Computer Plays Perfect Game Of Checkers

Forget data security. Never mind network audits. We know what's been keeping you up at night -- the possibility that someday, a computer would be able to play the perfect game of checkers.

Gird yourselves, my friends. That day has come.

Reuters reported that the a team of computer researchers at the University of Alberta have a computer called Chinook that, after playing over 500 billion possible piece positions, has determined that the perfect game of checkers... is a draw.

It only took the computer 18 years to come up with this. The team, however, wasn't surprised. "That checkers is a draw is not a surprise. Grandmaster players have conjectured this for decades," said one researcher in the team's report to the Journal Science.

So let me see if I understand this correctly: These guys spent nearly two decades letting a computer play checkers to a result they pretty much knew was going to happen anyway?As for the researchers' next in-depth study, they're trying to decide between a cure for cancer or how to beat Candyland.

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