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Chess Players 'Are Paranoid Thrillseekers'
Tardigrade submitted a brief little article that claims that chess players are paranoid thrillseekers. It's a fairly amusing little piece and definitely
makes me wish that my high-school chess club would have got into epic
battles with the groups that were capable of stretching us into pretzel
shapes, if only for the thrill. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.
Chess players are paranoid because they are chess players, not vice versa. Five years of swirlys and locker room beatings in high school while a member of the Chess Club usually causes that.
I play chess, and I'm good at it, but I'm not a paranoid thrillseeker. I'll grant that chess does give me a feeling of being in a war of wits, and I enjoy seeing my opponent squirm when they fall into one of my traps, but it's not on a par of thrillingness with things like skiing, where you can get yourself hurt.
Personally, I suck at chess, and even I know what an absorbing game chess is. It is a battle, and one does not forget that, especially if you consider yourself an intelligent person. It's a war of mind vs. mind, may the most intelligent (and least easily distracted) being win.
While it lacks the immediacy of video games, and the brutality of (mock?) physical combat, chess is a war waged in miniature, where one must consider logistics and the strength and position of both your forces and your opponent's in order to come to a victory. Even when your forces are decimated it is possible to achieve victory by the use of clever tactics.
But what really makes this not news is that any game can have this sense of immediacy. While realtime games have a little bit more of it, they work in generalities, where chess works in absolutes: You know exactly how the field will act, you know exactly what each piece is capable of. It's like fighting a war on a perfectly ordered (and symmetrical) battlefield with identical forces and perfect intelligence, a situation no one will ever be in, within the confines of reality. But if you focus, any game can become your reality - For a while.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
That demonstrating intelligence and creativity in proximity to Football (american) players is tempting death and mutilation.
Has Marvin been playing too much chess?
chess is all about testosterone, arousal, paranoia, excitement, danger and domination.
This is Morphy's famous "Night at the Opera" game. I love this game because it illustrates many tactical themes as well as the process of attack. Paul Morphy was known as a master of attack and I study his games when I need inspiration for my attacking game! 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 Diagram
This is Philidor's Defense. Black tries to create a strongpoint at e5.3.d4 Attacking Black's center. 3...Bg4 Pinning the knight. This prevents the knight from taking on e5 after dxe5 dxe5 and now the knight can't take on e5 lest the checkmate on d1. 4.dxe5 Bxf3 [ Preventing 4...dxe5?! 5.Qxd8+ Kxd8 preventing the king from castling. In this opening, this is often an advantage because now the king is stuck in the center, open to attack. 6.Nxe5] 5.Qxf3 dxe5 6.Bc4 Diagram
Threatening mate on f7.6...Nf6?! Blocking the mate. However, it allows White to take advantage of weaknesses in Black's structure. [ 6...Qd7 is necessary here.; or 6...Qe7 ] 7.Qb3 With a double attack on both b7 and f7. This is a common maneuver in king-pawn openings. Always look for weak points in the enemy's structure, and when there is more than one, try to attack both at the same time. Many times, the opponent won't be able to defend both in time. 7...Qe7 8.Nc3 As Grandmaster Larry Evans said in his comments to this game, "Development before Material!" I probably would have taken the pawn on b7, but Morphy, knowing he was much stronger than his opponent, wanted to demonstrate his attacking ability. 8...c6 Allowing the queen to protect the pawn at b7. However, Black is way behind in development. 9.Bg5 Diagram
Pinning the knight. Notice that White's back rank is empty besides the king and rooks. Now White can castle either way. Black still needs to move a piece to get the king to safety. Unfortunately, Morphy probably won't give him the chance.9...b5 Attacking the bishop. 10.Nxb5! Sacrificing the piece. White doesn't want to give up his superior development (by moving the bishop off the strong diagonal, White would let Black use another move to get his pieces out). When attacking, you must open lines, even if you must give up a little material. 10...cxb5 11.Bxb5+ Nbd7 12.0-0-0! Attacking the knight, which is protected only by queen and king (note that the f6 knight is pinned. 12...Rd8 Adding another defender. 13.Rxd7! Brilliant! For me and many other beginners, moves like this are hard to make, because we don't see the end result. Studying games like this should give us courage in our own games! 13...Rxd7 14.Rd1 Attacking the pinned piece. 14...Qe6 A futile attempt to get some breathing room. Now the knight is free to protect the rook, because it is not pinned. 15.Bxd7+ Nxd7 Diagram
Do you see Morphy's winning move?16.Qb8+!! Giving up yet another piece, however, it leads to immediate reward. 16...Nxb8 17.Rd8# Diagram
White mates Black's king with his final two pieces. Note the helpless queen standing by. Also remember this pattern of checkmating the king with bishop and rook, it is fairly common. For me, this game illustrates the importance of development and how to attack someone who has neglected development. 1-0 exhale sharply. oh yeah!!!
