White moves first in chess and, at least at the expert level, this confers an advantage similar to that of serving in tennis. White wins about twice as often as black at the professional level, although half of all games finish drawn. White can usually define the battleground and I used it to offer Deep Thought a “poisoned pawn” in the opening, a tempting offer of material that computers were still too eager to grab. Sure enough, the machine took the bait and was soon in great difficulties as my pieces swarmed over the board. My attack on its king forced it to give up its queen on move
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