R.I.P Bobby Fischer -we'll miss you.

[Phlosphr]

Bobby Fischer has died (http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-01-18-fischer-obit_N.htm) at the young age of 64. For those chess lovers and people who admired him, he will be missed. I'll remember him as a brilliant mind in chess and civil a disobedient cool guy...

We'll miss you.

[RikWriter]

He was a Holocaust denying anti-Semitic nutcake. He won't be missed by me.

[ASAKMOTSD]

IBM reports that Deep Blue is sad...

[CalMeacham]

I first knew his name from the chess column he used to write in Boys' Life. Does anybody remember that? I never see it mentioned in any news report on Fischer.

[Trunk]

He won't be missed.

Most people are probably glad.

Kasparov once said that Fischer was further ahead of the other players of his generation than anyone else ever. That's a really great way to measure any accomplishment.

How much is my copy of "60 Memorable Games" worth now?

[Kiros]

Sure, he was insane, but he was also an inspiration. When I was a little kid and too young to understand all of the political and anti-semitic stuff going on with him, and just knew him for his chess stories, Bobby Fischer was the coolest thing ever. RIP.

[Malacandra]

He was a Holocaust denying anti-Semitic nutcake. He won't be missed by me.

I think there's not much doubt he had one hell of a personality disorder. I'm sorry for his death, just for the sake of his chess. He turned in some phenomenal performances in his time, such as brushing Mark Taimanov and Bent Larsen aside as irrelevant annoyances (6-0 in a World Championship Candidates match, twice!), and chess is the poorer for his disappearance from the competitive scene when he still had many good years in front of hi.

[Annie-Xmas]

This weekend I will be playing the musical "Chess" in memory.

[Phlosphr]

He was a Holocaust denying anti-Semitic nutcake. He won't be missed by me.
As a kid, Fischer was who young chess players looked up to, our parents standing idly in the background shooshing us because he was such a nutcase, but there are still people like myself that remember those fonder times.

[RTFirefly]

The brilliant chessplayer of the 1960s and his incredible run to the world championship in 1972, we'll miss. But we've missed that Fischer for over three decades, ever since he didn't show up to defend his championship in 1975.

But of the Fischer who used his fame as a platform for anti-Semitic rants and who called the attacks on September 11, 2001 "wonderful news," I say good riddance to bad rubbish.

[Phlosphr]

The brilliant chessplayer of the 1960s and his incredible run to the world championship in 1972, we'll miss. But we've missed that Fischer for over three decades, ever since he didn't show up to defend his championship in 1975.

But of the Fischer who used his fame as a platform for anti-Semitic rants and who called the attacks on September 11, 2001 "wonderful news," I say good riddance to bad rubbish.
I agree with that.

[Spiff]

I hope this is not too much of a hijack, but what's up with this?

"Fischer claimed it would bring the fun back into the game and rid it of cheats."

That's a quote from a CNN obit describing Fischerandom, his new brand of chess whereby the back row is randomly shuffled prior to a match.

How does one cheat at chess, either regular chess or Fisherandom?

[Trunk]

People can cheat at chess, especially now with computers, but I think that fischer was probably just using "cheats" as a sort of crazy perjorative.

He thinks that opening preparation has strangled a lot of what people love about chess, and probably has some reason to believe that people who have prepped with computers or something are "cheats".

I don't know if you could get a good rationale for a lot of things he says.

[Robot Arm]

How does one cheat at chess,...The coaches can send their player coded messages during a match by giving him different flavors of yogurt, stuff like that.

[aldiboronti]

Horrible guy but as a young chess player he was a god. I stll remember playing over all his games at the time of the Fischer-Spassky match. Pure genius. He and Mikhail Tal were the heroes of my chess playing youth.

Ave atque vale, Bobby. I hope that the memory of the person you became will fade away leaving only that bright burning moment of your youth when you became one of the greatest players in the history of chess.

[borschevsky]

People can cheat at chess, especially now with computers, but I think that fischer was probably just using "cheats" as a sort of crazy perjorative.Fischer thought that a lot of games were pre-arranged move-for-move, for example from the Karpov-Kasparov matches. Random would prevent this; since the players would not know the starting position prior to the game, they could not play a pre-arranged set of moves.

[glee]

I hope this is not too much of a hijack, but what's up with this?

"Fischer claimed it would bring the fun back into the game and rid it of cheats."

That's a quote from a CNN obit describing Fischerandom, his new brand of chess whereby the back row is randomly shuffled prior to a match.

How does one cheat at chess, either regular chess or Fisherandom?

To explain what he meant, I need to give a little background:

Fischer was a brilliant chess player but a lonely, sad man.

He faced the might of the Soviet Union, which had invested heavily in chess to gain national and international fame. In a typical international tournament, Fischer would face four world-class Russian players. They would often agree short draws amongst themselves (to give themselves a rest day), but go all out against Fischer. It wouldn't matter which Russian finished above Fischer, as long as at least one did.

So Fischer felt the World was against him.

He also had no diplomatic skills, so if tournament conditions were not ideal (such as poor lighting), his justified complaint might lead to an argument, feeding his feelings of persecution.

Now onto why Fischerandom might reduce 'cheating':

The opening moves in chess have been analysed since the current rules were settled (about 500 years ago).

For professional players, it is important to analyse your own openings (looking for mistakes and improvements) and also to be well-briefed on your rivals opening choices in their published games.

This is very hard work, especially since you are not allowed memory aids in chess!

In Fischer's time, the games and analysis was published in books and magazines. Now the Soviets paid their very top players to play, but also paid for top quality trainers and analysts. So every time Fischer played a new opening move in a game, it would be analysed throughly by a team of Soviet analysts.

Fischer didn't trust many people, so did all this work himself. He felt that this was a massive disadvantage and called it 'cheating'.

Now if you don't know what the exact opening position is going to be (as per Fischerandom), then all your opening analysis is redundant and so it reduces 'cheating'.

P.S. Nowadays all top games are recorded on computer, and there are databases containing millions of such games, all neatly organised. So a tournament player today will spend an hour or to studying his opponent's recent games before playing. In between events, the player will spend hours each day looking ofr improvements. :eek:

[glee]

The coaches can send their player coded messages during a match by giving him different flavors of yogurt, stuff like that.

This is based on a single incident in the bitterly contested Karpov - Korchnoi match:

On the 25th move of game 2, a waiter delivered a tray with a glass of violet colored yogurt to Karpov. After the game Leeuwerik sent a letter to Schmid protesting the yogurt. 'It is clear that a cunningly arranged distribution of edible items to one player during the game, emanating from one delegation or the other, could convey a kind of code message'. Although the letter was almost certainly tongue-in-cheek, Baturinsky took it seriously and suggested that the binoculars Leeuwerik used during the game might also convey a coded message to Korchnoi.
By the time a waiter delivered another tray holding yogurt to Karpov on the 17th move of game 3, the first incident had been blown out of proportion by both Baturinsky and Leeuwerik. A few days later the jury met and agreed that Karpov could receive a beverage at a fixed time and that Schmid would be notified before the game if it would not be a violet colored yogurt.

http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/78kk$$01.htm

There have been recent suggestions that Topalov's coach signalled him during a recent Dutch event.
All extremely unlikely, in my opinion. :)

[glee]

Fischer thought that a lot of games were pre-arranged move-for-move, for example from the Karpov-Kasparov matches.

Have you got a cite for this?
Karpov was the darling of the Soviet establishment; Kasparov was seen as a 'rebel'. The players were real rivals - it's implausible that they would have co-operated on anything like this.

[Paul in Qatar]

When you look at grandmasters through history, few of them lived long, happy lives. What's up with that? Perhaps "normal" people cannot play chess at the highest level, and so those who do are abnormal.

A sad life.

--edited for typos--

[borschevsky]

Have you got a cite for this?
Karpov was the darling of the Soviet establishment; Kasparov was seen as a 'rebel'. The players were real rivals - it's implausible that they would have co-operated on anything like this.I don't know where Fischer originally claimed this, but I have seen it referenced a few times. For example

http://www.chessninja.com/dailydirt/2005/08/fischer_settles_in.htm

http://repositories.cdlib.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1023&context=cbmb (pdf)

[Annie-Xmas]

As per wikipedia, Fischer died at age 64, which is coincidentally the number of squares on a chessboard.

Yes, I'm the Arbitur, I know the score.
From square one I'll be watching all sixty-four.

Lyrics by Tim Rice

[Phlosphr]

As per wikipedia, Fischer died at age 64, which is coincidentally the number of squares on a chessboard.

Yes, I'm the Arbitur, I know the score.
From square one I'll be watching all sixty-four.

Lyrics by Tim Rice
Don't know why I didn't pick up on this, I'll just say...wow.

[Captain Amazing]

When you look at grandmasters through history, few of them lived long, happy lives. What's up with that? Perhaps "normal" people cannot play chess at the highest level, and so those who do are abnormal.

A sad life.

--edited for typos--

I don't know if that's true...I think people just focus on the ones who had unhappy lives.

Steinitz obviously went crazy at the end of his life (which might have been due to syphillis)

Lasker lived to 71, and except for near the end of his life, where he had to flee the Nazis and leave all his money and property behind, he was fairly happy.

Capablanca died young, but was happy enough.

Alekhine also died young, but was fairly normal, except for the potential Nazi collaboration thing, but that could have been a combination of the fact that he was a White Russian, and desired to protect his Jewish wife.

Euwe died at 80, and was normal.

Botvinnik died at 83, and again, was pretty normal.

Smyslov died at 86.

Tal was an alcoholic and died young.

Petrossian died young.

Spassky died at 70.

Karpov, Kasparov, Kramnik, and Anand are all still alive, and while Kasparov isn't all that popular with the Russian government, and Kramnik has a weird kind of arthritis, none of them are particularly miserable.

[wolf_meister]

As Paul in Saudi mentioned, chess champions do not live long and happy lives. Fischer's sad life may be vaguely analogous to that of Paul Morphy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Morphy) the only other United States chess giant.

Personally, I can forgive Fischer's rather strange behavior in his later life especially when contrasted with the brilliant chess wizardry of his earlier life.

R.I.P. Bobby

[Malacandra]

I don't know if that's true...I think people just focus on the ones who had unhappy lives.

Steinitz obviously went crazy at the end of his life (which might have been due to syphillis)

Lasker lived to 71, and except for near the end of his life, where he had to flee the Nazis and leave all his money and property behind, he was fairly happy.

Capablanca died young, but was happy enough.

Alekhine also died young, but was fairly normal, except for the potential Nazi collaboration thing, but that could have been a combination of the fact that he was a White Russian, and desired to protect his Jewish wife.

Euwe died at 80, and was normal.

Botvinnik died at 83, and again, was pretty normal.

Smyslov died at 86.

Tal was an alcoholic and died young.

Petrossian died young.

Spassky died at 70.

Karpov, Kasparov, Kramnik, and Anand are all still alive, and while Kasparov isn't all that popular with the Russian government, and Kramnik has a weird kind of arthritis, none of them are particularly miserable.

That appears not (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/more/01/18/fischer.obit.ap/) to be common knowledge.

[RikWriter]

As Paul in Saudi mentioned, chess champions do not live long and happy lives. Fischer's sad life may be vaguely analogous to that of Paul Morphy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Morphy) the only other United States chess giant.

Personally, I can forgive Fischer's rather strange behavior in his later life especially when contrasted with the brilliant chess wizardry of his earlier life.

R.I.P. Bobby

Do you feel the same way about, say, Mel Gibson?

[Captain Amazing]

That appears not (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/more/01/18/fischer.obit.ap/) to be common knowledge.

Ok...let me correct that by saying, "Spassky is 70 and still alive...." :)

[Malacandra]

Ok...let me correct that by saying, "Spassky is 70 and still alive...." :)

For which I'm duly grateful. He's played some mighty fine chess of his own over the years - and it said much for Fischer's skill that he could concede two games start to Spassky in Reykjavik 1972 through a combination of a schoolboy error in Game 1 and refusing to turn up for Game 2, and still hand him a dreadful hiding.

