Leading up to the tournament, there were AI experts saying that even Google’s computer program would need at least 10 more years of development before being able to beat a human world champion like Sedol. Apparently, the matches against AlphaGo re-ignited his interest in the game.
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The South Korean, who has 18 worldwide titles under his belt and is widely considered one of the greatest Go players of the modern era, said he felt he had under-performed against a formidable, but beatable opponent.
Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis has revealed that AlphaGo needed to reach its maximum limit for these matches.
The final match was too close to call until the very end. In a post-game press conference, he expressed regret over his defeat. In order to become a professional, a Go player needs to pass through dan promotion, but AlphaGo has already proven its prowess by beating top-class ninth-dan player Lee. The game involves two players who take turns placing black and white stones on a grid-shaped board.
After his first win on Sunday, Lee offered to play black stones, with which he believed AlphaGo displayed a relatively weak play.
Lee beat AlphaGo in the fourth match.
“So it’s really kind of the Mount Everest of ideal information and games”, Hassabis said. “I’ve never seen this much attention for Go, ever”, Lee Ha-jin, secretary general at the International Go Federation and guest commentator on Tuesday’s live broadcast, said.
The development shows how stunningly smart computers are becoming but also shows the potential artificial intelligence can have in helping to solve real-world problems through everything from robotics to climate modelling and disease analysis.
The match was concluded Tuesday, with the program AlphaGo running out 4-1 victor against Lee Se-dol.
“The victor here, no matter what happens, is humanity”, Alphabet chairman Eric Schmidt said prior to the first match, and that certainly seems to ring true now the challenge – and $1 million purse riding on it – has been decided.
Lee had said earlier in the series, which began last week, that he was unable to beat AlphaGo because he could not find any weaknesses in the software’s strategy. “After that AlphaGo played very well in the middle of the board, and the game developed into a long, very hard end game”.
The wins by AlphaGo are a momentous milestone in the field of AI since IBM’s Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov in chess in 1997, said Howard Yu, professor of strategic management and innovation at IMD business school, about the three consecutive wins by the program.
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Google DeepMind has talked about applying the deep neural networks and machine learning techniques that AlphaGo used to master Go to more pressing areas such as healthcare and robotics.
