Google's AlphaGo AI beats the world’s best human Go player

Google’s AI AlphaGo was at its best yet again defeating Ke Jie, the world’s number one Go player, in the first game of a three-match series in Wuzhen. Though the win was by just half a point, post match Google's DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis explained that this was how AlphaGo was programmed: to maximise its winning chances, rather than the winning margin.

#AlphaGo wins game 1! Ke Jie fought bravely and some wonderful moves were played.

— Demis Hassabis (@demishassabis) May 23, 2017

If AlphaGo wins this tournament, it will be a major breakthrough in the field of Artificial Intelligence. AlphaGo's win against Korean legend Lee Se-dol over a year ago is still fresh in our memories and Jie's defeat shows that it was just the beginning.

"We'll release some details of the architecture, of the games that AlphaGo plays against itself, later this week," said the DeepMind CEO. "The reason, ultimately, is to use more widely in science and medicine to help human experts make faster breakthroughs. We have a lot of work ahead of us in the coming years."

Ke and AlphaGo are facing off as part of the Future of Go Summit being held by Google in Wuzhen, China, this week. The second game will be on Thursday (China time; Wednesday evening in the US) while the finale will be on Saturday.

Watch the first game in the video below. The remaining two bouts will be live streamed on the official The Future of Go Summit page here.