We are thrillseekers, but we're not paranoid ! This must be some Go player conspiracy !
That's the basis of every competitive behavior and interaction between people all over the world.
When I play chess with my friends, I don't feel that much adrenaline rolling. What I mean is that the "Paranoic Thrillseeking" feeling is not related at all with chess. It's the enviroment that causes this. It's competition, risks of loss, the chance that what you have studied and fought might crumble.
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
When I was a kid, strategic encounters of all sorts were likened to chess matches, so it seemed to me that getting good at chess would just make me a more savvy competitor in all sorts of situations.
;-)
After a while, I began to understand that the way to win in chess was to become "fluent" in the patterns of chess itself, and that those patterns didn't really have any important analog elsewhere.
Once it appeared that putting a lot of effort into mastery of chess wasn't doing anything for me besides making me better at chess, I gave it up.
Shortly thereafter I replaced it with programming. Talk about "out of the frying pan, into the fire...."
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
I definately agree with this article, atleast in the sense of the physiological effect. I have a friend with whom I am evenly matched, and our games always ended up with atleast one or more crescendo moments where the entire game changes for better or for worse... and in the precedeing and following moments, I have noticed on several occasions an increased heart rate and alertness.
What I dont agree with is the paranoid part... the article just seems to throw that in.
"More competitive chess players have been shown to score highly for unconventional thinking and paranoia, both of which have been shown to relate to sensation-seeking."
Unconventional thinking? what the hell is conventional thinking?
Also: this article seems to be about male players... what about female players...
Anyway its interesting that the same thing that enhances my sense during a rollercoaster (adrenaline+testosterone) also is probable released when I play chess.. I wonder when else this happens:
Sales deals
FPS Games (ever lead the document grab in RTCW theres some adrenaline for ya?
television perhaps too...
my point... this aint new news
--
What is the sound of this sentence?
chess is all about testosterone, arousal (Article).
[Transcription of 1-900-CHESSXX.]
"...Dial 512 to accept these charges and continue"
[Beat. Beep-boop-bop.]
[Ring. Ring.]
<deep husky voice> "Hi there. I'm Edith."
<heavy breathing. audible swallow.>"...I'm Paul."
E. Mmmmm, Paul. I like that name. Wasn't Morphy's first name Paul.
P. Oh YES.
E. Tell me...how long have you played chess?
P. S-since I was eleven.
E. Want to tell me about your first time.
P. W-well, I don't know. It was with my father. He didn't play all that well. I started beating him not long after that.
E. Want to hear about my first time?
P. Oh yeah, tell me about your first time, Edith. How old were you?
E. My first time was at the tender age of fourteen.
P. Really?
E. Yessss. Before then, I hardly knew the names of the pieces.
P. How well do you play now?
E. Oh, better than you, probably.
P, excited. Really?
E. Yes, I'm a genius you know. Want to hear about my first time?
P. Yes, tell me about it.
E. My sister's friend was over. He was a Geek. Are you a geek, Paul?
P. Yes, yes, I am.
E. I love geeks. They excite me. My sister's friend was the first geek I met. He introduced me to Linux. He also taught me chess.
