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'''The Bernstein Chess Program''',<br/>
 
'''The Bernstein Chess Program''',<br/>
was the first complete chess program, developed in [[Timeline#1957|1957]] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Bureau_Corporation Service Bureau Corporation], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madison_Avenue Madison] & [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/59th_Street_%28Manhattan%29 59th Street], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan Manhattan], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City New York City] <ref>[http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1958/11/29/runner-up-4 Runner-Up - The New Yorker - November 29, 1958]</ref>, by chess player and programmer at [[IBM]], [[Alex Bernstein]] with his colleagues [[Michael de V. Roberts]], [[Timothy Arbuckle]] and [[Martin Belsky]], supported by chess advisor [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bisguier Arthur Bisguier] <ref>[http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bisguier Arthur Bisguier from Wikipedia.de] (German)</ref>, who became IBM employee at that time and in 1957 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Grandmaster international chess grandmaster], and supervised by [[Nathaniel Rochester]] <ref>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Rochester_%28computer_scientist%29 Nathaniel Rochester (computer scientist) from Wikipedia]</ref>.  
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was the first complete chess program, developed around [[Timeline#1957|1957]] at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Bureau_Corporation Service Bureau Corporation], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madison_Avenue Madison] & [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/59th_Street_%28Manhattan%29 59th Street], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan Manhattan], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City New York City] <ref>[http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1958/11/29/runner-up-4 Runner-Up - The New Yorker - November 29, 1958]</ref>, by chess player and programmer at [[IBM]], [[Alex Bernstein]] with his colleagues [[Michael de V. Roberts]], [[Timothy Arbuckle]] and [[Martin Belsky]], supported by chess advisor [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bisguier Arthur Bisguier] <ref>[http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bisguier Arthur Bisguier from Wikipedia.de] (German)</ref>, who became IBM employee at that time and in 1957 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Grandmaster international chess grandmaster], and supervised by [[Nathaniel Rochester]] <ref>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Rochester_%28computer_scientist%29 Nathaniel Rochester (computer scientist) from Wikipedia]</ref>. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_McCorduck Pamela McCorduck], who was married to [[Mathematician#JFTraub|Joseph F. Traub]], interviewed Alex Bernstein as published with several details given on the development of the program in her seminal book ''[[Artificial Intelligence#MachinesWhoThink|Machines Who Think]]'' <ref>[http://www.talkchess.com/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=70939&start=17 Re: The mystery of Alex Bernstein] by [[Sergei Markoff|Sergei S. Markoff]], [[CCC]], June 09, 2019</ref>.
 +
 
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=Quotes=
 +
==McCorduck==
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Quotes by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_McCorduck Pamela McCorduck] from ''[[Artificial Intelligence#MachinesWhoThink|Machines Who Think]]'' <ref>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_McCorduck Pamela McCorduck] ('''2004'''). ''[[Artificial Intelligence#MachinesWhoThink|Machines Who Think: A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence]]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_K_Peters A. K. Peters] (25th anniversary edition), pp. 182-185</ref>
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Bernstein drew upon not only his own experience with chess, but began to study [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Chess_Openings Modern Chess Openings], which came out then every two years, and spent six months going through some five hundred chess openings. He assigned scores to various positions, scores that depended not only on the pieces retained, but also on [[Square Control|area control]] of the board and [[Mobility|mobility]]. He also developed a fourth measure, what he called a “[[King Pattern|greens area]]” around the king, meaning that the more squares outward from the king controlled by his own side the better. But after six months of this he gave it up. He couldn’t make any sense out of it.
 +
 
