With Dr Marion Tinsley indisposed, it was always going to be dollars to doughnuts that the computer would win the World Checkers Championship, and it duly retained its draughts title as champion by playing to a draw on Thursday against Don Lafferty, the second best human player: the Chinook program runs on a Challenge XL server from Silicon Graphics Inc, was developed by a team led by Professor Jonathan Schaeffer of the University of Alberta, beat Lafferty once, lost once and drew 18 games over six days at the Computer Museum in Boston.