P. You use Linux?
E. Well, technically it's not Linux, I use my own kernel.
P. You kernel-hack?
E. I guess you could call it that...
P. What do you mean?
E. Well I don't bother with Torvaldis's source-tree.
P. Oh, Edith. Tell me what you do.
E. I mess with kernel directly.
P. mmmm.
E. Oh, it gets very messy. Straight assembly. Pur hex.
P. Oh-ooh. Tell me about your sister's friend.
E. He taught me chess. By the end of the first hour I was seeing three, four moves ahead of him. By the time I was seventeen, four years ago, I was placing in the nationals.
P. Oh, man. Are you really that good?
E. Want to try me?
P. <inhales deeply> e2?
E. e3 Paul.
[rest censored]
My boss is a chess player. He likes to win, but the thrill of winning is second only to the thrill of completely unnerving his opponent. I would never play chess with him, mainly because he is a poor winner and a poor loser. I think that this kind of attitude is pretty common in the chess world. Just look at the famous people who were good at it, like Bobby Fischer. You couldn't ask for a bigger Grade A asshole than him.
The middle mind speaks!
Kasparov
You can't handle the truth.
they could have just said, "studies have shown testosterone levels increase in a man winning a chess game." as i'm sure happens just as much if not more in trivial pursuit, connect-4 and well, paper-scissors-rock. this is friggin' obvious. but no, scientists need to sensationalize their pointless studies so as to get more grant money.
Surely this is the same for anyone who's any good at nearly anything? For example, re-writing as:
...makes exactly the same amount of sense. Aren't they just saying that to be good in most things you need to have a mind? Why should Chess be unique in this?
More competitive F1 drivers have been shown to score highly for unconventianal thinking and paranoia
Cheers,
Ian
Chess is all about raising one's ego, and dominating the ego of the opponent.
Sure, the game is wrapped up fairly nicely in deep strategy and protocol, but when you get down to it, most people play because they like crushing the opposition.
Chess is really no different (on a pyschological level) from football. The goal is to intimidate, dominate, and force the other player into submission. Of course, that gives a fairly large 'rush', especially when the game is at a critical juncture.
I look at my school's chess team, and I see a bunch of kids who aren't (physically) the jock types, so how do they get the ego boost?
Chess. So next time some meathead makes fun of you for playing, just tell him it's like football =)
So does this imply that Deep Blue, and other chess computers, are destined to live with serious social problems?
No data, no cry
This describes very well how I have found tournament play. I am not a good chess player (and have only played few tournaments). Like any player relatively new to tournament play, I lost all of my first games. The adrenalin was about enough to kill me.
I'm not actually that fond of tournament play, because of the excitement/stress/tension, whatever you like to call it. However, if you are interested in chess it is natural to attend tournaments, at least sometimes, to expose yourself to different ideas and players.
After a couple of rounds of losses, I managed to calm down enough and force myself to remain patient. My games improved. But the first time that I realized that I could make a draw, the adrenaline was back (not a win mind you--I just realized I wasn't going to lose). It was a total test of self-control not to blow the game on nerves.
The same was true the first time I won a game, so I am completely unsurprised that a scientist would observe an increase in testosterone after a win. I haven't gone to a tournament in about a year, but just thinking about being in a game and having the upper hand makes me feel aggressive, like I need to calm down.
For comparison, I enjoy other activities that might be considered "testosterone high" like Karate. By comparison to tournament chess, I would rate my typical experience in Karate as bland. Sure I want to improve my martial art, and I would like to perform well with/against my workout partners. By I tend to feel that I am learning WITH my martial arts partners. In chess, it is win or get beat--and it really taps into the survival instinct in a different way.
As a previous post reminded me, I fell in love with chess about 4th grade, and kept going strong until I suddenly realized in 7th grade that it was totally artifical - there was no "porting" its lessons to real life.
And that's when I gave up on Chess - when I realized that it was a completely constrained, artifical environment just like I was creating for myself in Real Life. The thing about chess is that its almost completely a game of recognizing previously-identified patterns of play, then countering them with a pre-selected strategy. Not until you get to beyond Grandmaster is there room for innovation. And even then, its constrained to a couple of moves in a 30-move match.
