Google's DeepMind Achieves Legendary Victory

It seems that artificial intelligence has managed to take a step forward with an unexpected and impressive victory: the AlphaGo has managed to defeat no one else than legendary Go player Lee Se-dol. Lee himself did not expect this result, which makes everything much more interesting.

AlphaGo is actually a program that was developed by Google's DeepMind unit. The challenge between the program and the player is being held in Seoul, South Korea.

AlphaGo, a program developed by Google's DeepMind unit, has defeated legendary Go player Lee Se-dol in the first of five historic matches being held in Seoul, South Korea

A total of five matches will be taking place, so this was only the first one. The match was quite intense, lasting no less than three and a half hours. Lee decided to resign, probably, knowing that there was nothing he could do to win.

However, the stake is quite big for the player, as he is actually competing for the prize of no less than $1 million. And not only the money put high interest on this challenge, but also the stake: this is the first time when a player has taken on a computer, so Lee surely wants to make history by winning.

And maybe, the famous player will prepare more for the upcoming challenge, Lee actually saying that he was pretty much surprised with the results of the match."I didn't expect to lose. [But] I didn't think AlphaGo would play the game in such a perfect manner," he explained.

However, Lee immediately added that despite the computer's victory, he did not regret accepting to play. "I don’t regret accepting this challenge," he said.

I am in shock, I admit that, but what's done is done. I enjoyed this game and look forward to the next. I think I failed on the opening layout so if I do a better job on the opening aspect I think I will be able to increase my probability of winning," Lee went on to explain.

He also added that what he found to be most surprising was how strong the opening that AlphaGo opted for was and also how it decided to use some unexpected moves.

Well, although he lost, Lee surely received a lot of appreciation, including from Demis Hassabis, the founder of DeepMind. Hassabis described the game as "hugely exciting" and "very tense" and said that he had "huge respect for Lee Se-dol and his amazing skills."

And, naturally, Lee has another chance to beat AlphaGo, as the second match is set to take place in a few days. Lee is surely willing to get his revenge and everyone expects the match to be very difficult.

When we came into this match we thought anything was possible and we still think that now — there’s still four games to go," Hassabis said.

However, no matter who will finally be the winner, everyone will have something to win. "The winner here, no matter what happens, is humanity," the CEO of Google's parent company Alphabet, Eric Schmidt said.

Humanity wins because the advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning will make each, and every other, human being in the entire world smarter, more capable - just better human beings," he concluded.