How an intern helped build the AI that shook the world

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2518451-how-an-intern-helped-build-the-ai-that-shook-the-world/

Publish Date: 2026-03-07 07:30:00

Source Domain: www.newscientist.com

Historic Victory: In March 2016, Google DeepMind’s AI system, AlphaGo, achieved a historic victory in a five-match series of the ancient Chinese board game Go against the world champion player, Lee Sedol. The matches were broadcast on TV, marking a significant milestone in the development of AI.
Development Process: Chris Maddison, working under Ilya Sutskever, spearheaded the development of AlphaGo. They initially struggled with different approaches, ultimately succeeding by using neural networks to predict the next move in expert gameplay, mirroring the way the human visual cortex works.
Team Effort and Challenges: The success of AlphaGo was a result of significant contributions from a large team and intensive development over time. The pressure was enormous, especially as the team approached the challenge of defeating top human player Lee Sedol, who was regarded as nearly unbeatable.
Impact on AI and Future Directions: AlphaGo laid the foundation for many modern AI technologies, particularly large language models (LLMs), which similarly rely on pretraining and reinforcement learning to align systems with human goals. The underlying technology has proven to be foundational for future AI advancements.
Beyond the Competition: Despite AlphaGo’s victory, there was a sense of sympathy for Lee Sedol, who experienced significant stress and a unique heartbreak as AI disrupted traditional aspects of the game that human opponents can share, such as post-match analysis. The narrative of man versus machine, while gripping, overlooks the collaborative nature of AI development.
Human Role in the AI Era: While AI advancements are impressive, there remains room for humans to contribute to and enjoy aspects of games like Go, which are about more than just winning – they offer enjoyment, cultural heritage, and opportunities for discovery.