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At this time, Bernstein was unaware of [[Claude Shannon|Shannon’s seminal papers]], and did not know that chess had caught the interests of a group at [[Los Alamos National Laboratory|Los Alamos]], including [[James Kister|J. Kister]], [[Paul Stein|P. Stein]], [[Stanislaw Ulam|S. Ulam]], [[William Walden|W. Walden]], and [[Mark Wells|M. Wells]], who were working on a limited [[MANIAC I|6x6 board]], rather than the regulation 8x8. Nor did he know that [[Allen Newell]], [[Cliff Shaw|J. C. Shaw]], and [[Herbert Simon]] together, and [[John McCarthy]] independently, were also pondering chess-playing machines. Alex Bernstein only knew that the problem was hot ...
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It was now that Bernstein became aware of [[Alan Turing|Turing’s]] work and read at least one of Shannon’s papers. When he finally began to see how he might codify some of the principles he felt were essential, he telephoned [[Claude Shannon]] at [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology|MIT]]. “I went up to MIT and spent a day or two with him, telling him what I was planning to do, and he said he thought it was intelligent, and a good way of proceeding. Essentially I felt I’d received his blessings, which was pleasant.”
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Bernstein also mentioned that he was working on the problem to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lasker Dr. Edward Lasker], a well-known chess writer, who introduced him to [[Stanislaw Ulam]] of the Los Alamos group. Bernstein had the advantage that the Los Alamos group didn’t have, of a machine with a large amount of memory, although the four thousand words of memory the [[IBM 704]] had to begin with were insufficient for Bernstein’s program in the end. The 704’s memory was to have doubled by the time Bernstein finished his program, and he still came within two hundred words of overflowing memory.
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So Bernstein’s chess program selected what seemed to be the likeliest fruitful moves, and these it examined in considerable depth, comparing one to another among a number of dimensions. The program contained a large data base, which allowed it to examine any particular piece or square at any time. In descending order of importance, the program asked such questions as, Is the [[King|king]] in [[Check|check]]? If the king is in check, there is nothing else to do. Is the king in [[Check#DoubleCheck|double check]]? If he is, merely to capture one piece that threatens the king will be insufficient; the king must be moved. The next question had to do with [[Material|material]]: is there any to be gained, or any in danger of [[Captures|capture]]? And clearly it is more important to rescue or capture a rook than to rescue or capture a pawn, and this was factored into the program.
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==McCarthy==
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As mentioned by [[John McCarthy]] <ref>[http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/slides/dartmouth/dartmouth/node1.html The Dartmouth Workshop--as planned and as it happened]</ref>, the Bernstein Chess Program under construction was presented at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dartmouth_workshop 1956 Dartmouth workshop]:
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Alex Bernstein of IBM presented his chess program under construction. My reaction was to invent and recommend to him [[Alpha-Beta|alpha-beta]] pruning. He was unconvinced.  
  
 
=Shannon Type B=
 
=Shannon Type B=
The Bernstein Chess Program was the prototype of a selective forward pruning, [[Type B Strategy|Shannon Type B]] program. On an [[IBM 704]], one of the last vacuum tube computers, it searched four [[Ply|plies]] [[Minimax|minimax]] in around 8 minutes, considering seven most plausible moves from each position and [[Evaluation|evaluated]] [[Material|material]], [[Mobility|mobility]], [[Square Control|area control]] and [[King Safety|king defense]] <ref>[[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-431614f690f16 Computer vs. Chess-Player]''. [[Scientific American]], Vol. 198, pp. 96-105. [http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-2.Computer_V_ChessPlayer.Bernstein_Roberts.Scientific_American.June-1958/Computer_V_ChessPlayer.Bernstein_Roberts.Scientific_American.June-1958.062303059.sm.pdf pdf] from [[The Computer History Museum]], reprinted in [[Computer Chess Compendium]] by [[David Levy]]</ref>.  
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The Bernstein Chess Program was the prototype of a selective forward pruning, [[Type B Strategy|Shannon Type B]] program. On an [[IBM 704]], one of the last vacuum tube computers, it searched four [[Ply|plies]] [[Minimax|minimax]] in around 8 minutes, considering seven most plausible moves from each position and [[Evaluation|evaluated]] [[Material|material]], [[Mobility|mobility]], [[Square Control|area control]] and [[King Safety|king defense]] <ref>[[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-431614f690f16 Computer vs. Chess-Player]''. [[Scientific American]], Vol. 198, reprinted '''1988''' in [[Computer Chess Compendium]]</ref>.  
  
 
=Publications=  
 
=Publications=  
* [[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-431614f690f16 Computer vs. Chess-Player]''. [[Scientific American]], Vol. 198, pp. 96-105. [http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-2.Computer_V_ChessPlayer.Bernstein_Roberts.Scientific_American.June-1958/Computer_V_ChessPlayer.Bernstein_Roberts.Scientific_American.June-1958.062303059.sm.pdf pdf] from [[The Computer History Museum]], reprinted 1988 in [[Computer Chess Compendium]]
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<ref>hosted by [[The Computer History Museum]]</ref>
* [[Alex Bernstein ]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-4316153963418 A Chess Playing Program for the IBM 704]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_Review Chess Review] July 1958, [http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-2.Chess_Review.A_Chess_Playing_Program_for_the_IBM_704.Bernstein.1958/Chess_Review.A_Chess_Playing_Program_for_the_IBM_704.Bernstein.July-1958.062303058.sm.pdf pdf] from [[The Computer History Museum]]
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* [[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-431614f690f16 Computer vs. Chess-Player]''. [[Scientific American]], Vol. 198, reprinted '''1988''' in [[Computer Chess Compendium]]
* [[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]], [[Timothy Arbuckle]], [[Martin Belsky]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-431e18a41d415 A chess playing program for the IBM 704]''. Proceedings of the 1958 Western Joint Computer Conference, pp. 157-159, Los Angeles, California. [http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-2.A_Chess_Playing_Program_for_the_IBM_704.Bernstein_Roberts_Arbuckle_Belsky/A_Chess_Playing_Program_for_the_IBM_704.Bernstein_Roberts_Arbuckle_Belsky.062303011.pdf pdf] from [[The Computer History Museum]]
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* [[Alex Bernstein ]] ('''1958'''). ''[http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/full_record.php?iid=doc-4316153963418 A Chess Playing Program for the IBM 704]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_Review Chess Review], July 1958
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* [[Alex Bernstein]], [[Michael de V. Roberts]], [[Timothy Arbuckle]], [[Martin Belsky]] ('''1958'''). ''[https://www.computerhistory.org/chess/doc-431e18a41d415/ A chess playing program for the IBM 704]''. Proceedings of the 1958 Western Joint Computer Conference
 
* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Leiber Fritz Leiber] ('''1962'''). ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Leiber_bibliography#Short_stories The 64-Square Madhouse]''. [http://www.unz.org/Pub/WorldsIfSF-1962may-00064 Worlds of If] <ref>[http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=49858 Fritz Leiber's "The 64-Square Madhouse"] by [[Ian Osgood]], [[CCC]], October 28, 2013</ref>
 
* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Leiber Fritz Leiber] ('''1962'''). ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Leiber_bibliography#Short_stories The 64-Square Madhouse]''. [http://www.unz.org/Pub/WorldsIfSF-1962may-00064 Worlds of If] <ref>[http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=49858 Fritz Leiber's "The 64-Square Madhouse"] by [[Ian Osgood]], [[CCC]], October 28, 2013</ref>
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* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_McCorduck Pamela McCorduck] ('''1979'''). ''Machines Who Think''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._H._Freeman_and_Company W. H. Freeman]
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* [[David Levy]], [[Monroe Newborn]] ('''1982'''). ''[http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-85538-2 All About Chess and Computers]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springer_Science%2BBusiness_Media Springer]
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* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamela_McCorduck Pamela McCorduck] ('''2004'''). ''[[Artificial Intelligence#MachinesWhoThink|Machines Who Think: A Personal Inquiry into the History and Prospects of Artificial Intelligence]]''. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_K_Peters A. K. Peters] (25th anniversary edition)
  
 
=External Links=  
 
=External Links=  
* [http://www.computerhistory.org/chess/search.php?more=&submitted=1&keywords=Bernstein&x=34&y=7&all=all&item_document=item_document&item_moving_image=item_moving_image&item_artifact=item_artifact&item_still_image=item_still_image&item_oral_history=item_oral_history&item_software=item_software The Bernstein Chess Program] from [[The Computer History Museum]]
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* [https://www.computerhistory.org/chess/search/?q=Alex+Bernstein Alex Bernstein] from [[The Computer History Museum]]
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20071221115817/http://classicchess.googlepages.com/Chess.htm Classic Computer Chess - ... The programs of yesteryear] by [[Carey Bloodworth|Carey]], hosted by the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Archive Internet Archive] <ref>[http://www.talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=56938&start=2 Re: Old programs CHAOS and USC] by [[Dann Corbit]], [[CCC]], July 11, 2015</ref>
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* [https://www.gettyimages.de/fotos/ibm-704?editorialproducts=timelife&family=editorial&phrase=IBM%20704&page=1&recency=anydate&suppressfamilycorrection=true Photos] with [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lasker Edward Lasker] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Feininger Andreas Feininger], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getty_Images Getty Images] » [[IBM 704#QuoteMachinesWhoThink|Quote from Machines Who Think]]
* [http://www.gettyimages.de/search/2/image?phrase=IBM+704&editorialproducts=timelife&family=editorial Photos] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Feininger Andreas Feininger], [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getty_Images Getty Images]
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* [https://www.chess.com/blog/Ginger_GM/the-history-of-computer-chess-part-3-alex-bernstein The History of Computer Chess - Part 3 - Alex Bernstein] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Williams_(chess_player) Simon Williams], [[Chess.com]], August 31, 2019
* [http://www.research.ibm.com/deepblue/reference/html/i.3.html Chess Pieces - IBM Research] the [[Deep Blue]] site
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* [https://www.chess.com/blog/Ginger_GM/the-history-of-computer-chess-part-4-alex-bernstein-continued The History of Computer Chess - Part 4 - Alex Bernstein continued...] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Williams_(chess_player) Simon Williams], [[Chess.com]], September 28, 2019
* [http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1958/11/29/runner-up-4 Runner-Up - The New Yorker - November 29, 1958]
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* [https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1958/11/29/runner-up-4 Runner-Up - The New Yorker - November 29, 1958]
 
