First notification. The development of artificial intelligence has its risks. It is one of the favorite plots of fiction, as we have seen in ‘Westworld’ and in countless series and movies in which the machines are out of control. Without going to those extremes, an impatient human and a machine without the laws of robotics well learned can be a dangerous combination. We have been able to see it in a game as peaceful as chess. Kasparov he lost his pride against Deep Blue, but a 7-year-old boy has come close to losing something else. According to the Tass agency, a robot broke a finger to Christopherone of the promises of Moscow chess, while playing a game with him in the Russian capital.
The event occurred on the 19th, during the Moscow Open Chess Forum, which took place from July 13 to 21. In the video you can see, with very poor quality –it seems from the security cameras– that the young chess player struggles with Chessrobotas the robot was baptized. Sergey Lazarev, president of the city’s Chess Federation, explains what happened: “The robot broke the child’s finger. This, of course, is bad. The machine was rented and has been exhibited in many places for a long time, with specialists. The operators apparently missed the problem. The boy made the move for him and then he had to give the robot time to respond, but the little boy rushed and the robot grabbed him ».
In the video you can see that several people rush to try to free the child, who is left with the hooked finger in the claws of the robot. Just in case, the federation stood out: “We have nothing to do with the robot.” The consequences were not serious, in any case. The boy was able to play again the next day, although he finished the tournament in a cast. There was no lack of volunteers to write down his plays, as he is required in official tournaments.
It seems that the parents of the injured boy want file a complaint, according to the agency Tass. “We will figure it out and try to help in any way we can. Robot operators will have to think about reinforcing protection so that this situation does not happen again,” a spokesperson for the organization told the Russian agency.
Incident of a rapid
The creators of Chessrobot claim that their machine is equipped with artificial intelligence and that it can play up to three games at the same time, in a kind of multidisciplinary simulcast. On July 19, his opponent was one of the 30 strongest Moscow chess players under the age of 9. The robot ate one of the pieces of his young rival and put his own in its place. Christopher then stepped forward, as he so often does in quick games, and started his move before the bot finished his. Whether by accident or ‘disgusted’ by this behaviour, the machine grabbed the index finger of the child and squeezed him tightly. Several people helped him and managed to free him, but they could not prevent the fracture.
Vladimir Kramnik plays against a robot with an articulated arm, in the presence of Magnus Carlsen and Arkady Dvorkovich, among others
The robot looks the same or an updated version of the one you can see in the image above, which is now several years old. So his rival was the former world champion Vladimir Kramnik, who at some point jokes with the machine and pushes his ‘hand’ away. Among the spectators, a very young Magnus Carlsencurrent world champion, and the president of FIDE, Arkady Dvorkovich.
The images were surprising in their day, not so much because of the chess strength of the machine as because of the speed at which it performs its movements, which is a bit scary.
criticism of the child
Sergey Smagin, grandmaster and vice president of the Russian Chess Federation, sided with the robot. “There are certain safety rules and the child apparently violated them,” says the chess player. “When he made the move on him, he didn’t realize he had to wait first. This is an extremely rare case, the first I can remember,” he added. Smagin, apparently more concerned about the machine than the human, told RIA Novosti that the incident was “a fluke” and that the robot is “absolutely safe”.
The great master has also given his opinion on the case Sergey Karjak too, punished by FIDE for his support of the war in Ukraine, who believes that the incident is due to “some kind of software bug or something.” “This had never happened before. I wish the boy good health,” he added, in statements collected by ‘The Guardian’.
The British newspaper cites a 2015 study according to which one person a year dies from an industrial robot in the United States alone. According to the US Occupational Safety Administration, most workplace accidents since 2000 involving robots have been fatal, the report says.
The first known case is Robert Williams, who was crushed to death by the arm of a one-tonne robot on a Ford production line in Michigan in 1979. Robots used in medical surgery were also held responsible for the deaths of 144 people between 2008 and 2013. , the safest thing seems to be playing chess with a mobile phone or a tablet. There are no known accidents in games of this type yet.