Hans Berliner

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Hans "Jack" Berliner (born January 27, 1929 in Berlin ; † January 13, 2017 in Riviera Beach ) was an American systems analyst and the 5th correspondence chess world champion .

Life

Berliner's family emigrated from Nazi Germany to the USA in 1937 . At the age of 13 he learned chess . He made rapid progress in this game. In 1951 he returned to Bad Kreuznach as a soldier and played for two years on the top board of the “Kreuznach Chess Club 1921”, winning all the games. At the 1952 Chess Olympiad in Helsinki he was part of the US team, but only played one game (a draw against František Zíta ). In 1956 he won the championship of the Eastern States of the USA ahead of the young Bobby Fischer . In 1957 he was fifth at the US state championship.

He started correspondence chess in the 1950s . In 1955, 1956 and 1959 he became the USA champion in this discipline, each with an astonishing result of +18 = 0 −0, which demonstrated his great playing strength.

The opening group 1 for the 5th World Correspondence Chess Championship he was able to win 1962-1963 just under 11.5 points from 13 games. Manfred Mädler came second with 11 points, who Berliner defeated in a complicated runner-up final .

With great superiority (3 points ahead) Berliner then won the final round of the 5th World Correspondence Chess Championship, which was held from 1965 to 1968. His game with Black against Jakow Borissowitsch Estrin , in which Berliner first sacrificed a knight in the Fritz variant and was finally able to win in the rook ending, became particularly well known .

He did not defend his title afterwards. He was only persuaded to participate in the ICCF 50 years World Champions Jubilee Tournament , which took place from 2001 to 2004 and brought together nine correspondence chess world champions in one tournament. There he took 6th place with 3.5 points. In correspondence chess, Berliner was considered a perfectionist who was always looking for the best move.

After winning the World Correspondence Chess Championship, he devoted himself to research in the field of artificial intelligence and the development of chess computers . He was Professor of Artificial Intelligence at Carnegie Mellon University and was involved in the development of the HiTech chess program . He also developed a backgammon program, BKG 9.8 . This was the first game program that was able to defeat a world champion - Luigi Villa (June 1979).

He caused a stir with his book The System , published in 1999 , in which he claims that the best opening move is 1. d4 and that White can achieve a clear advantage in all variations. Berliner was unable to substantiate this in every detail. However, he was of the opinion that he had found a "system" according to whose principles the evidence could be provided in each individual case. As an example, he cited the Grünfeld-Indian Defense , which he developed with the variant 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 d5 4. cxd5 Nxd5 5. e4 Nxc3 6. bxc3 c5 7. Bc4 Bg7 8. Ne2 Nc6 9. Be3 0–0 10. Rc1 Qa5 11. Kf1 cxd4 12. cxd4 considered potentially refuted. Reviewers, however, expressed skepticism as to whether the “system” that Berliner only roughly outlined could lead to the desired results in practice.

The German grandmaster Robert Huebner reviewed Berliner's work extensively in ChessBase Magazine (No. 79 [2000] and No. 80 [2001]) and came to the conclusion that “the system is a belief system . [...] The understanding cannot gain hold on what is commanded, but it shouldn't do that either; Faith and allegiance create security. "

Fonts (selection)

  • Chess as problem solving: the development of a tactic analyzer . 1979
  • as editor: Computer Game Playing. American Association for Artificial Intelligence . 1988
  • as editor: Computer Chess . 1990
  • The system . Gambit Publications London, 1999, ISBN 1-901983-102 , ISBN 978-1-901983-10-4

literature

  • Fritz Baumbach : Interview with Hans Berliner , Part 1 in: Schach 1/1999, pp. 59–61, Part 2 in: Schach 2/1999, pp. 59–61

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Dylan Loeb McClain: Hans Berliner, Master Chess Player and Programmer, Dies at 87 . The New York Times , January 16, 2017, accessed January 17, 2017.
  2. ↑ Hans Berliner's results at the Chess Olympiads on olimpbase.org, accessed on January 17, 2017 (English).
  3. ↑ For the assessment of this endgame see Fritz Baumbach: Not only the perfectionist was wrong here . In: Schach 5/2000, p. 38.
  4. ↑ Tournament table of the 50WCJT, as of December 24, 2014, accessed on January 17, 2017.
personal data
SURNAME Berliner, Hans
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Berliner, Hans Jack (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American chess player
DATE OF BIRTH January 27, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH January 13, 2017
Place of death Riviera Beach