MENACE: the pile of matchboxes which can learn

Matt Parker demonstrates MENACE, a physical machine made of matchboxes built in 1961 that learns to play tic-tac-toe through reinforcement.

See more data and check out what we changed on the second day (which caused MENACE to learn a different strategy) in the second video: youtu.be/KcmjOtkULi4 Check out Matt Scroggs’s original blog post about MENACE and in the amazing Chalkdust magazine. mscroggs.co.uk/blog/19 chalkdustmagazine.com/tag/menace/ Play against the online version of MENACE: mscroggs.co.uk/menace/ This is the original 1961 “Experiments on the mechanization of game-learning” by Donald Michie. dropbox.com/s/ycsycu0l01g9643/DonaldMichie.pdf?dl=0 Thanks to Katie Steckles for organising our stall at the Manchester Science Festival and Antonio Benitez for giving us the space. The MENACE crew were: Alison Clarke, Andrew Taylor, Ash Frankland, David Williams, Katie Steckles, Matthew Scroggs, Paul Taylor, Sam Headleand and Zoe Griffiths Get your MENACE data here! dropbox.com/s/0f9ukxxvh0pgdui/MENACE-data.zip?dl=0 CORRECTIONS: None yet. Let me know if you spot anything! Thanks to my Patreon supporters who made this possible! Here are the random subset I read out during the video: Ben White Scott Robinson Nelson Emerson Amy Sandland Neil McGovern Support my channel and make more videos like this possible! patreon.com/standupmaths Music by Howard Carter Filming and editing by Trunkman Productions Audio mastering by Peter Doggart Design by Simon Wright MATT PARKER: Stand-up Mathematician Website: standupmaths.com/ Maths book: makeanddo4D.com/ Nerdy maths toys: mathsgear.co.uk/