[BarnOwl]

Wasn't there some concern about mental telepathy during the Iceland chess match?

Honest. I seem to remember someone complaining about it - A Russian or Fischer, himself. (I'd a mentioned the city there, but I can't spell it.)

And wasn't the coverage grand! We had Shelby Lyman doing the blow by blows, and a bunch of other Masters chipping in. It was wonderful.

In one match it was down to a couple of pawns each. It was Fischer's move and everyone in the studio was speculating frantically. No one had a clue of what Fischer was up to. And then he moved!

KAPOW!!!!!!!!!!!

It was all over and no one guessed that move. Thrilling? A total understatement

[Liberal]

He was a lunatic, to be sure. But his games were so amazingly beautiful. They were the perfect balance of aggression, finesse, defense, and all the elements. There was a time when he had no peer, and had he stayed with it, that time would have lasted much longer. My personal dealings with him were maddening, but I still consider him to be the last undefeated world chess champion, and I blame the USCF for his disappearance and subsequent descent into madness.

[Miller]

Have you got a cite for this?
Karpov was the darling of the Soviet establishment; Kasparov was seen as a 'rebel'. The players were real rivals - it's implausible that they would have co-operated on anything like this.

There's a fair bit of daylight between, "What Bobby Fischer believed," and "What's actually plausible."

[Elendil's Heir]

The brilliant chessplayer of the 1960s and his incredible run to the world championship in 1972, we'll miss. But we've missed that Fischer for over three decades, ever since he didn't show up to defend his championship in 1975.

But of the Fischer who used his fame as a platform for anti-Semitic rants and who called the attacks on September 11, 2001 "wonderful news," I say good riddance to bad rubbish.

Amen, amen, amen.

[Argent Towers]

I don't think Fischer was an anti-Semite, I think he was suffering from very severe mental problems which happened to manifest themselves in bizarre anti-Semitic ranting. (He himself was born Jewish, after all.)

I think this is different from someone who is of normal mental state and still chooses to be anti-Semitic. Fischer was probably schizophrenic or suffering from dementia.

[Troy McClure SF]

Do you feel the same way about, say, Mel Gibson?
Yeah, really. A dick is a dick. Barry Bonds was a great and fairly liked player early in his career but I don't hear anyone talking about that these days.

[Larry Borgia]

I don't think Fischer was an anti-Semite, I think he was suffering from very severe mental problems which happened to manifest themselves in bizarre anti-Semitic ranting. (He himself was born Jewish, after all.)

I think this is different from someone who is of normal mental state and still chooses to be anti-Semitic. Fischer was probably schizophrenic or suffering from dementia.I agree with this. His hate-filled rants seemed more sad and pathetic than anything else. Watching a once brilliant mind devour itself was heartbreaking.

[Gangster Octopus]

His games are still out there to be seen, so I can appreciate those. But considering what he has contriobuted lately, I won't be missing him at all.

[Marley23]

Yeah, really. A dick is a dick. Barry Bonds was a great and fairly liked player early in his career but I don't hear anyone talking about that these days.
"I look at Bobby Fischer the way you might look at Barry Bonds."

-one of my chess-loving coworkers, when I said I wasn't sure if I should express my condolences (or any other emotion) on Fischer's passing

[Martin Hyde]

With a lot of mental illnesses where people are paranoid, they tend to be extremely suspicious of what they view as the "power structure."

For example a great many paranoid schizophrenics fear the CIA is always watching/listening in on them. I think we had a thread once wondering what the mentally ill were afraid of before the CIA. Well, it was the power structures in that place/time, be it the Catholic Church, the royal families et cetera.

Mentally ill-type paranoia lends people to buy into conspiracies way more often than usual, too. Jews are often portrayed as secretive, power-broker who operate in the shadows and secretly run the world by many anti-Semites, to an ill mind that's the sort of fodder it is easy to buy into when you already believe the entire world is conspiring against you, what is one more conspiracy?

So yeah, I think Bobby Fischer was mentally ill and that is the reason he expressed anti-Semitic feelings.

[Phlosphr]

He was a lunatic, to be sure. But his games were so amazingly beautiful. They were the perfect balance of aggression, finesse, defense, and all the elements. There was a time when he had no peer, and had he stayed with it, that time would have lasted much longer. My personal dealings with him were maddening, but I still consider him to be the last undefeated world chess champion, and I blame the USCF for his disappearance and subsequent descent into madness.
I was sort of waiting for you to post in this thread. May I ask about this:
My personal dealings with him were maddening, but I still consider him to be the last undefeated world chess champion,
Underlining obvious - personal dealings? Have you....you know...played him? I knew you were ranked/maybe still are....but can you elaborate on your dealings with Fischer? I know your IM and EMAIL are diabled...but I'd be all ears.

[Starving Artist]

...but I'd be all ears.As would I.

[Shodan]

Fischer's sad life may be vaguely analogous to that of Paul Morphy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Morphy) the only other United States chess giant.
Morphy is the subject of my favorite chess story of all time. This was before time limits on games.

Morphy and his opponent sat across from each other, neither speaking, for eight solid hours. At the end of it, Morphy blinked, looked up, and said, "Oh - is it my move?"

Regards,
Shodan

[Sal Ammoniac]

I don't know if that's true...I think people just focus on the ones who had unhappy lives.
What about my homeboy Harry Pillsbury? He'd have been the best in the world if he hadn't gotten syphilis and died at 34.

[Starving Artist]

That's what happens when you're homeboys are dawgs. ;)

And Shodan: :D

[Miller]

Do you feel the same way about, say, Mel Gibson?

I dunno. How good is Mel Gibson at chess?

But, in seriousness, yes, I do. Judge the art, not the artist. Whatever his personal failings, Bobby Fischer was a giant in the field of chess, and now that he's gone, he's never again going to contribute to the game, and that's a terrible loss. The world has plenty of assholes, the loss of one more doesn't change things much, one way or the other. But there are damned few people throughout history who could play chess the way Fischer did, and it's sad that there's one fewer today.

[Starving Artist]

...and it's sad that there's one fewer today.I agree it's sad, but for a somewhat different reason. I just think it's sad when such an exceptional person goes off the deep end, and I find myself not really holding his comments and views against him as I find it hard to take them seriously, and I find myself now genuinely saddened both at what eventually became of him and that he has now died at such a relatively young age.

[Liberal]

I was sort of waiting for you to post in this thread. May I ask about this:

Underlining obvious - personal dealings? Have you....you know...played him? I knew you were ranked/maybe still are....but can you elaborate on your dealings with Fischer? I know your IM and EMAIL are diabled...but I'd be all ears.I didn't play him, no. And I was ranked, but at a very minor level. I was my state's Class A champion for one year in the mid 1980s. Class A sounds impressive, but it is below both Expert and Master.

I was, however, an officer in my state's USCF affliate as treasurer, and I was the editor of our state's official chess newsletter. That is to say that, while I did play competitively in tournaments and did win some money, most of my practical participation was political and administrative in nature.

My personal involvement was through Steven Doyle, president of the US Chess Federation at the time, and officers of our and other states convening in Florida nearly a decade after the Karpov fiasco. It was moved by our group that a letter I drafted be mailed to Fischer in care of Claudia Mokarow in Pasadena. The gist of the letter was these main points:


The USCF would officially and unconditionally apologize to Fischer for failing to support him during his battles with the Soviet chess machine at the time of his scheduled match with Karpov, and would promise unwavering support of him in the future.

The USCF would offer Fischer a permanent and generous stipend to do anything in any official capacity that he pleased, whether it was playing simuls, touring, or tutoring grandmasters.

The USCF would offer Fischer generous life insurance and health insurance coverage for the rest of his natural life.

The USCF would officially recognize Fischer as holding the title of Undefeated World Chess Champion, and his status as such would be used to fight for his right to play as a bye in the next world championship qualifying rounds.

It seemed like forever before we got a response, and when we did, it was a postcard from Claudia, saying that Fischer wanted $10,000 to open the letter. When Stephen Doyle heard about this, he hit the roof, and declared in a rage that he would not shove that kind of money into a hole just to see what would happen.

And thus were broken the ties forever between the USCF and its greatest player, all because of the myopic engorged ego of a man whose incompetent administration of the USCF almost brought it to its knees. It was a very sad day for us, and Doyle refused to hear our pleas for reconsideration.

Just think. All it would have taken was a measly ten grand — less than Doyle would have spent on the US Open Championship — to have a shot at bringing back the greatest player in US history. By the time competent leadership took over, it was too late, and Fischer was too fargone and too mistrusting for anyone in the USCF ever to reach out to him again.

I stopped playing and participating shortly thereafter. My heart wasn't in it anymore. I was on course to make Expert (about 20 points shy), but I just said fuck it instead. It was a terrible time for US chess.

[Starving Artist]

Thanks for the...ahem...elucidation, Lib.

[Phlosphr]

Thanks, Lib - very nicely put. I have vague memories of that time, I was in Highschool in the mid-80's and was a voracious family chess player. I kept a small eye on what was going on in the USCF but nothing really substancial, I'd read the occasional news article in school...but that background you give is interesting and to be honest adds a bit of mystery to the game and the man. What if...

[BarnOwl]

...up there in Iceland or elsewhere? Which game(s) did you find most appealing?

If you watched on TV like most of us, what did you think of the analysis?

[Gangster Octopus]

So Fischer wanted $10,000 to open a friggin' letter and Doyle is the one with the myopic engorged ego?

[pulykamell]

So Fischer wanted $10,000 to open a friggin' letter and Doyle is the one with the myopic engorged ego?

Yeah, no kidding... (I actually had to re-read the sentence several times until it dawned on me that Doyle was being referenced as the one with the engorged ego.)

[Liberal]

So Fischer wanted $10,000 to open a friggin' letter and Doyle is the one with the myopic engorged ego?Yes, I realize how that must sound, but it is important to understand that Fischer was completely, thoroughly, and categorically abandoned by the USCF when the Soviets were pushing FIDE (the International Chess Federation) to adopt rules favorable to Karpov. The wimps in New York, when they didn't remain silent, attempted to rationalize and justify the Soviet demands simply because they feared the Soviets could damage USCF relations with FIDE in some way that might have monetary consequences.

It was a political mess, and their spinelessness was the whole reason Fischer dropped out. He belt betrayed. He felt like he was owed an apology (hence the first promise of the letter). For all he knew, it was a letter chastising him in some way or making some unreasonable demand of him. He was the great artist, and Doyle was the museum curator. The deference must go from the latter to the former.

[Liberal]

...up there in Iceland or elsewhere? Which game(s) did you find most appealing?

If you watched on TV like most of us, what did you think of the analysis?I watched on TV like everyone else. I was only a C Class player at the time, and hadn't really gotten involved in the political and administrative aspects yet. But I'd say my favorite game was 6, not just because of the beautiful combination, but because of the the fact that Fischer played a Queen's Gambit. I've heard it said that Spassky joined the applause at the end of that game, and that that gesture endeared him to Fischer for life. As for the analysis, I took it with a grain of salt. A mere grandmaster commenting on Fischer at his prime is like a local golf pro commenting on the play of Tiger Woods. That said, I thought it was adequate.

[Gangster Octopus]

That's all fine and good, but seriously, $10,000 (which works out to about $50,000 today)to open a letter. And the USCF has never been flush with cash either.

And let's not paint Fischer as saintly during the Championship match negotiations either.

[Liberal]

The money would have been a show of good faith. The first show of good faith from Doyle's administration. Our group thought it was eminently reasonable. The return the USCF might have had from a resurgent Fischer could have helped considerably with their financial woes (which mostly were due to mismanagement and waste anyway). As for Fischer's part in the negotiations, who could expect him to be a saint when he was fighting not only the Soviets but his own frigging people?