What I look for in my games nowdays is the element of outside interference - items not in the control of either player (or any player, in the case of MP games). That's where the real creativity and brilliance comes in - the capability and flexibility to cope with situations which could not be reasonably forseen (though adept planning will make coping much easier).
I wish we would have more games for kids in this manner - ones which not only met that "Creative Problem Solving" mantra, but also give their players a taste of what they'll need to really know: how to expect the unexpected (and unpredictable) and to cope with them.
Chess is fun, insofar as it teaches good pattern recognition and a disciplined mind. I would argue, though, that if you haven't move beyond it after a couple of years, you really are hurting yourself.
-Erik
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
As witnissed by "A Beautiful Mind," (and previously by the wonderful movie "Pi") there seems to be a significant number of mathematicians (talking about people who spend their lives doing math research) who have mental problems.
One book to read would be Paul Hoffman's _The Man Who Loved Only Numbers: The Story of Paul Erdos_. Erdos was a nomadic mathematician, wondering from university to university (and from math professor house to math professor house), working on mathematics. On average, he spent about 19 hours a day working just on math. The story is rather humorous, and a good read for math people and non-math people alike. Erdos survived until very late in his life, and commented that many of his fellow mathematicians had died or were going crazy.
I also read a short book on the life of Godel. Godel was such an example of a mathematician going crazy. He became so paranoid that he refused to eat, and ended up dying of starvation.
Sylvia Nasar's _A Beautiful Mind_, the biography of John Forbes Nash Jr. on which the movie is, apparently, very loosely based, is another such example. Nash was diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenia later in life.
One of the authors comments that it is possible that mathematicians are more likely to go crazy than other scientists is that, in math, there are no definite absolutes. Sure you can say that two parallel lines never meet, and prove things off of that, but then you can wonder "What happens if they do, eventually, meet?"
By Godel's second incompleteness theorem, we can't know that mathematics is consistent. Godel's theorem shows that there can't be any complete and consistent theories in mathematics. Imagine basing your view of the world on a system that you know cannot be complete or consistent.
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
Mr. Dobson is actually talking about full contact chess.
Ahh - My eye!
The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
what do they think about Bughouse players? :)
Vizzini: So it is down to you, and it is down to me.. if you wish her dead, bu all means keep moving forward.
Man in black: Let me explain...
Vizzini: There's nothing to explain. You're trying to kidnap what I have rightfully stolen.
Man in black: But if there can be no arrangement, then we are at an impasse.
Vizzini: I'm afraid so. I can't compete with you physically, and you're no match for my brains.
Man in black: You're that smart?
Vizzini: Let me put it this way: Have you ever heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates?
Man in black: Yes.
Vizzini: Morons!
Man in black: really! In that case, I challenge you to a battle of wits.
Vizzini: For the pricness? To the death? I accept!
Hey, Im a high school senior who plays football... And guess what? I love chess, so do half the other players... We waste time in the locker room playing chess. Its actually very similiar to football, its all about planning and strategy and knwoing how/when to strike your opponent
Grass-roots web hosting.We are poor colleg
It doesn't have that satisfaction of dealing with other people, using them for your own means.
Ahhh yes, the satisfaction of using other people for your own means!
Nah chess is too lonely and quiet for me.
Keep using people for your own means and you'll tasting loneliness soon enough...
At times in my life I've played lots of chess like this, played in clubs every week, lots of weekend tournaments, internet chess every day. You get to know the players who gather at tournaments and clubs. In contrast to the romantic image that some people have that chess makes kids smart, I found that most chess players are of fairly average intelligence, and many focus on chess to the exclusion of other pursuits, like many hackers do. I found that many chess players were more interested than other people, in gambling - betting on football games or bridge or cribbage or whatever, and their satisfaction in tournament play was all about winning money prizes rather than about the aesthetics of the game. Players might be ingenious over the board, but otherwise utterly lacking in insight, knowledge, intelligence, or refinement.
I do think that teaching children to play chess can help sharpen their thinking skills. Then again, the findings of this study don't surprise me at all, but I don't think it's talking about casual chess players.
to be honest, getting girls has less to do with your mental ability and more to do with your physical ability.
