Contrary to belief, chess is not always about black ‘n’ white. Sometimes, there is a little blue involved too. Deep Blue, to be precise. When an IBM supercomputer Deep Blue took on the legend Garry Kasparov in a six-game chess match contest in the late 1990s, chess experts and aficionados were sitting so far on the edge of their seats that they were in danger of falling off altogether.  The matches between the then world chess champion Kasparov and Deep Blue resulted in the first defeat of a reigning world chess champion by a computer under tournament conditions in the second match.

The contest threw the world of chess into a tailspin and the ‘man vs machine’ confrontation became the subject of a documentary film called: ‘Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine’. Many went beyond the obvious man vs machine aspect. They saw the defeat as artificial intelligence (AI) catching up with Human Intelligence.  Man vs Machine or even man vs animals have always held followers in thrall. We have occasionally heard sporting enthusiasts talk about how the fastest man in the world would fare against a car. Or a cheetah, for that matter.