[Captain Amazing]

Yes, I realize how that must sound, but it is important to understand that Fischer was completely, thoroughly, and categorically abandoned by the USCF when the Soviets were pushing FIDE (the International Chess Federation) to adopt rules favorable to Karpov.

Fischer was the one trying to change the rules to ones more favorable to him, not Karpov. The USCF was right to not back Fischer, and FIDE was right to strip him of his title.

[Ogre]

So Fischer wanted $10,000 to open a friggin' letter and Doyle is the one with the myopic engorged ego?Seems to me he was playing chess. The $10K was his opening gambit, and USCF (or Doyle) tipped over his king. I can't honestly say that anyone won the match, though. :(

[Liberal]

Seems to me he was playing chess. The $10K was his opening gambit, and USCF (or Doyle) tipped over his king. I can't honestly say that anyone won the match, though. :(I couldn't agree more. It was all loss and no gain. It is especially disheartening to see the revisionism that it was Fischer, and not the Soviets, who were unreasonably demanding. He demanded nothing more than he deserved and had earned. Karpov was the challenger, not the champion. But the USCF folded like a cheap suit, and the world lost an artist. Fischer's death was announced today, but his spirit was murdered decades ago.

[Miller]

I couldn't agree more. It was all loss and no gain. It is especially disheartening to see the revisionism that it was Fischer, and not the Soviets, who were unreasonably demanding. He demanded nothing more than he deserved and had earned. Karpov was the challenger, not the champion. But the USCF folded like a cheap suit, and the world lost an artist. Fischer's death was announced today, but his spirit was murdered decades ago.

I'm not familiar with the details of the dispute. What changes did the Soviets want to make? Why were the changes unreasonable?

[Captain Amazing]

Fischer demanded changes to the rules that were already existing...the same rules that he himself had become a champion under..

Fischer was, at the same time, a brilliant chess player and an incredible asshole. It's just a shame that the second interfered with the first.

[Captain Amazing]

I'm not familiar with the details of the dispute. What changes did the Soviets want to make? Why were the changes unreasonable?

As Wikipedia puts it:

Fischer was scheduled to defend his title against challenger Anatoly Karpov in 1975. Fischer had played no tournament games since winning the title, and he laid down numerous (a total of 64) conditions for the match. While most of them were purely game-oriented in nature, some were as bizarre as a requirement for everyone entering the room where the game is conducted to have uncovered heads. Many commentators supposed that Fischer's objective in making the demands was to avoid having to play the match, the outcome of which Fischer was not certain. Fischer made the following three principal demands:

1. The match should continue until ten wins, without counting the draws.
2. There is no limit to the total number of games played.
3. In case of a 9:9 score, champion (Fischer) retains his title.

Fischer claimed the usual system (twenty-four games with the first player to get 12.5 points winning, or the champion retaining his title in the event of a 12-12 tie) encouraged the player in the lead to draw games, which he regarded as bad for chess. Fischer instead wanted a match of an unlimited number of games. However, a match based on the first two conditions could take several months (In 1927 the Capablanca-Alekhine match to achieve the condition of winning only six games continued for 34 games). Many argued that this would be an exercise in stamina rather than skill. The FIDE commission headed by FIDE president Max Euwe and consisting of both, US and USSR, representatives, ruled that the match should continue until six wins. However, Fischer replied that he would resign his crown and not participate in the match. Instead of accepting Fischer's forfeit, the commission agreed to allow the match to continue until nine wins, leaving only one of the 64 conditions set by Fischer unsatisfied. FIDE postulated that the player achieving nine victories first would win the match, eliminating any advantage for the reigning champion (Fischer). Most observers considered Fischer's demand of his win in case of 9:9 draw to be unfair. It meant that Fischer only needed to win nine games to retain the championship, while Karpov had to win by a 10-8 score. Because FIDE would not agree to that demand, Fischer resigned in a cable to FIDE president Max Euwe on June 27, 1974

[Liberal]

I'm not familiar with the details of the dispute. What changes did the Soviets want to make? Why were the changes unreasonable?Fischer had three simple demands: (1) that draws don't count; (2) that a 9-9 tie go to the champion; and (3) that otherwise, play would continue until 10 games are won. This differed from the traditional rules in a number of ways. Draws always counted 1/2 point. 24 games were played until someone scored 12-1/2. But 12-12 ties went to the champion.

There were other demands Fischer made not related to gameplay per se, but not unreasonable either. He wanted, for example, that everyone's head be uncovered when entering the game room proper. Considering the stealthy deceit of Soviet agents at the time, it was a perfectly reasonable thing to ask. Chess was a huge — huge — deal to the Soviets, and there is no reason to believe that they would not have brought their intelligence services to bear. Nor was there any reason to believe they would not cheat.

The Soviets, of course, wanted to keep things status quo (since the rules had been designed by FIDE to accomodate them in the first place). The USCF balked at backing Fischer, and Fischer bolted. It is important to keep in mind that Soviet influence on FIDE was far stronger than US influence on the UN's Security Council. It was the Soviet Chess Federation that padded FIDE with its puppets, and it never hesitated to pull on the strings.

ETA:

Seeing the Wiki propaganda, I would just say that the reason Fischer wanted these changes was not to prolong the tournament, but to shorten it. The incentive for draws would be removed, and everybody knew that Fischer was an aggressive attacking player, while Karpov was a meak defensive player (albeit a good one.) Karpov would have wanted to play for draws against Fischer, but Fischer would never have accepted them unless his position was a loss.

[glee]

I don't know where Fischer originally claimed this, but I have seen it referenced a few times. For example

http://www.chessninja.com/dailydirt/2005/08/fischer_settles_in.htm

http://repositories.cdlib.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1023&context=cbmb (pdf)

There's a fair bit of daylight between, "What Bobby Fischer believed," and "What's actually plausible."

Sorry, chaps! :o

I realise that Fischer could easily have made such a claim - I meant that there was no evidence for it, was there?

[glee]

When you look at grandmasters through history, few of them lived long, happy lives. What's up with that? Perhaps "normal" people cannot play chess at the highest level, and so those who do are abnormal.

A sad life.

--edited for typos--

Captain Amazing covered World Champions pretty well (also Capablanca was appointed as an Honorary Cuban Diplomat; Botvinnik explored computer chess programs; Spassky moved to France), but I know a lot of grandmasters and while they spend a lot of time practising chess, they lead pretty sensible lives. The only sense in which they are abnormal is that they are pretty intelligent (Kasparov is a contributing Editor to the Wall Street Journal)...

For some of the English GMs:

Adams is a millionaire and gets all-paid invites to top events
Short is a millionaire and has a family life in Greece
Nunn is a millionaire, has won the World Chess Solving championship several times and writes excellent books
Chandler is a millionaire and ran the British Chess Magazine for many years
Hennigan is a millionaire and sponsored a team in the UK National League

[glee]

As Paul in Saudi mentioned, chess champions do not live long and happy lives. Fischer's sad life may be vaguely analogous to that of Paul Morphy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Morphy) the only other United States chess giant.

Personally, I can forgive Fischer's rather strange behavior in his later life especially when contrasted with the brilliant chess wizardry of his earlier life.

R.I.P. Bobby

I don't agree.
Fischer made some pretty revolting statements.
Capablanca, Karpov, Kasparov, Kramnik and Anand were/are also brilliant, but perfectly well-behaved.

[glee]

Wasn't there some concern about mental telepathy during the Iceland chess match?

Honest. I seem to remember someone complaining about it - A Russian or Fischer, himself. (I'd a mentioned the city there, but I can't spell it.)


Do you mean Reykjavik?
The mental telepathy is probably a reference to Karpov-Korchnoi in Bagio City, where Karpov hired a bloke (a 'parapsychologist') to sit in the front row and stare at Korchnoi.
There's no evidence of telepathy, but who wants anyone staring at you for hours at a time.


In one match it was down to a couple of pawns each. It was Fischer's move and everyone in the studio was speculating frantically. No one had a clue of what Fischer was up to. And then he moved!

KAPOW!!!!!!!!!!!

It was all over and no one guessed that move. Thrilling? A total understatement

I couldn't remember that game, so checked the match here (http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=54397). No Fischer-Spassky game ended with just a couple of pawns left. :eek:

[glee]

Morphy is the subject of my favorite chess story of all time. This was before time limits on games.

Morphy and his opponent sat across from each other, neither speaking, for eight solid hours. At the end of it, Morphy blinked, looked up, and said, "Oh - is it my move?"

Regards,
Shodan

I couldn't find a reference to this anywhere (Wikipedia gives 2 hours 20 minutes as the longest 'chess think').
It is inconceivable that a strong player, let alone a world-class one, wouldn't know whose move it was. (When a master gives a simultaneous display against 25 opponents, he can tell who has excitedly moved before they should.)

[glee]

Fischer had three simple demands: (1) that draws don't count; (2) that a 9-9 tie go to the champion; and (3) that otherwise, play would continue until 10 games are won. This differed from the traditional rules in a number of ways. Draws always counted 1/2 point. 24 games were played until someone scored 12-1/2. But 12-12 ties went to the champion.


I wouldn't call (3) a simple demand. It means that Karpov could only win if he reached a 10-8 (or better) victory.
Winning by two clear games is more than Fischer had to do (he won if he reached 12.5-11.5).

Also a general problem with only counting wins is that the match can go on a long time.
The later World Championship match Karpov-Kasparov was only first to 6 wins - it overran by months and was eventually abandoned.

Fischer was perfectly reasonable to complain about the Champion having a 1 game advantage when he was the Challenger. But it was hard to back him in demanding a two game advantage as soon as he became Champion.


Seeing the Wiki propaganda, I would just say that the reason Fischer wanted these changes was not to prolong the tournament, but to shorten it. The incentive for draws would be removed, and everybody knew that Fischer was an aggressive attacking player, while Karpov was a meak defensive player (albeit a good one.) Karpov would have wanted to play for draws against Fischer, but Fischer would never have accepted them unless his position was a loss.

As I said, the changes would have dramatically extended the match, not shortened it.
I wouldn't describe Fischer as an 'aggressive attacking' player. He was a brilliant all-round player with excellent endgame technique. He was perfectly happy to exchange an attacking position for an endgame advantage.
Tal was 'aggressive' :eek: and now Shirov and Morozevich are. :cool:

Karpov was not a meek defensive player. He was a fantastic player (and very hard to beat). He would not have 'played for draws' with White, for sure.
It can be very difficult to understand players like Petrosian, Karpov (and Kramnik repeatedly playing the Berlin defence against Kasparov).
I remember watching GM Anderssen winning an apparently drawn game by just 'manouvreing back and forth'. I said to GM Miles that it looked fairly easy to play that way. He laughed and said I (a FIDE Master) wasn't strong enough to understand the effort Anderssen that put in. :eek:

[Elendil's Heir]

I guess I don't understand his demand that no one wear a hat. Who would wear a hat indoors in the 1970s, anyway? And if he was concerned about messages being sent by some kind of Hat Code, wouldn't the KGB or whoever just switch to lapel pins, distinctive neckties or even hairstyles? Seems pretty damned paranoid to me.

[Shodan]

I couldn't find a reference to this anywhere (Wikipedia gives 2 hours 20 minutes as the longest 'chess think').
It is inconceivable that a strong player, let alone a world-class one, wouldn't know whose move it was. (When a master gives a simultaneous display against 25 opponents, he can tell who has excitedly moved before they should.)
You're probably right - the story is apocryphal. And the guy who told me the story, an infinitely better chess player than I, I haven't seen in years.

I put it forth because I thought it was funny, nothing more.

Regards,
Shodan

[eleanorigby]

IMO, Fischer was mentally ill. Brilliant, but mentally ill--maybe only mentally unstable, but something was not "right".

Anyway, I wandered in here to recommend the movie, Searching for Bobby Fischer which is quite good.

