I’m no chess expert but I am a game theorist.

I got the feeling that AlphaZero cares about materiel only insofar as it occupies positions and projects power; in this sense it is further in the abstract-strategy realm than grandmasters and human-coded chess programs are.

Human-style players are like quantum theory: they’re concerned with stuff. AlphaZero is like general relativity: it’s concerned with bending the backdrop so mere stuff becomes pliant and goes where it wants... of course you need stuff to bend the backdrop, but beyond that...

I don’t know if I’m making much sense, cockeyed metaphors are my only means of expressing my impressions.