Speaking of cameras, here's a rather expensive chess board whose pieces are various (expensive!) camera lenses or parts thereof:
[URL]http://www.instablogsimages.com/1/2011/07/22/lensrentals_chess_set_01_g2izg.jpg[/URL]
A computer can now beat the best human in chess (but not even close in go). However, imagine taking a supposedly intelligent robot into a messy room and tell it to find and assemble the chess boards. The above is one of the boards. Here are some more:
[URL]http://www.beautifullife.info/wp-content/uploads/06/img6.jpg[/URL]
[URL]http://www.instablogsimages.com/images/2009/06/30/vacuum-tube-chess-set_01_zR3na_58.jpg[/URL]
A basic problem with designer chessboards: They designers don't know the game.
White on the right.
[URL]http://www.instablogsimages.com/images/2010/08/18/hammond-chess-set_vLIsA_58.jpg[/URL]
Obviously a bit too much drinking is going on here.
White on the right, clowns.
[URL]http://www.instablogsimages.com/images/2009/10/27/chess-set-_02_5nw8X_17621.jpg[/URL]
Why are so many of these designer chessboards set up wrong?
[PLAIN]http://www.inewidea.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/2009081403.jpg
No way to get this one wrong!
[URL]http://trendsupdates.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/air_chess.jpg[/URL]
Finally, white on the right.
The reason for the above is because someone of note said (danged if I can find the quote) that while a computer program can beat a human, it could never find a chessboard in a messy room. And that's the kind of board used in tournaments. The designer board above? Without special programming? Not a chance, at least not for a long time.
Pattern recognition is what we humans do best. Not math, not logic, and definitely not considering millions of options. We are pretty lousy at math and logic, and we certainly can't look 17 plies deep into a chess game.
We don't need to. Human chess players think by gestalt. Computer chess programs don't think. They work by brute force.
A computer go game that can beat the best human is still a long ways into the future. Brute force can help; a computer go game did beat a 8 dan professional a few years back. However, the program was given a nine stone handicap (about the same as a two rook handicap in chess) and ran on an 800 CPU supercomputer with equivalent of 15 teraflops.
If someday a computer program is made that can beat an 8 dan profession playing white, that program still won't be able to find the chessboard hidden in plain sight in a messy room.