[RickJay]

Do you mean Reykjavik?
The mental telepathy is probably a reference to Karpov-Korchnoi in Bagio City, where Karpov hired a bloke (a 'parapsychologist') to sit in the front row and stare at Korchnoi.
There's no evidence of telepathy, but who wants anyone staring at you for hours at a time.
I would think anyone involved in a competitive game or sport with spectators in attendance would have to put up with exactly that.

[treis]

It's sad to see how mental illness so ravaged this brilliant man's life. The international chess community bent over backwards to meet his increasingly bizarre demands. They finally refused to cave when his demands amounted to giving himself an unfair advantage over his opponent. Under the rules he won the title, there was an advantage given to the current champion, but that was a simple necessity due to the nature of the competition. Under his proposed first to 10 system, the only unfairness inherent in the competition is who gets white first. The champion, of course, would get that. However, the winner of the competition is the first to 10 wins. It shouldn't matter if the score is 10-9 or 10-0.

[wolf_meister]

I stated that Fischer's odd behavior in his later life could be forgiven considering the chess brilliance he displayed in his younger days.
glee replied:
I don't agree.
Fischer made some pretty revolting statements.Considering Bobby Fischer's declining mental state over the past three decades, should we really place that much weight on what he said during that time? I don't think so.


*****************************************************
Liberal's posting concerning Bobby Fischer's mental decline was well said:
Karpov was the challenger, not the champion. But the USCF folded like a cheap suit, and the world lost an artist. Fischer's death was announced today, but his spirit was murdered decades ago.
Sad.

[ShermanAter]

Bobby Fisher, Kiss my entire ass

I will gladly piss on bobby fishers grave

His comment after 9/11 secured his place in history to me. May he rot in Hell, if there is such a place.

[Malacandra]

I couldn't find a reference to this anywhere (Wikipedia gives 2 hours 20 minutes as the longest 'chess think').
It is inconceivable that a strong player, let alone a world-class one, wouldn't know whose move it was. (When a master gives a simultaneous display against 25 opponents, he can tell who has excitedly moved before they should.)

I've heard that story, except that it was Paulsen who sat there for hours and only then expressed surprise on learning it was his move. This was in the pre-clocks era when men like Elijah Williams routinely sat for hours on end over a single move.

As to what is inconceivable, it's inconceivable that a strong player would inadvertently capture one of his own pieces, and it's inconceivable that a World Championship contender should have to ask the referee if it is legal to castle if your rook is attacked (ceteris paribus, it is), and it's inconceivable that a respected master and long-established commentator should remark twice in the same game that Black's best move was to castle when Black had earlier moved his king. However, all of these inconceivabilities are cited in a book I believe you have on your shelf, glee - The Complete Chess Addict.

I understand that by the 1970s the world championship was not the champion's personal property (in the 1930s Alekhine made good and certain that Capablanca would not get a re-match) and the "revisionism" Liberal cites appears to be very widespread - also that FIDE did concede most of Fischer's demands, and as to the most unreasonable of them, glee has ably addressed that already.

[Gatopescado]

For example a great many paranoid schizophrenics fear the CIA is always watching/listening in on them. I think we had a thread once wondering what the mentally ill were afraid of before the CIA. Well, it was the power structures in that place/time, be it the Catholic Church, the royal families et cetera.



Just because I fear the Duck Cult, doesn't mean they're not out to get me!

[Liberal]

Glee, with all due respect — and I realize that you are a FIDE master — I would hold your analysis of most chess positions to be reasonably sound, but your opinion of what is fair and what isn't is just as open to challenge as anyone else's. Yasser Seirawan, a FIDE grandmaster and, I believe, at the time a FIDE IM (international master) as well as Lev Alburt , at that time a FIDE grandmaster and recent defector to the US, both agreed with our group about the reasonableness of Fischer's demands. They were both guests of ours, and I was priviledged to play a (brief) casual game with Lev as we waited for dinner to be served. (He crushed me, of course.)

If the challenger is ahead by 9-8, then he ought to have to win one more game to seal the championship. However, if the champion is behind by 8-9, then he too ought to have to win one more game to retain his title. These were not just rules that Fischer designed for himself. He designed them to unseat the Soviets from domination of FIDE. It was common knowledge (and Lev confirmed) that they cheated with regularity whenever they played important matches against foreign players.

The suggested rules cannot be compared one to one with the past rules involving draws. Draws were, as you are aware, just another tactic in the Soviet arsenal. Their players were trained (and told) to play for draws. That kept their ratings artificially high, and it forced others to play for wins because drawn matches fell to the champion. Fischer simply sought to eliminate that strategy. And no one will ever know whether it would have taken longer or shorter because it was never tried. And even besides, what the fuck. If it takes six months, so what. If the Soviets were in a hurry, they could play to win.

[Guinastasia]

Bobby Fisher, Kiss my entire ass

I will gladly piss on bobby fishers grave

His comment after 9/11 secured his place in history to me. May he rot in Hell, if there is such a place.


What was his comment?

[Liberal]

What was his comment?See page 1 of the thread.

[Guinastasia]

Wow-what an asshat.

(A talented asshat, but an asshat nonetheless.)

ETA: I'm mourning Ernie Holmes (http://post-gazette.com/pg/08019/850575-122.stm), myself.

[glee]

You're probably right - the story is apocryphal. And the guy who told me the story, an infinitely better chess player than I, I haven't seen in years.

I put it forth because I thought it was funny, nothing more.

Regards,
Shodan

No worries - it's certainly amusing. :D

I've heard that story, except that it was Paulsen who sat there for hours and only then expressed surprise on learning it was his move. This was in the pre-clocks era when men like Elijah Williams routinely sat for hours on end over a single move.


I too had 'heard' it was Louis Paulsen. However I could find no support for that anywhere.

As to what is inconceivable, it's inconceivable that a strong player would inadvertently capture one of his own pieces, and it's inconceivable that a World Championship contender should have to ask the referee if it is legal to castle if your rook is attacked (ceteris paribus, it is), and it's inconceivable that a respected master and long-established commentator should remark twice in the same game that Black's best move was to castle when Black had earlier moved his king. However, all of these inconceivabilities are cited in a book I believe you have on your shelf, glee - The Complete Chess Addict.


And what a fine book it is too. :cool:

There are many many instances of players making an illegal move when short of time (I agree that capturing your own piece is pretty special!). I remember a GM leaving his King in check for several moves - eventually I noticed and took it. :confused: Of course it was a blitz game.
There is only one 'story' of both players calmly sitting for 8 hours waiting for the other to move. Didn't either of them want to go to the toilet? Didn't either of them want to get a drink? Didn't either of them want to stretch?

Korchnoi explains his castling question logically:
'Korchnoi confirmed he did ask the question at that point, explaining that the Russian chess rules left the situation a little ambiguous, and it was the first time the situation had occurred in his games. Considering the levels of tension surrounding the match and this game in particular, Korchnoi thought it best to confirm with the match referee before making the move.'

http://www.chessvault.com/2006/04/29/victor-korchnoi-at-the-chess-bridge/

Was it Golombek who remarked that Black could illegally castle?
I suppose it's a bit rude to remark that he was rather careless, but I will anyway. He annotated one of my games in his chess column and overlooked the win of a rook. Another time he adjudicated a game of mine as a loss. I sent in one move as appeal analysis and he reversed his decision.

[glee]

I would think anyone involved in a competitive game or sport with spectators in attendance would have to put up with exactly that.

That's true, but Karpov made sure that Korchnoi knew there was a 'parapsychologist' sitting in the front row for every session of play, staring at Korchnoi and trying to put him off.
There's a big difference between a crowd generally looking at the players, then the demonstration boards, then analysing on their pocket sets, wandering out of the hall etc and one guy whose mission in life is to distract you.

I might add that as a lesser player, I would love to have anyone at all watch my games! :)

[glee]

I stated that Fischer's odd behavior in his later life could be forgiven considering the chess brilliance he displayed in his younger days.
glee replied:
Considering Bobby Fischer's declining mental state over the past three decades, should we really place that much weight on what he said during that time? I don't think so.

Sorry, but I still don't think Fischer's brilliance at chess gives him a free pass to be incredibly insulting later on.

You can say that he was probably paranoid and that means we should ignore his rantings, but it has nothing to do with chess.

[glee]

Under his proposed first to 10 system, the only unfairness inherent in the competition is who gets white first. The champion, of course, would get that. However, the winner of the competition is the first to 10 wins. It shouldn't matter if the score is 10-9 or 10-0.

No the unfairness is the extra clause of a 9-9 score in wins that meant Fischer won (he retained his title).
So the challenger had to win by 10-8 or better.

[glee]

Glee, with all due respect — and I realize that you are a FIDE master — I would hold your analysis of most chess positions to be reasonably sound, but your opinion of what is fair and what isn't is just as open to challenge as anyone else's. Yasser Seirawan, a FIDE grandmaster and, I believe, at the time a FIDE IM (international master) as well as Lev Alburt , at that time a FIDE grandmaster and recent defector to the US, both agreed with our group about the reasonableness of Fischer's demands. They were both guests of ours, and I was priviledged to play a (brief) casual game with Lev as we waited for dinner to be served. (He crushed me, of course.)

If the challenger is ahead by 9-8, then he ought to have to win one more game to seal the championship. However, if the champion is behind by 8-9, then he too ought to have to win one more game to retain his title. These were not just rules that Fischer designed for himself. He designed them to unseat the Soviets from domination of FIDE. It was common knowledge (and Lev confirmed) that they cheated with regularity whenever they played important matches against foreign players.

The suggested rules cannot be compared one to one with the past rules involving draws. Draws were, as you are aware, just another tactic in the Soviet arsenal. Their players were trained (and told) to play for draws. That kept their ratings artificially high, and it forced others to play for wins because drawn matches fell to the champion. Fischer simply sought to eliminate that strategy. And no one will ever know whether it would have taken longer or shorter because it was never tried. And even besides, what the fuck. If it takes six months, so what. If the Soviets were in a hurry, they could play to win.

I appreciate your courtesy and I hope I can match it. :)

Yasser Seirawan is a great bloke (I met him in Holland once), who has made huge efforts recently to get the World Chess Championship back on track and Lev Alburt knows the Soviet system from the inside.

Fischer had to win one more game than Spassky in a total of 24 games. Tha's a clear advantage to the Champion. (It used to be worse - Botvinnik insisted on a return match if the Champion lost :eek: :rolleyes: )
However Fischer's demands meant that the challenger would have to win 2 games more than the Champion. (10-8 at the minimum.)
If Fischer had simply said "Draws shouldn't matter- first to 10 wins is Champion", I am confident it would have got through FIDE. (There would have been real logistical problems about the uncertain length of the match, but no doubt money could have sorted those out...)

[Arnold Winkelried]

Words of wisdom from my five-year-old: today I showed him the picture in the Los Angeles Times where Fischer was playing 50 opponents in Hollywood in 1964. I explained to him that a great chess player had died. He said "well now he's a skeleton and he can play with the other skeletons underground if they have a chessboard!"

Regardless of his faults, I still think he deserves respect with a capital R for his chess skills. Happy trails, Bobby.

[Liberal]

Yasser Seirawan is a great bloke (I met him in Holland once), who has made huge efforts recently to get the World Chess Championship back on track and Lev Alburt knows the Soviet system from the inside.Although we may disagree on a lot of things, we completely agree on this. I don't believe I have ever met a nicer man than Yaz, inside or outside of chess. If you would indulge one more personal story...

I was the tournament director for our state's Open Championship when he graciously accepted our invitation and pittance of an offering to play. It was a great risk to him, since a freak loss to one of our minor masters or experts (it was a Swiss pairing system) would have damaged his rating. But it was our work to bring back Fischer that had attracted him to us, and so he came.

It was my practice always to consult the high player of board one in Swiss systems about where he would like to play, and then all other pairings would fall off from that. For example, if the high player wanted to be in the corner, I would place him there, and then board two beside his, and so on.

