AlphoGo, the computer created by DeepMind, the Artificial Intelligence (AI) arm of Google, defeated world champion Lee Sedol of South Korea Wednesday in Game One of human vs. machine Go-chess showdown. The result is out of the expectations of many, including China's Go grandmaster Ke Jie, but Ke put it clear "AlphaGo is not in my match now".
Ke admitted Thursday he had underestimated AlphaGo's capability before the opening match, but he still believes he will be the winner should he have been the player versus AlphaGo.
"I have to say I underestimated the mind power of AlphaGo prior to the first match as I thought Lee Sedol can win in a 5-0 whitewash," said Ke, who holds a head-to-head record of eight wins and two losses against Lee.
"For me, I'm not interested in playing against an easy opponent, especially for an easy-to-handle computer, for I don't want to win 100 times out of 100 games, but now I think we (Ke vs. AlphaGO) can have a try."
"I want to see actually how it is to play against AlphaGo. Like the Chinese proverb goes, it's better to see once than hear dozens of times and it's better to have a try yourself than you see how others play dozens of times," said Ke, who is the first player to win two major international titles in a single year since Lee won the 3rd BC Card Cup and the 8th Chunlan Cup in 2011.
"Now facing AlphaGo, I do not feel the same strong instinct of victory when I play a human player, but I still believe I have the advantage against it. It's 60 percent in favor of me."
Ke is confident of himself for the moment in the human vs. machine duel, but he gives credit to AlphaGo in the future. "According to the pace of AI's progress, it won't be long for AlphaGo to beat all human players, it may happen a few years later, even a few months later," added Ke.
It's assumed that Ke will be AlphaGo's next opponent if the machine wins the best-of-five series with Lee. Demis Hassabis, Google DeepMind's CEO, has expressed the willingness to pick Ke as AlphaGo's next target.
Ke defeated Qiu Jun ninth dan to win the 2nd Bailing Cup final, and become a new world champion, on January 14, 2015 when he is just at a level of fourth dan.
Then Ke, already acquired Go's highest level of ninth dan, won the 2015 Samsung Cup by defeating Shi Yue on December 9, in Shanghai, becoming the first player to win two major international titles in a single year since Lee's feat in 2011.
Ke was born in 1997 and became a pro in 2008. His performance wasn't especially notable until 2013, but somehow he became very strong and powerful in 2014.
Go is a complex ancient Chinese mind game played on a board with a 19x19 grid of black lines.
