It's a landmark moment for poker, and humanity, as four of the best HUNL players in the world lose to the 'Libratus' by a stunning margin.

Daniel Mcauely

In 1997 chess changed forever when IBM Artificial Intelligence 'Deep Blue' beat GrandMaster Garry Kasparov over six matches. Poker may have just had it's own Deep Blue moment.

Carnegie Mellon University AI 'Libratus' has just beaten the team of Dong Kim, Jimmy Chou, Jason Les and Daniel Mcauley over 120,000 hands of heads-up No Limit Hold'em.

Humanity lost to the machine for the sum of $1,766,250 in virtual dollars. Jimmy Chou lost by $522,857, Jason Les by $880,087, Daniel Mcauely by $277,657 and Dong Kim (who was beating Libratus for a long time) by $85,649.

The matches took place over 20 days. The blinds were $50/$100 and each hand started with $20,000.

Big implications for humanity

Tuomas Sandholm of CMU

Last year a team of four professionals, which included Doug Polk, beat the Carnegie Mellon AI, just as Kasparov did in 1996, but the rate at which AI improves compared to humans is exponential.

AI has beaten lesser poker players already and has also beaten the best Limit Hold'em players in the world. Heads-up No Limit Hold'em is a different beast, however, and this victory is a huge story for the tech industry as it is an example of AI developing 'general intelligence'.

The common sense reaction to this would be to suggest a 'rubber match' next year, possibly with fan favourite Doug Polk. However, the smart money would be on the AI as the rate at which it will improve will be like nothing we have ever seen in poker. The four players involved did an AMA on Reddit last week and confirmed the same thing.

Many suspect this could be a watershed moment for poker like it was for chess (this writer thinks not) and even more suggest that this is a landmark moment for technology and humanity in general.

Keep an eye on the mainstream media this week as this is surely going to command a lot of airtime in the news.

Will this change the game as we know it? Share your thoughts in the comments: