Chess fell to the machines

[MingBei]

Hi everyone:

"For AI researchers, Go is equally exalted. Chess fell to the machines in 1997, when Garry Kasparov lost a match to DeepBlue, an IBM computer."

I am confused by the "the machines". Can I use "machines" to express the concept of a nonspecific reference?

Thank you.

Ryan.

 

[Steven David]

In this sentence, "the machines" is a reference to all artificial intelligence and technology together.

 

[MingBei]

In this sentence, "the machines" is a reference to all artificial intelligence and technology together.

Thank you!

 

[dojibear]

Literally "the machines" are computers. They may use AI or not.

Winning chess-playing computer programs like Deep Blue did not use AI. They used teams of human chess experts (who defined the exact strategies the program would use to play chess) working with software engineers (that turned those strategies into software running on a computer).

 

[MingBei]

Literally "the machines" are computers. They may use AI or not.

Winning chess-playing computer programs like Deep Blue did not use AI. They used teams of human chess experts (who defined the exact strategies the program would use to play chess) working with software engineers (that turned those strategies into software running on a computer).

Yes, exactly. Thank you.

 

[kentix]

"'The machines" is a classification word. In this case it's a contrast to "the humans".

You have two groups - the humans and the machines.

Until this time the best humans were always the winners over the best machines in chess. After this match, that was no longer true.

It doesn't mean every human could beat every machine or every machine could beat every human. It's making a general statement about the groups as a whole.

 

[Packard]

HAL (2001: A Space Odyssey): Sorry, Dave. ...

 

[MingBei]

"'The machines" is a classification word. In this case it's a contrast to "the humans".

You have two groups - the humans and the machines.

Until this time the best humans were always the winners over the best machines in chess. After this match, that was no longer true.

It doesn't mean every human could beat every machine or every machine could beat every human. It's making a general statement about the groups as a whole.

Thank u. I wonder can I use "machines" to show a concept of classification?