Yaz, of course, was the high player of our tournament, and as I escorted him into the room, I asked him where he would prefer to play. With almost no hesitation, he exclaimed, "Oh, look at that view! I love that view!" The view he referenced was behind the TD's long bank of banquet tables, where we officials sat to look important and be useless. Accomodating him basically meant rearranging the whole room.

"No problem," I responded instantly, and set about to drag the tables away, motioning for my assistant to help me. But guess who else pitched in? That's right — Yaz. He was young and in excellent physical condition, and moved two tables to our one all by himself, and guided us in the most efficient way to accomplish it by moving only the necessary ones. We were finished in five minutes.

And then, as if that weren't enough, he thanked me for asking him where he prefered to play. He said that no one had ever rearranged a room to suit him before, and he broke out a big wide smile. I almost wanted to bow to him. What a great "bloke" indeed.

[Liberal]

Words of wisdom from my five-year-old: today I showed him the picture in the Los Angeles Times where Fischer was playing 50 opponents in Hollywood in 1964. I explained to him that a great chess player had died. He said "well now he's a skeleton and he can play with the other skeletons underground if they have a chessboard!"

Regardless of his faults, I still think he deserves respect with a capital R for his chess skills. Happy trails, Bobby.A beautiful story, Arnold. Thanks for sharing that with us.

[treis]

No the unfairness is the extra clause of a 9-9 score in wins that meant Fischer won (he retained his title).
So the challenger had to win by 10-8 or better.

Yeah, we are saying the same thing. Declaring that 9-9 should result in the champion retaining his title implies that a 10-9 victory for the challenger isn't really a victory. Which, of course, is bupkis.

[BarnOwl]

Do you mean Reykjavik?
The mental telepathy is probably a reference to Karpov-Korchnoi in Bagio City, where Karpov hired a bloke (a 'parapsychologist') to sit in the front row and stare at Korchnoi.
There's no evidence of telepathy, but who wants anyone staring at you for hours at a time.



I couldn't remember that game, so checked the match here (http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=54397). No Fischer-Spassky game ended with just a couple of pawns left. :eek:

Thanks for the reference, Glee!

But I do remember this happening. Perhaps each player had a piece or two, but the focus was on the pawns. And when Fischer made his move it astounded Shelby and everyone else in the studio.

Nevertheless, I'll treasure the link you so thoughtfully provided.

Thanks again.

[Liberal]

Yeah, we are saying the same thing. Declaring that 9-9 should result in the champion retaining his title implies that a 10-9 victory for the challenger isn't really a victory. Which, of course, is bupkis.But it isn't saying that at all. 10-9 is a metaphysically impossible score. What it's saying is that the challenger should have to win 10 games and the champion only 9. Let me splain...

Let's say that Fischer were to win 9 straight. If that happened, then he could forfeit the next nine games and still win. In fact, there would be no way for the challenger to win, and so he could resign and the match could be called by the director — thus shortening the time significantly. But if the champion can win only 8 games, then there is no way for the challenger to lose.

So the whole 10-9 thing is just a red herring. And I'm confident that Fischer intended to win 9 straight. With these rules, there is incentive for both players to play for wins. And once again, nullifying the Soviet drawing machine was the whole point.

I think people don't realize how badly they cheated. Not only did they communicate in subtle and sophisticated ways during play, but they caucused during adjournments and put their heads together to work out possible lines when play was to continue. That particular practice was as much a violation of the rules as communication during play, but FIDE never seemed to be able to "verify" that the Soviets were doing what everyone knew the Soviets were doing. As Lev put it, all a FIDE official would have to do is put his ear to the door to hear a "bunch of drunk Russians" arguing loudly about chess moves.

[Liberal]

Thanks for the reference, Glee!

But I do remember this happening. Perhaps each player had a piece or two, but the focus was on the pawns. And when Fischer made his move it astounded Shelby and everyone else in the studio.

Nevertheless, I'll treasure the link you so thoughtfully provided.

Thanks again.You might be thinking of game 13. The final moves and positions for all the games are here (http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/72fs$$.htm).

[BarnOwl]

You might be thinking of game 13. The final moves and positions for all the games are here (http://www.mark-weeks.com/chess/72fs$$.htm).

I really can't say, Lib, but thank you for the linky.

[treis]

But it isn't saying that at all. 10-9 is a metaphysically impossible score.

What does this mean?



What it's saying is that the challenger should have to win 10 games and the champion only 9. Let me splain...

Let's say that Fischer were to win 9 straight. If that happened, then he could forfeit the next nine games and still win. In fact, there would be no way for the challenger to win, and so he could resign and the match could be called by the director — thus shortening the time significantly.

How does this work? If Fischer wins the first 9 straight, the challenger can still win the match by winning the next 10 straight.



But if the champion can win only 8 games, then there is no way for the challenger to lose.

Well, yeah. If the conditions for victory are winning 10 games, and the champion can only win 8, how could the challenger lose?

[Liberal]

What does this mean? A metaphysical impossibility is a negation of modal possibility. Like a real number square root of a negative number, for example.

How does this work? If Fischer wins the first 9 straight, the challenger can still win the match by winning the next 10 straight.When the challenger has won his 9th game, the score will be 9-9. The champion wins at 9-9.

[treis]

A metaphysical impossibility is a negation of modal possibility. Like a real number square root of a negative number, for example.

Only because you've defined it to be so without any reason. 10-9 should be a victory in a first to 10 match.


When the challenger has won his 9th game, the score will be 9-9. The champion wins at 9-9.

Again, only because you've decided it to be so. There's no reason for the winner of a first to 10 wins match be the person that is first to 10 wins.

[Liberal]

I didn't decide or define anything. Those were Fischer's demands. I'm only analyzing them. If we are to analyze something other than what we've been talking about for the past two days, that's fine, but let's not conflate the two.

[treis]

Funny, I though we were discussing the fairness of Fischer's demands.

[Malacandra]

Exactly, and the point is that they weren't fair. Having removed the objectionable criterion whereby the champion retained the title in the event of a drawn match, Fischer created another "drawn match" criterion that meant he won. I'm puzzled by your analysis of the 9-0 situation, Liberal - if Fischer reaches any score of 9-x then he wins at once, since Karpov cannot reach ten wins without the score reaching 9-9 at some stage. There's no need for the director to step in and no need for any games to be thrown.

I'm also puzzled by the fact that you should think that Karpov would ever offer Fischer a draw in a position that Fischer would be clearly losing. Do you really think Karpov would routinely throw away wins, or be unable to perceive what he was doing?

Then, too, why would you think that a "meek defensive player" (I suppose if you described Fischer as "dogged" and "obdurate" those would be positive adjectives) would be at a disadvantage in a match in which draws were not counted? A draw is still a game that is not lost, and tough defensive chess can be a way to win - as I would have thought a player of your stature would be the first to appreciate.

Indeed, being willing to grind out matches in a tough defensive style has long been a feature of the successful match-player, predating Soviet dominance by decades. Capablanca was a fantastic match-player not merely because of his ability to win games but because he was really good at not losing - and a generation before Capa, British chess writers were remarking on how Blackburne's style was better suited to tournament play than match, because in matches the man who was willing to endure exhausting draw after draw was the man who would not lose, whereas in a tournament it was not good enough merely to draw - a series of draws and one win would settle a match, but see the contestant place only in mid table in a tournament.

Whatever advantage the Russian drawing machine might have conferred* when it was a question of one Russian out of many finishing ahead of Fischer would have been irrelevant in a match in which Fischer was playing only one Russian. He tried to impose an absurdly unfair demand on Karpov and he was rightly told to shove it.

* Did the sporting Americans refrain from such reprehensible stratagems because of their sense of fair play, or did American chess suffer from a lack of players of the quality of the top Soviets?

[glee]

Although we may disagree on a lot of things, we completely agree on this. I don't believe I have ever met a nicer man than Yaz, inside or outside of chess. If you would indulge one more personal story...

I was the tournament director for our state's Open Championship when he graciously accepted our invitation and pittance of an offering to play. It was a great risk to him, since a freak loss to one of our minor masters or experts (it was a Swiss pairing system) would have damaged his rating. But it was our work to bring back Fischer that had attracted him to us, and so he came.

It was my practice always to consult the high player of board one in Swiss systems about where he would like to play, and then all other pairings would fall off from that. For example, if the high player wanted to be in the corner, I would place him there, and then board two beside his, and so on.

Yaz, of course, was the high player of our tournament, and as I escorted him into the room, I asked him where he would prefer to play. With almost no hesitation, he exclaimed, "Oh, look at that view! I love that view!" The view he referenced was behind the TD's long bank of banquet tables, where we officials sat to look important and be useless. Accomodating him basically meant rearranging the whole room.

"No problem," I responded instantly, and set about to drag the tables away, motioning for my assistant to help me. But guess who else pitched in? That's right — Yaz. He was young and in excellent physical condition, and moved two tables to our one all by himself, and guided us in the most efficient way to accomplish it by moving only the necessary ones. We were finished in five minutes.

And then, as if that weren't enough, he thanked me for asking him where he prefered to play. He said that no one had ever rearranged a room to suit him before, and he broke out a big wide smile. I almost wanted to bow to him. What a great "bloke" indeed.

It's great to meet such people, who remain charming despite having a world-class talent. :)

[glee]

But it isn't saying that at all. 10-9 is a metaphysically impossible score. What it's saying is that the challenger should have to win 10 games and the champion only 9. Let me splain...

Let's say that Fischer were to win 9 straight. If that happened, then he could forfeit the next nine games and still win. In fact, there would be no way for the challenger to win, and so he could resign and the match could be called by the director — thus shortening the time significantly. But if the champion can win only 8 games, then there is no way for the challenger to lose.

So the whole 10-9 thing is just a red herring. And I'm confident that Fischer intended to win 9 straight. With these rules, there is incentive for both players to play for wins. And once again, nullifying the Soviet drawing machine was the whole point.


Sorry, I don't agree!

1. In a match where 'the first to 10 wins', 10-9 is perfectly possible.
Only if the champion insists that a 9-9 tie is somehow a 'win' for him does 10-9 become impossible.

2. If Fischer were to win 9 games, under his rules the challenger could win the next 10 and still lose. :(

3. 'if the champion can win only 8 games, then there is no way for the challenger to lose'.
Well if the challenger can only win 9 games, he can't win.
So what?

4. If Fischer can win 9 straight, then he can win 10 straight. There's simply no need for a 9-9 clause.


I think people don't realize how badly they cheated. Not only did they communicate in subtle and sophisticated ways during play, but they caucused during adjournments and put their heads together to work out possible lines when play was to continue. That particular practice was as much a violation of the rules as communication during play, but FIDE never seemed to be able to "verify" that the Soviets were doing what everyone knew the Soviets were doing. As Lev put it, all a FIDE official would have to do is put his ear to the door to hear a "bunch of drunk Russians" arguing loudly about chess moves.

I don't understand.
When games were adjourned, the rules allowed players to get as much help as they wanted.
The only forbidden assistance is during play.

[Miller]

There were other demands Fischer made not related to gameplay per se, but not unreasonable either. He wanted, for example, that everyone's head be uncovered when entering the game room proper. Considering the stealthy deceit of Soviet agents at the time, it was a perfectly reasonable thing to ask. Chess was a huge — huge — deal to the Soviets, and there is no reason to believe that they would not have brought their intelligence services to bear. Nor was there any reason to believe they would not cheat.

Now that's interestig. How were Soviets using hats to cheat at chess?

[BarnOwl]

Now that's interestig. How were Soviets using hats to cheat at chess?

You are sooooooo stupid!

Hocus Pocus put Mr. Hinkle's MAGIC HAT on Frosty the Snowman, and Frosty came to life!!!!!!!!

If a mere rabbit can pull off shit like that, think what a KGB-er can do with a friggin' hat.

