Kramnik ready for super-computer match
World chess champion Vladimir Kramnik said on Wednesday he was ready to do battle with super-computer Deep Fritz, but admitted his "monstrous" opponent has a psychological edge.
"I am ready for the competition because the preparation was quite serious. It took me more than one month and now I am ready to play," the soft-spoken 27-year-old told Reuters in an interview before the match in Bahrain, which starts on Friday.
"It is a different feeling because there is a lot of psychology in chess; your (traditional) opponent has strong points and weaknesses, and here all psychological factors work against me because I am human and my opponent is not."
The long-awaited eight-game contest comes five years after then world champion Garry Kasparov lost sensationally to the computer Deep Blue in a dramatic contest between man and machine.
"It is a battle between human creativity and the monstrous calculating power of the machine," Kramnik said.
The young Russian beat two grandmasters by the age of 10 and has not looked back since. In 2000, he won an informal world title by defeating Kasparov in the Brain Games championship.
"It's totally different in all senses playing against a machine," Kramnik said. "It's a different game. The machine has its own style of playing and it's very different from a human opponent. I don't really know what to expect."
According to its creator, Friedrich Friedel, Deep Fritz has superseded Deep Blue. The software can execute about three million moves per second, the human brain can execute just one.
"Until very recently I thought we had a very good chance, but then I learned that Vladimir has been working for eight to 10 hours a day preparing for Deep Fritz and that gives me a slightly sinking feeling," said Friedel at the opening ceremony of the Brains in Bahrain match.
The $1 million showdown was due to be held one year ago but was postponed after the September 11 attacks on U.S. landmarks.
Kramnik, who will play black in the first game on Friday, will take home $700,000 if he draws against Deep Fritz in their epic encounter, spread over a 15-day period.
Whether Man can still compete with Machine on the chessboard is in question in view of the technological advances made between the development of Deep Blue and Deep Fritz.
"May the best entity win," said Friedel.