* Alex Bernstein: ''juega al ajedrez con un'' IBM 704 (Thinking Machines), [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YouTube YouTube] Video
 
* Alex Bernstein: ''juega al ajedrez con un'' IBM 704 (Thinking Machines), [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YouTube YouTube] Video
 
: {{#evu:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUjiUR0ZH58|alignment=left|valignment=top}}
 
: {{#evu:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUjiUR0ZH58|alignment=left|valignment=top}}
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'''[[Engines|Up one Level]]'''
 
'''[[Engines|Up one Level]]'''
 
[[Category:Mainframe|Bernstein Chess Program]]
 
[[Category:Mainframe|Bernstein Chess Program]]
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[[Category:Quotes|Bernstein Chess Program]]
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[[Category:McCarthy Quotes|Bernstein Chess Program]]

Latest revision as of 17:38, 25 February 2021

Home * Engines * The Bernstein Chess Program

The Bernstein Chess Program,
was the first complete chess program, developed around 1957 at Service Bureau Corporation, Madison & 59th Street, Manhattan, New York City [2], by chess player and programmer at IBM, Alex Bernstein with his colleagues Michael de V. Roberts, Timothy Arbuckle and Martin Belsky, supported by chess advisor Arthur Bisguier [3], who became IBM employee at that time and in 1957 international chess grandmaster, and supervised by Nathaniel Rochester [4]. Pamela McCorduck, who was married to Joseph F. Traub, interviewed Alex Bernstein as published with several details given on the development of the program in her seminal book Machines Who Think [5].

Quotes

McCorduck

Quotes by Pamela McCorduck from Machines Who Think [6]

Bernstein drew upon not only his own experience with chess, but began to study Modern Chess Openings, which came out then every two years, and spent six months going through some five hundred chess openings. He assigned scores to various positions, scores that depended not only on the pieces retained, but also on area control of the board and mobility. He also developed a fourth measure, what he called a “greens area” around the king, meaning that the more squares outward from the king controlled by his own side the better. But after six months of this he gave it up. He couldn’t make any sense out of it.
At this time, Bernstein was unaware of Shannon’s seminal papers, and did not know that chess had caught the interests of a group at Los Alamos, including J. Kister, P. Stein, S. Ulam, W. Walden, and M. Wells, who were working on a limited 6x6 board, rather than the regulation 8x8. Nor did he know that Allen Newell, J. C. Shaw, and Herbert Simon together, and John McCarthy independently, were also pondering chess-playing machines. Alex Bernstein only knew that the problem was hot ... 
It was now that Bernstein became aware of Turing’s work and read at least one of Shannon’s papers. When he finally began to see how he might codify some of the principles he felt were essential, he telephoned Claude Shannon at MIT. “I went up to MIT and spent a day or two with him, telling him what I was planning to do, and he said he thought it was intelligent, and a good way of proceeding. Essentially I felt I’d received his blessings, which was pleasant.”
Bernstein also mentioned that he was working on the problem to Dr. Edward Lasker, a well-known chess writer, who introduced him to Stanislaw Ulam of the Los Alamos group. Bernstein had the advantage that the Los Alamos group didn’t have, of a machine with a large amount of memory, although the four thousand words of memory the IBM 704 had to begin with were insufficient for Bernstein’s program in the end. The 704’s memory was to have doubled by the time Bernstein finished his program, and he still came within two hundred words of overflowing memory.
So Bernstein’s chess program selected what seemed to be the likeliest fruitful moves, and these it examined in considerable depth, comparing one to another among a number of dimensions. The program contained a large data base, which allowed it to examine any particular piece or square at any time. In descending order of importance, the program asked such questions as, Is the king in check? If the king is in check, there is nothing else to do. Is the king in double check? If he is, merely to capture one piece that threatens the king will be insufficient; the king must be moved. The next question had to do with material: is there any to be gained, or any in danger of capture? And clearly it is more important to rescue or capture a rook than to rescue or capture a pawn, and this was factored into the program. 

McCarthy

As mentioned by John McCarthy [7], the Bernstein Chess Program under construction was presented at the 1956 Dartmouth workshop:

Alex Bernstein of IBM presented his chess program under construction. My reaction was to invent and recommend to him alpha-beta pruning. He was unconvinced. 

Shannon Type B

The Bernstein Chess Program was the prototype of a selective forward pruning, Shannon Type B program. On an IBM 704, one of the last vacuum tube computers, it searched four plies minimax in around 8 minutes, considering seven most plausible moves from each position and evaluated material, mobility, area control and king defense [8].

Publications

[9]

External Links

References

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