Some people. :smack:

[Malacandra]

I don't understand.
When games were adjourned, the rules allowed players to get as much help as they wanted.
The only forbidden assistance is during play.
I don't understand how a strong player and tournament organiser doesn't know this. :confused:

Reference your Golombek adjudication anecdote above, glee, I'm quietly proud of having found a mistake in Modern Chess Miniatures, Barden and Heidenfeld 1960. There's a game between Balogh and Sandor in which the annotation ignores a mate that I spotted. I'm at work at the minute, but I'll see if I can dig out the book when I'm at home now that I've seen this thread is still alive.

It's great to meet such people, who remain charming despite having a world-class talent.
My sister worked at the hotel where the Soviet team stayed at Bath 1973, and she'll endorse this. She said Mikhail Tal was especially sweet.

[Mayo Speaks!]

I know nothing of chess, but I'd just like to say that reading this thread has been very enlightening.

Thanks, guys!

[ianzin]

Glee, I'm only a few steps from a chess simpleton, but I was interested when younger and when Fisher was in the news a lot. Now that he's gone, I'd welcome your views / opinion on the simple question - just how good was he?

Usual caveats. I know there's no definitive answer, and I know this is just aimless fun like those who sit around in the pub debating who was the greatest boxer / soccer star / rock guitarist of all time. All that said, I'd still welcome your insightful opinion. He was world champion, of course, but was he the all-time greatest, as he clearly believed?

Question 2. Fisherandom... do you agree that it makes sense, in that it means players cannot rely on memorised openings and have to actually apply their intellect to the complexities of the game? Has it been tried in formal tournaments? Does it receive much support or enthusiasm among aficionados such as yourself?

[Malacandra]

Liberal, if you come back to this thread, I'm still puzzled by this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=9383538&postcount=63):

Seeing the Wiki propaganda, I would just say that the reason Fischer wanted these changes was not to prolong the tournament, but to shorten it. The incentive for draws would be removed, and everybody knew that Fischer was an aggressive attacking player, while Karpov was a meek defensive player (albeit a good one.) Karpov would have wanted to play for draws against Fischer, but Fischer would never have accepted them unless his position was a loss.

Aside from saying "tournament" for "match" (what with a tournament being a multi-player event as opposed to a head-to-head contest, which is what a match is - but a man with your background knew this all along), I don't understand why you believe why Fischer's conditions would remove the incentive to play for draws. A draw is still the better result if the position is such that the player cannot win, and a "meek" (or "obdurate") defensive style can be as valid a way to win games as an aggressive, attacking one. It served Steinitz well, and Petrosian too, and also Capablanca.

It's all very well to claim that Fischer would never have accepted a draw offer unless he was losing, but I believe you'll find numerous instances from his career - My 60 Memorable Games is probably a reasonable place to start - in which he did exactly that. Too, of course, Fischer doesn't necessarily have to accept an offer in order for a game to be drawn; threefold repetition, stalemate, perpetual check and a number of statutory endings are already drawn, offer or no.

You could consider the Alekhine-Capablanca championship as a model for the Fischer-Karpov one. Capablanca was perfectly capable of playing winning chess, but part of the secret of his success was a playing style that allowed him to go for years without losing a game (not a match; a single game); Alekhine was the aggressive, imaginative player. As cited, that match ran for 34 games before the aggressive Alekhine scored his sixth win; mathematically, you would expect Fischer-Karpov to have run fifty games at least - possibly a few more since Fischer was ring-rusty and might have dropped a game or two while getting back into the swing of things. Not a good brief for an exciting contest.

[glee]

Glee, I'm only a few steps from a chess simpleton, but I was interested when younger and when Fisher was in the news a lot. Now that he's gone, I'd welcome your views / opinion on the simple question - just how good was he?

Usual caveats. I know there's no definitive answer, and I know this is just aimless fun like those who sit around in the pub debating who was the greatest boxer / soccer star / rock guitarist of all time. All that said, I'd still welcome your insightful opinion. He was world champion, of course, but was he the all-time greatest, as he clearly believed?

Question 2. Fisherandom... do you agree that it makes sense, in that it means players cannot rely on memorised openings and have to actually apply their intellect to the complexities of the game? Has it been tried in formal tournaments? Does it receive much support or enthusiasm among aficionados such as yourself?

Hey, I used to think I was a strong player. Then I played Kasparov!
Your questions are like chess - simple to state; hard to resolve.
Here's my opinion (full of waffle as usual!)...

1. Fischer was certainly the strongest player of his day.
He beat Spassky, who had the full resources of the Soviet chess organisation behind him. No doubt every Fischer game was scrutinised by top Soviet players, looking for weaknesses. They still couldn't stop him!

Fischer was determined to win as much as possible.
Suppose you are playing a top chess tournament, with a decent money 1st prize. You win a few early games, whilst all your rivals draw most of their games. In the last couple of rounds, you only need three draws to win the event outright. Your last three opponents are not chasing the lead, so will undoubtedly agree a draw*. Fischer would try to win all 3 games! This is of course very entertaining for the spectators and (if successful, as it almost always was) will push Fischer's chess rating up.

As you say it's hard to compare generations.
When Morphy was playing wonderful attacking chess over 100 years ago, there was no formal payment system. His most famous game** was played against two noblemen in a theatre box! :confused:
When Euwe became World Champion, he still taught maths at school. A true amateur!
Fischer used books and magazines for his research - modern World Champions have these massive databases.

Fischer quotes:
- Morphy was probably the greatest genius of them all
- All I want to do, ever, is just play Chess
- I don't believe in psychology. I believe in good moves
- Your body has to be in top condition. Your Chess deteriorates as your body does. You can't separate body from mind
- It’s just you and your opponent at the board and you're trying to prove something
- You have to have the fighting spirit. You have to force moves and take chances
- I like the moment when I break a man's ego
- There are tough players and nice guys, and I'm a tough player
- If I win a tournament, I win it by myself. I do the playing. Nobody helps me
- Don't even mention losing to me. I can't stand to think of it
- Different people feel differently about resigning
- My opponents make good moves too. Sometimes I don't take these things into consideration

I'm going to say that Kasparov was possibly stronger than Fischer.
I cannot prove it; I don't have a cite and there are stronger players than me who would disagree.

As a professional chess teacher, I would add one thing. Fischer was clearly driven to win the World Chess Championship. However his education was cut short; he had problems socialising and was undoubtedly unhappy a lot of the time, especially after he achieved his ambition.
There are many successful World Champions (Capablanca, Spassky + Kasparov particularly) and I think that chess is a great game but you need to spend time on making a success of the rest of your life too!

2. Fischerrandom does indeed wipe out hundreds of years of analysis. (It shows the complexity of chess that even modern computers still cannot say which opening moves are the best.)
Stronger players use more analysis. A beginner will remember little; a club player will have a couple of favourite openings; an international will study several openings for each colour and a world-class player will have a massive computer database with millions of games. Yes, Fischerrandom levels the playing field in this respect.
However there are some problems:

- some opening positions may not be fair
- we've all spent some time learning to understand openings; now that's all been wasted?!
- computers become even stronger

There is not much support for Fischerrandom, presumably because of these reasons. There are occasional international events, but I don't see it catching on.
For one thing, it's fun for me to think "I'm following one of Fischer's games!"

*International chess is tough, with a single game lasting up to 7 hours. If you play a tough game, you will be thinking about missed opportunities for hours afterwards. You may not enjoy the rest of the day, including your main meal :eek: , because you are frustrated with yourself. Having the tournament leader offer you a quick draw is extremely tempting.

**I can post it here if you like....

[Liberal]

It's great to meet such people, who remain charming despite having a world-class talent. :)I consider you to be one of those people. We don't know each other in real life, but we went through that prayer thing here on the board many years ago. You might not even remember it at all, but I won't ever forget how fair, gracious, and accomodating you were. Though the experiment failed on one level, it succeeded on another. You gained a lifelong admirer.

[Liberal]

Aside from saying "tournament" for "match" (what with a tournament being a multi-player event as opposed to a head-to-head contest, which is what a match is - but a man with your background knew this all along), I don't understand why you believe why Fischer's conditions would remove the incentive to play for draws.Apologies for the slip. As a former TD, I actually have to watch myself with respect to that terminology. I think I caught most of them, but that one slipped.

A draw is still the better result if the position is such that the player cannot win, and a "meek" (or "obdurate") defensive style can be as valid a way to win games as an aggressive, attacking one. It served Steinitz well, and Petrosian too, and also Capablanca.

It's all very well to claim that Fischer would never have accepted a draw offer unless he was losing, but I believe you'll find numerous instances from his career - My 60 Memorable Games is probably a reasonable place to start - in which he did exactly that. Too, of course, Fischer doesn't necessarily have to accept an offer in order for a game to be drawn; threefold repetition, stalemate, perpetual check and a number of statutory endings are already drawn, offer or no.

You could consider the Alekhine-Capablanca championship as a model for the Fischer-Karpov one. Capablanca was perfectly capable of playing winning chess, but part of the secret of his success was a playing style that allowed him to go for years without losing a game (not a match; a single game); Alekhine was the aggressive, imaginative player. As cited, that match ran for 34 games before the aggressive Alekhine scored his sixth win; mathematically, you would expect Fischer-Karpov to have run fifty games at least - possibly a few more since Fischer was ring-rusty and might have dropped a game or two while getting back into the swing of things. Not a good brief for an exciting contest.Karpov was a Soviet drone. His physical conditioning was horrible. He was pale and gaunt because he never went outside or exercised. Instead, he spent all his time studying chess under the heavy weight of Soviet coaches who did not necessarily share Fischer's opinions on physical fitness, body and mind, that sort of thing. But chess at that level is almost as physically demanding as it is mentally demanding. Plus, we all know that the body tires when the mind does. The eyes hurt. The head aches. And the body longs to remove itself from the table.

I wouldn't insult Petrosian by comparing him to Karpov. Petrosian was a defender, yes, but an aggressive defender who used his defensive strategies as a means to launch counter-attacks against mistakes and careless play. Karpov was a machine, playing for the draw rather than the win unless the win simply presented itself. We can both speculate any way we like about how he might have fared against Fischer, but I don't think Alekhine-Capablanca is an apt comparison. Frankly, had there been a time-warp and Fischer had ended up defending against Kasparov after the fall of the Soviet Union, I doubt that he would have bothered with trying to set up new rules. Like I said, they were designed for the sole purpose of nullifying the Soviet apparatchik.

Yes, Fischer certainly accepted draws throughout the course of his career. And of course I know that there are other methods to draw. But to fail to see his intentions for the Karpov match is to remove everything from its context. He expressly said that his rules were designed not to reward draws. He knew what the Soviet strategy would be for the match. And he knew that the frail, ashen Soviet darling of chess would crumble under the pressure of having to win games to win the match. You may say he was wrong, but he knew more than either of us about the Soviet cabal. He faced it time and time again.

[Liberal]

Now that's interestig. How were Soviets using hats to cheat at chess?Fischer suspected two things: (1) that they had transmission and/or receiving devices under them, and (2) that they adjusted them as part of the rest of their eye, hand, and facial expression signals. I realize that in this day and age of Internet conspiracy jokesters, this sound like just more of the same, but Soviet cheating was common knowledge, especially in the form of collusion, which two economists have fairly well and conclusively documented (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=905612) in a peer-review journal article, "Did the Soviets Collude? A Statistical Analysis of Championship Chess 1940-64". Their work covers only up to the mid 60s, but it shows the pattern and there's no reason to believe the Soviets suddenly reformed when Fischer burst onto the scene and began knocking down their grandmasters like bowling pins.

[Liberal]

Another Fischer quote to add to those listed by glee. Speaking to Dick Cavett, Fischer said, "When I have white, I win because I'm white. When I have black, I win because I'm Fischer."

[Malacandra]

Here we are: Balogh vs Sandor, Budapest 1956

1r3r1k:p4p1P:2p2n1Q:4qP2:np1pp3:1N3P2:PPP5:1K1R1B1R

Here Balogh (White) played 23. Bb5! and Barden commented "...now if 23. ... cxb5; 24. Rdg1, Ne8; 25. Rg8+, Rxg8; 26. hxg8(Q)++, Kxg8; 27. Rg1+" which is indeed winning for White, but overlooks that 24. ...Ne8 allows 25. Qxf8#. It's not often I get to correct a former British champion's exercises for him. :)

[Malacandra]

Karpov was a Soviet drone. His physical conditioning was horrible. He was pale and gaunt because he never went outside or exercised. Instead, he spent all his time studying chess under the heavy weight of Soviet coaches who did not necessarily share Fischer's opinions on physical fitness, body and mind, that sort of thing. But chess at that level is almost as physically demanding as it is mentally demanding. Plus, we all know that the body tires when the mind does. The eyes hurt. The head aches. And the body longs to remove itself from the table.

I wouldn't insult Petrosian by comparing him to Karpov. Petrosian was a defender, yes, but an aggressive defender who used his defensive strategies as a means to launch counter-attacks against mistakes and careless play. Karpov was a machine, playing for the draw rather than the win unless the win simply presented itself. We can both speculate any way we like about how he might have fared against Fischer, but I don't think Alekhine-Capablanca is an apt comparison. Frankly, had there been a time-warp and Fischer had ended up defending against Kasparov after the fall of the Soviet Union, I doubt that he would have bothered with trying to set up new rules. Like I said, they were designed for the sole purpose of nullifying the Soviet apparatchik.

Yes, Fischer certainly accepted draws throughout the course of his career. And of course I know that there are other methods to draw. But to fail to see his intentions for the Karpov match is to remove everything from its context. He expressly said that his rules were designed not to reward draws. He knew what the Soviet strategy would be for the match. And he knew that the frail, ashen Soviet darling of chess would crumble under the pressure of having to win games to win the match. You may say he was wrong, but he knew more than either of us about the Soviet cabal. He faced it time and time again.

The Wikipedia article on Karpov (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_Karpov) appears to be revisionist, too, even where it doesn't mention Fischer. It gives the bare facts of his Candidates' wins against Polugaevsky (+3=5) and Spassky (+4-1=6), and also credits his "tenacious and aggressive play" in winning the latter match, in the face of earlier predictions that Spassky would wipe the floor with him and despite losing the opening game to Spassky. His stamina was tested in the final Candidates match with Korchoi, where it was the meek and unaggressive Karpov who went three games up before finally winning +3-2=19. Kasparov points out that Fischer had been sulking in his tent for three years while Karpov had been playing very serious competitive chess, although Spassky is quoted as saying that Fischer would have won in 1975 but Karpov would have qualified again and won in 1978.

Karpov won Las Palmas 1977 with a score of 13.5/15 - that's twelve wins minimum. He scored four early wins against Kasparov in their 1984 title match and was 5-0 ahead before Kasparov won any; in none of their four subsequent matches did Kasparov win by more than a single game.

It might be worthwhile to add this:

The next major meeting of Kasparov and Karpov was the 1994 Linares chess tournament. The field, in eventual finishing order, was Karpov, Kasparov, Shirov, Bareev, Kramnik, Lautier, Anand, Kamsky, Topalov, Ivanchuk, Gelfand, Illescas, Judit Polgar, and Beliavsky; with an average ELO rating of 2685, the highest ever to that point, meaning it was the first Category XVIII tournament ever held. Impressed by the strength of the tournament, Kasparov had said several days before the tournament that the winner could rightfully be called the world champion of tournaments. Perhaps spurred on by this comment, Karpov played the best tournament of his life. He was undefeated and earned 11 points out of 13 possible (the best world-class tournament winning percentage since Alekhine won San Remo in 1930), dominating second-place Kasparov and Shirov by a huge 2.5 points. Many of his wins were spectacular (in particular, his win over Topalov is considered possibly the finest of his career). This performance against the best players in the world put his ELO rating tournament performance at 2985, the highest performance rating of any chess player in any tournament in all of chess history.

Note that 11 out of 13 and finishing 2.5 points ahead of Kasparov and Shirov. Quite an achievement for a timid drawing master, no? :dubious:

In summary (speaking as a disinterested party), I find your assessment of Karpov unfair with a strong flavour of jingoism. But if all that you say is true, and Karpov in 1975 was a fraction of the player he would later become, and a physically weedy specimen unsuited to the rigours of a long match, why in Kaissa's name did Fischer insist that a 9-9 result meant he retained the title when it was there for the taking simply by dropping this condition?

[Miller]

Fischer suspected two things: (1) that they had transmission and/or receiving devices under them, and (2) that they adjusted them as part of the rest of their eye, hand, and facial expression signals. I realize that in this day and age of Internet conspiracy jokesters, this sound like just more of the same, but Soviet cheating was common knowledge, especially in the form of collusion, which two economists have fairly well and conclusively documented (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=905612) in a peer-review journal article, "Did the Soviets Collude? A Statistical Analysis of Championship Chess 1940-64". Their work covers only up to the mid 60s, but it shows the pattern and there's no reason to believe the Soviets suddenly reformed when Fischer burst onto the scene and began knocking down their grandmasters like bowling pins.

I don't doubt at all that the Soviets cheated at chess, just as they did in every other international competition in which they were involved. I just don't buy the "no hats" rule as a realistic counter-measure.

[Liberal]

In summary (speaking as a disinterested party), I find your assessment of Karpov unfair with a strong flavour of jingoism. But if all that you say is true, and Karpov in 1975 was a fraction of the player he would later become, and a physically weedy specimen unsuited to the rigours of a long match, why in Kaissa's name did Fischer insist that a 9-9 result meant he retained the title when it was there for the taking simply by dropping this condition?Karpov did indeed improve considerably over the 20 year period, and I do not mean to take away from him in that regard. I haven't even talked about him as a modern player at all. Many other players got better as they got older too, like Lasker for instance. But you keep discounting the fact that the player in question at the time was not one man — it was a dozen Soviet grandmasters, the KGB, and the full weight and influence of the Soviet Politburo, and even the Kremlin itself. This wasn't Russia; it was the Soviet Union — a failed totalitarian state that spent a large portion of its spare rubles on first-class accomodations for its chess prodigies. And it did this because they represented success in the midst of all the failures of socialism and the soviet system.

Fischer could not drop the condition because it would have begun a cascade of Soviet counter-demands. The USSR was not a nation in which there was debate over whether waterboarding is torture. Its massive chess machinery would have lept upon the slightest sign of weakness, which is exactly what it did when the USCF balked at backing Fischer. Their betrayal of him was tantamount to a show of weakness, and so they put their foot down at this arbitrary line knowing that there was nothing Fischer could do.

Incidentally, these Wikipedia cites are interesting and all, but lest you think I'm a lone wolf in my opinions (and you do not believe what I said were the opinions of Yasser and Lev), Susan Polgar, a contemporary chess legend who plays competitively on a grandmaster level with men, writes (http://susanpolgar.blogspot.com/2006/05/fischer-karpov-1975.html):

I personally asked Karpov, Spassky and Kasparov about the 1975 Fischer - Karpov matchup. All three said that they felt Fischer may have had an edge in 1975. However, all three also agreed that Karpov would have defeated Fischer in a rematch.And thus, Karpov himself gave Fischer the edge. But they all knew that he would improve over time with further Soviet training, which seems to have come to fruition in the 1990s. They knew that Fischer would languish in isolation, having been abandoned by his own backers.

[Liberal]

I don't doubt at all that the Soviets cheated at chess, just as they did in every other international competition in which they were involved. I just don't buy the "no hats" rule as a realistic counter-measure.Fair enough. But you just might have looked at it differently if you had been playing in conditions where every third body in the room was a Soviet agent of some sort or another, whether a state-sponsored grandmaster or an "assistant".

[treis]

Karpov did indeed improve considerably over the 20 year period, and I do not mean to take away from him in that regard. I haven't even talked about him as a modern player at all. Many other players got better as they got older too, like Lasker for instance. But you keep discounting the fact that the player in question at the time was not one man — it was a dozen Soviet grandmasters, the KGB, and the full weight and influence of the Soviet Politburo, and even the Kremlin itself. This wasn't Russia; it was the Soviet Union — a failed totalitarian state that spent a large portion of its spare rubles on first-class accomodations for its chess prodigies. And it did this because they represented success in the midst of all the failures of socialism and the soviet system.

What did the KGB do, specifically and with cite please, to influence the results of chess matches?

Your description of this Soviet machine going up against the poor widdle Americans is not accurate. Yes, the Soviets were serious about chess, but that doesn't conflate an unfair advantage. Fischer could have had access to US grandmasters if he wanted, but his growing insanity and personality prevented that.


Fischer could not drop the condition because it would have begun a cascade of Soviet counter-demands. The USSR was not a nation in which there was debate over whether waterboarding is torture. Its massive chess machinery would have lept upon the slightest sign of weakness, which is exactly what it did when the USCF balked at backing Fischer. Their betrayal of him was tantamount to a show of weakness, and so they put their foot down at this arbitrary line knowing that there was nothing Fischer could do.


This is a gross misrepresentation of what the international and U.S. chess community did for Fischer.

(1) Fischer shouldn't have even been eligible to compete for the 1972 World title. He refused to compete in the U.S. championship, which was a qualifier, because of yet another one of his format disputes. Only because of the work of the USCF and the graciousness of another American player did Fischer get to compete.

(2) FIDE changed the qualification tournaments in response to Fischers (justified) complaint of Soviet collusion.

(3) When Fischer refused to play for the world championship because he felt the prize fund was too small, it was doubled quickly.

(4) Spassky agreed to change the playing conditions of their match in the middle of it, simply to accommodate Fischer's paranoia. This likely caused financial hardship for the backers of the match.

(5) FIDE tried to modify Fischer's 9-9 demand to a 6-6 match, but caved when Fischer held firm to his demand.

(6) The only demand that FIDE refused to meet out of the 64 Fischer set forth was one that provided him with an unfair advantage.

No, FIDE was not simply a tool of the Soviet machine. They, as you noted, agreed to change the championship match to a format that was more favorable to Fischer's style of play. They changed the qualifier to satisfy his demands. They did everything Fischer wanted to in regards to playing conditions. The only thing they weren't willing to do for Fischer was confer an unfair advantage.

[Liberal]

What did the KGB do, specifically and with cite please, to influence the results of chess matches?The KGB influenced chess results by influencing chess players by monitoring them when they played abroad. That's what KGB agents did for a living — monitor people. It was a part of the whole Soviet machine. This was all common knowledge, and the demand for a cite is frankly ridiculous. But here is one from The Independent (http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/article3350920.ece):

The USSR took its chess very seriously. Potential champions were selected young and trained by grandmasters. They were expected not just to excel in the game, but to be model Soviet citizens, ambassadors for their country. At home, they were admired like rock stars. Abroad, they were carefully, protectively watched by the KGB.

Out of 88 chess grandmasters in the world, 33 were from the Soviet Union, and another large batch were from the satellite communist states of eastern Europe. Every world chess champion since 1937 had been a Soviet citizen.

Against this vast phalanx of chess champions, all the US had to offer was this strange loner who had dropped out of school in his teens.

Your description of this Soviet machine going up against the poor widdle Americans is not accurate. Yes, the Soviets were serious about chess, but that doesn't conflate an unfair advantage. Fischer could have had access to US grandmasters if he wanted, but his growing insanity and personality prevented that.What US grandmasters? Byrne? Bisguier? There was not a one that hadn't been Fischer's punching bag on his way to the top.

This is a gross misrepresentation of what the international and U.S. chess community did for Fischer.

(1) Fischer shouldn't have even been eligible to compete for the 1972 World title. He refused to compete in the U.S. championship, which was a qualifier, because of yet another one of his format disputes. Only because of the work of the USCF and the graciousness of another American player did Fischer get to compete.

(2) FIDE changed the qualification tournaments in response to Fischers (justified) complaint of Soviet collusion.

(3) When Fischer refused to play for the world championship because he felt the prize fund was too small, it was doubled quickly.

