[theptip]

I think there is something to this line of reasoning, but I'm not sure we have to get that abstract.

I suspect this stems from the fact that each game imposes its own set of artificial restrictions. Of course you don't ride a horse in a footrace; that's not the game. Just as you don't confer with your team of experts in a Go game. A game is only given meaning by the artificial restrictions it defines.

Within the bounds of the rules of the footrace, the game is still competitive for humans; currently this is somewhat tautologically so. (Though I think we will have a similar conversation to this when human cyborgs can out-compete unmodified humans [1]). The fact that there are things faster than a human outside of the bounds of the game is irrelevant.

In Go, within the bounds of the rules of the game, humanity cannot compete at the highest level any more. I see that as a big difference.

[1]: http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2009-11/seriously-d...