2020). An analysis of games played in world computer chess championships over the years. ICGA Journal, Vol. 42, Nos. 2-3
• Monty Newborn (2020). The laughing is over. ICGA Journal, Vol. 42, Nos. 2-3
• Monty Newborn (2021). Mad Monty Chess. ICGA Journal, Vol. 43, No. 1

External Links

• Monty Newborn, Professor School of Computer Science, McGill University
• Monroe Newborn's ICGA Tournaments
• Monty Newborn from Wikipedia
• The Mathematics Genealogy Project - Monty Newborn
• Newborn Monroe | The Chess Federation of Canada - La Fédération Canadienne des Échecs
• Canadian Chess - Monroe (Monty) Newborn
• Oral History of Monty Newborn, pdf © 2005 The Computer History Museum

References

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