However, if you are a chessplayer AND rich, well you'll most likely get any girl you want, however chess isnt going to make you rich, better off being a programmer.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Because you dont know how to really play chess.
Do you know the Ruy Lopez, English, Modern, Kings Indian? I bet you dont know any openings.
Do you know how the game works? Learn how it works, then play someone on an even level, every single move you make will be in anticipation of a move that you think they will make, the surprise is when they make the move you never expected, causing you to change your entire plan, or when they block your attempts to gain an advantage.
Chess does deal with people, You manipulate their peices on the board, if you are really good you can beat a person so bad that you pretty much can control where all their peices will be.
I beat a person in chess so bad once that I was telling them exactly where their peices would move before they moved it, and pretty much had all their peices locked up where they couldnt move anything but their king, then chased their king around with pawns toying with them even though i could have mated them, I eventually mated them with something like a pawn.
Its fun to beat someone and beat them in a way where they KNOW they cant compare to you however its also fun to barely beat a person knowing they are playing better than you but catching them.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Congradulations! You've just won the 'American who assumes that Everybody In The World Does What We Do In America!' award, the award for Americans who just can't see to grasp that there are other ways to do things. Some Canadian provinces, for example, include a 'Grade 13' which is attended by students who intend to go on to University.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
http://151.17.13.5/chessline/homepage.asp
ChessLine Go there to experience what chess is all about.
Maybe we can take this to the chessboards instead of bragging about our abilities on this forum.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Gee, two chess threads in one week, I'm thrilled. But then as a chessplayer I love thrills, apparently.
It is eternally amusing to me to see Americans immediately start several chessplayers=geek threads the first thing the game is mentioned. I generalize, but they inevitably turn out to be Americans since it is about the only place in the world where such a view prevails. Even so it is a remarkable contradiction since in no other culture is chess so consistently used as a positive metaphor. Dozens of commercials use chess and chess imagery to symbolize intelligence and strategic planning. Every Hollywood movie and TV show that wants to not-so-subtly demonstrate that a character is brilliant and cultured slaps a chessboard - usually set up wrong - in his den or has him playing.
The 'chess is for geeks' model in the US is then most easily explained by envy and fear, much the way people who don't know anything about computers denigrate those who do. The old 'scribble scribble scribble' method of squeezing sour grapes. But in general most people I meet in the US are impressed and/or fascinated by the fact that I work for Garry Kasparov and am a master level player myself. No, I didn't get beat up in school for starting a chess club in my California high school. (At 1.95m that wasn't much of an issue.)
In Europe and South America chess and other 'brain games' receive both attention as sports and respect from the public. In the US - a country that has oxymoronic basketball scholarships - on the other hand, there is a tendency to want to believe that any sport worth the name must involve blood loss. (They conveniently ignore the various tubs of lard who play first base.)
The incredible level of concentration reached by Grandmasters is on par with that needed for any peak performer in any sport or art and the same goes for the amount of energy expended, although it is not as quantifiable in drops of sweat. Take a good look at a player before and after a week or two of professional chess and you'll see what I mean. Weight loss of ten kilos is not unusual and physical conditioning is critical for top performance. Most players begin to decline on the rating list by the time they pass 32 years of age, similar to professional sports like football. (There is only one player in the top 10 over that age and only one in the top 20 over 40 years old.)
As touched upon in the article that started the thread, chess is in many ways a thrilling and even violent game. Much like boxing, it is purely mano a mano; there are no teammates to blame, no wind that wasn't blowing your way, nothing but your ego on the line. Losing can be absolutely crushing, and to excel you must build up an ego on par with those possessed by other pro athletes. (Yes, they even refer to themselves in the third person sometimes.)
It can take months or even a lifetime to recover from a bad result. Even an amateur can have a missed chance or bad loss stick in their brain for years. You don't hear too many people going on about some pickup basketball game they lost 10 years ago, but this is common in chess. The psychological elements are extremely powerful, and the history of damaged individuals in chess do not only illustrate the attraction of chess for introverts and others with everything from quirks to acne to serious psychoses. These anecdotes also show the power of the game to affect people who were quite stable to begin with.
