[Retros] 2512 dead in one set, more than 300000 or million in others. Yefim 09/02/2004

[doubleexclam at comcast.net]

"In dead set with position
4k3/2b5/8/p1p1p1p1/P1P1P1P1/8/2B5/4K3 w - -
304704 positions and if we add WB will be more than million.
Do you know how many "series of legal moves" are possible here?:)
Googol, googolplex, gugolsplash :)) may be very small for comparison. Who will show
all series? Player? Director? Convention of mathematicians?
It should be omitted because there are may exist dead positions requiring
very deep reasoning... Let players continue a game...:( :)" -YT

How long shall the players continue such futility? Shall it drag on until it becomes a clock-pounding contest and one of them "wins" on time? (By the same logic, 3-move repetition and 50-move rule do not 'prove' a draw, so they are also ruled out...)

In this case there is every reason to declare the game drawn. It is irrelevant how many possible different continuations there are; heuristic logic easily shows that there is no possible checkmate. 

It's true A. Buchanan has composed several problems playing on this rule; in one of them, a retraction of 17 moves is required to show that the position is alive or dead. This is one of the few positions that I've seen where it is not immediately obvious that the position is dead. Buchanan also pointed out that it's not tenable to apply this rule to most chess problems (for example, self-stalemates); the problems that DO employ it carry the condition of "Dead Reckoning" under the diagram.

Still, the rule makes too much sense for the game of chess to be scrapped; it makes no sense to have a player lose a game on time when he could not lose it over the board if his opponent had all the time in the world. The "deep" dead position is such a rare occurrence over-the-board that it's not even worth worrying about. If such should arise, let play continue. Sorry to disappoint, but even a game so logical as chess must sometimes be decided by a judgement call.

-Ryan McCracken




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Subject: [Retros] 2512 dead in one set, more than 300000 or million in others. Yefim 09/02/2004
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