In short, chess ain't for sissies. Those who insult chessplayers are usually those who don't have suffient self-confidence to play it themselves. (Apart from people who just have no interest in it, of course.) In a culture that says chess is for smart people you have to come up with some sort of reason to explain why you aren't good at it. "It's for nerds," isn't a good one, but it appears to still be around.
I know lots of top chess players who wouldn't strike you as particularly intelligent otherwise. While chess employs many faculties that make up the amorphous term 'thinking,' there are also chessplayers who fail their math classes, don't like to read, and vote Republican.
Saludos, Mig
KasparovChess.com
I value various intellectual activities for the "use it or lose it" reasons you mention. Even so, I think there are more useful intellectual activities than chess that should also be equally good at staving off dementia. (You be the judge whether it has worked. ;-) )
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
At SICO (the "Snoot Internet Chess Orgy") they've got anonymous chess for the truly paranoid. Take turns playing a single move in all sorts of crazy variatons. It's pretty weird but also quite addictive...
...is fundamental to almost all human mental activities. Chess doesn't train you to "recognize patterns" any better than grocery shopping or driving do.
What chess does do is train you to recognize chess patterns, which is not a skill applicable to anything other than chess, and to recognize more general patterns of generic competition, which a lot of other activities can teach you equally well.
Of course, this is all just based on what it seems like to me. Not very scientific, I'll have to admit.
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
Although a form of paranoia and thrillseeking can be found in tournament chess players, I have also seen a different type of player: the ones who seek to make a thing of beauty happen during a game. I happen to be one of those players. Although my passion for quirky openings and strategies often caused me problems during tournaments (I often seek double-edge positions), I always hope to find THE move, the one leading to a superb combination, so pretty because of its subtlety. I don't often succeed, but that's what I wish to find in each of my tourney games; not to crush my opponent (I don't like easy victories), but to win a tight game because I saw one of those beautiful combinations.
:)
Some might say if I kept playing that way, I wouldn't ever become a good chess player. To them I reply I got my 'expert' title from my chess federation anyway and I did it while having fun
But I don't have the drive to become a master; it takes serious effort and time that I cannot afford. I'll always continue to play, but regular tourney play is not something I'll be doing anymore.
De gustibus et coloribus non est disputandum
That's not correct. There are no 3+ dan players at the moment. The strongest Go program was rated as 3 kyu, but I think it's overrated. I have 1 dan and can beat any Go progam easily, even when I give them the highest handicap (i.e. 9 stones).
..., 1 kyu, 1 dan, 2 dan, ..., 9 dan.
JFYI:
Lowest Go rating is 20 kyu (in some countries they start from 30 kyu), next one is 19 kyu,
... resturant had a checkered tablecloth - he took 2 hours to pass the salt.
All women want is honesty, if you can fake that, you're in.
They're neo-maxi zoom-dweebies!
"Information wants to be paid"
If you, like a lot of other players, get fed up because because you don't know chess openings, check out fischerrandom chess. It's a variant of normal chess designed by bobby fischer (often thought of as the greatest chess player of all time (I disagree, but...)).
http://www.chessvariants.com/diffsetup.dir/fischer .html
Since the game starts at a somewhat random position, pre-definied and known openings aren't an advantage.
regards,
garc
The article tries to make us think there is something special about chess, but they give absolutely no evidence at all. It would be a much less interesting story if it were found that games in general, when played competitively and at the highest levels, cause similar reactions. But I'm pretty sure that this less interesting conclusion is the correct one, that there is nothing hormonally different about a victory in chess and, say, in bowling.
In high school I was among the people who
could stretch the chess players into human
pretzels, but it seems my school's administration
is unique in making it damn clear to us jocks
that this would not be tolerated. You know
the whole sportsmanship ethic thing? There's
the idea that it's not sportsmanlike to
roughhouse with someone who does not want to.
It got drilled into us, and made for a better
environment for all.