(4) Spassky agreed to change the playing conditions of their match in the middle of it, simply to accommodate Fischer's paranoia. This likely caused financial hardship for the backers of the match.

(5) FIDE tried to modify Fischer's 9-9 demand to a 6-6 match, but caved when Fischer held firm to his demand.

(6) The only demand that FIDE refused to meet out of the 64 Fischer set forth was one that provided him with an unfair advantage.

No, FIDE was not simply a tool of the Soviet machine. They, as you noted, agreed to change the championship match to a format that was more favorable to Fischer's style of play. They changed the qualifier to satisfy his demands. They did everything Fischer wanted to in regards to playing conditions. The only thing they weren't willing to do for Fischer was confer an unfair advantage.Is that what Wikipedia said? Fischer actually made 127 demands, 2 of which were not met including the 9-9 demand. FIDE was negotiating in the manner that an undersecretary negotiates. They could make no decisions without tacit Soviet approval. If they have Google where you are, look up what Kasparov has to say about FIDE and the Soviets.

Look up also what happened to him in 1984 when he was slated to play the darling Karpov. The whole match was postponed because "players were tired". Kasparov denies that he was tired, and the notion that such a postponement of a prestigious internal match could have happened without direct Kremlin intervention is naive in its conception.

[Miller]

The KGB influenced chess results by influencing chess players by monitoring them when they played abroad. That's what KGB agents did for a living — monitor people. It was a part of the whole Soviet machine. This was all common knowledge, and the demand for a cite is frankly ridiculous. But here is one from The Independent (http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/article3350920.ece):

The USSR took its chess very seriously. Potential champions were selected young and trained by grandmasters. They were expected not just to excel in the game, but to be model Soviet citizens, ambassadors for their country. At home, they were admired like rock stars. Abroad, they were carefully, protectively watched by the KGB.

Out of 88 chess grandmasters in the world, 33 were from the Soviet Union, and another large batch were from the satellite communist states of eastern Europe. Every world chess champion since 1937 had been a Soviet citizen.

Against this vast phalanx of chess champions, all the US had to offer was this strange loner who had dropped out of school in his teens.


Your cite refers to the KGB watching their own players. I'm not sure how that translates into a disadvantage for American players. For that matter, I'm not entirely sure how the KGB monitoring American players necessarily translates into a disadvantage for American players.

Is that what Wikipedia said? Fischer actually made 127 demands, 2 of which were not met including the 9-9 demand. FIDE was negotiating in the manner that an undersecretary negotiates. They could make no decisions without tacit Soviet approval. If they have Google where you are, look up what Kasparov has to say about FIDE and the Soviets.

Wait, the FIDE agreed to 125 out of 127 of Fischer's demands, and this is evidence that the FIDE was biased against Fischer?

[treis]

What US grandmasters? Byrne? Bisguier? There was not a one that hadn't been Fischer's punching bag on his way to the top.

So? They still could have helped him.



Is that what Wikipedia said? Fischer actually made 127 demands, 2 of which were not met including the 9-9 demand. FIDE was negotiating in the manner that an undersecretary negotiates. They could make no decisions without tacit Soviet approval. If they have Google where you are, look up what Kasparov has to say about FIDE and the Soviets.

Cite for the 127 demands? Every place I've looked says 64.

I don't know why you continue to ignore my arguments. You say that FIDE could not change the rules without Soviet approval, but the evidence says otherwise. FIDE changed the candidates matches to prevent Soviet draw collusion. Tell me, why would the Soviets allow this change? FIDE agreed to change the structure of the match to favor Fischer. Why would the Soviets allow this? Fischer should not have been eligible for the 72 championship match. If the Soviets were in control why wouldn't they have prevented him from competing?

Don't just come at me with snark. Address and respond to my arguments.

[glee]

I consider you to be one of those people. We don't know each other in real life, but we went through that prayer thing here on the board many years ago. You might not even remember it at all, but I won't ever forget how fair, gracious, and accomodating you were. Though the experiment failed on one level, it succeeded on another. You gained a lifelong admirer.

You're most kind, but I am slightly worried that I wasn't that person. :eek:
Anyway I do appreciate your attitude!

[glee]

Karpov was a Soviet drone. His physical conditioning was horrible. He was pale and gaunt because he never went outside or exercised. Instead, he spent all his time studying chess under the heavy weight of Soviet coaches who did not necessarily share Fischer's opinions on physical fitness, body and mind, that sort of thing. But chess at that level is almost as physically demanding as it is mentally demanding. Plus, we all know that the body tires when the mind does. The eyes hurt. The head aches. And the body longs to remove itself from the table.


I agree that being unfit makes one a weaker player. However (as Malacandra has posted), Karpov had world-class results for years.


Yes, Fischer certainly accepted draws throughout the course of his career. And of course I know that there are other methods to draw. But to fail to see his intentions for the Karpov match is to remove everything from its context. He expressly said that his rules were designed not to reward draws. He knew what the Soviet strategy would be for the match. And he knew that the frail, ashen Soviet darling of chess would crumble under the pressure of having to win games to win the match. You may say he was wrong, but he knew more than either of us about the Soviet cabal. He faced it time and time again.

If Fischer wanted to ignore draws (fair enough), all he needed was to say "first to win 10 games wins the match". He didn't need the 9-9 clause, which caused him to lose a lot of international support.

Oh, and on a related topic:

I'd like to add that Fischer's '60 memorable games' is one of the most remarkable chess books ever published.
Although it's likely that US GM Larry Evans actually took Fischer's analysis and comments and put them into book form, the book is still full of amazing games, well-analysed and with little comments - "my opponent went suspiciously quiet, so I thought he had set a trap" - that really add to the atmosphere.
Also Fischer gave a few losses, which was unheard of at the time. (Players used to show only how wonderful they were...)

Fischer was undoubtedly (accidentally!) responsible for a massive world boom in chess, particularly in the US, when he played Spassky.

[glee]

Another Fischer quote to add to those listed by glee. Speaking to Dick Cavett, Fischer said, "When I have white, I win because I'm white. When I have black, I win because I'm Fischer."

I think he nicked that!

“When I have White, I win because I am white;
When I have Black, I win because I am Bogolyubov”

Efim Bogolyubov 1889-1952

[Malacandra]

I think he nicked that!


Efim Bogolyubov 1889-1952

Although the quote would have been more factually accurate had it run:


“When I have White, I win because I am white;
When I have Black, I win because I am not playing Alekhine” :D

[Liberal]

Don't just come at me with snark. Address and respond to my arguments.Frankly, you can take your "arguments" to Great Debates and your snark to the Pit. I'm no longer going to enjoin you here because it merely perpetuates the repeated slurs against this great player, and the trivialization of his career and struggles as people continue to quote anonymous contributors from Wikipedia while ignoring the comments from mainstream newspapers, Susan Polgar, Kasparov, and Karpov himself. Neither of us will convince the other of anything.

I'd like to add that Fischer's '60 memorable games' is one of the most remarkable chess books ever published.Again we agree. For me, it's the narrative in the analysis. I like to know how a great player thinks. I wish more chess analysis was like that. In other books, the cold listing of move-branches becomes so boring after the first few games. And there's always some uncommented move that really needs a comment. But not in this book. It's just right.

[BarnOwl]

I think he nicked that!

“When I have White, I win because I am white;
When I have Black, I win because I am Bogolyubov”

Efim Bogolyubov 1889-1952

Shame on you, Lib. :D :D :D :D

I'm a lowly patzer (if that's the term) and I knew that quote.

[Malacandra]

A perfectly-correct use of a seldom-heard term. :)

I'm sorry that Liberal feels that Fischer is being traduced in this thread, especially if he feels I contributed to this; for myself, I set out my stall with my first post in the thread, when I expressed my admiration for Fischer's chess, and I have reiterated this view once or twice. And it's true that I've only cited Wikipedia here; it's difficult to cut and paste from, say, The Oxford Companion To Chess, which I would hope was less likely to have been hijacked by pro-Karpov revisionists than Wikipedia might putatively have been, or from numerous other chess books I have read over the years.

Doubtless it would help if I could name-check a grandmaster or two whom I know personally and who endorse my position, but I don't move in such exalted circles. I guess I have to proceed by reason and appeal to facts.

The simple fact of the matter is that Fischer's intended victory conditions for the 1975 world championship were functionally equivalent to:

"The title shall go to whoever first wins ten games, draws not counting. However, Fischer shall receive a one-game start."

My position that this is functionally equivalent to Fischer's stated condition can be easily falsified by providing a scoreline that is a win under my suggested phrasing, and not a win under Fischer's.

I believe my phrasing is less obfuscatory and makes the unfairness of Fischer's conditions patently obvious, and nothing can make them fair; no appeals to pity for Fischer's misunderstood genius and unworthy allies, no slippery-slope arguments alleging without proof that had this one demand been refused the Soviets would have played FIDE like a fiddle, no ad hominem about Karpov's playing strength or style or physical weakness, no scaremongering about what the KGB could or could not do, no quibbling as to whether the record shows that Fischer tried to impose 64 conditions or the more reasonable 127, and certainly no complaining about the weakness of American chess generally compared to Russian. When the supposedly strongest player in the world is demanding a 1-0 lead before he will consent to sit down and defend his title, it ill behooves him or his adherents to deride the sportsmanship of the other side, and it is hardly character assassination to point this out.

[treis]

Frankly, you can take your "arguments" to Great Debates and your snark to the Pit. I'm no longer going to enjoin you here because it merely perpetuates the repeated slurs against this great player, and the trivialization of his career and struggles as people continue to quote anonymous contributors from Wikipedia while ignoring the comments from mainstream newspapers, Susan Polgar, Kasparov, and Karpov himself. Neither of us will convince the other of anything.


Uh hu. I smash your arguments and you take your ball and go home. Typical.

[Liberal]

Well, no, I didn't mean to target you, Malacandra, or for that matter anyone in particular, but it is a longstanding tradition that threadshitting in tribute threads in Cafe Society is frowned upon. See here (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=9397305&postcount=231), for example. There's nothing wrong with opening a separate thread to trash Fischer, but somehow it seems that some of us missed the punctuation in the thread title. ;)

[Malacandra]

Oh, well, if I'd been wanting to trash Fischer, instead of arguing the toss about how he effectively disqualified himself from defending his world title, I'd maybe have started another thread. On the whole I tried to paint myself as generally pro-Fischer, especially considering the posters who were talking about him being a nutbar anti-Semite who wouldn't be missed one little bit.

[Liberal]

That's why I said I didn't mean you. I think you have argued fairly, and my disagreement with your arguments does not constitute any disrespect. I realize, for example, the logical implication of the 9-9 demand just as you explained it. But Fischer was taking no more than he had been willing to give, vis a vis the first game at Reykjavik. :)

[glee]

I'm sorry there's a bit of edge creeping into the thread, which has otherwise been very interesting.

For example, I was fascinated to learn (thanks to Liberal) that Karpov, Spassky and Kasparov all felt Fischer would have had an edge over Karpov in 1975. :cool:

Can I try to bring posters together?

1. KGB minders:

It's certainly true that the Soviets kept a horribly repressive eye on their players. When Taimanov lost to Fischer 6-0, he was punished. :mad:

Taimanov: The sanctions from the Soviet government were severe. I was deprived of my civil rights, my salary was taken away from me. (All Soviet grandmasters received from their government a substantial salary). I was prohibited from travelling abroad and censored in the press. It was unthinkable to the authorities that a Soviet grandmaster could lose in such a way to an American, without a political explanation. I became the object of slander and was accused, among other things, of secretly reading the books of Solzhenitsin. I was banned from society for two years.

http://www.guardian.co.tt/archives/2006-08-26/SA-4.html

I remember when my club team played a Soviet team in the European Championship that they brought 8 incredibly strong players, a competent captain and an 'interpreter'. The 'interpreter' spoke no English and obviously knew nothing about chess. (He also wore a trenchcoat :rolleyes: ). However no Soviet player could leave the playing hall without the interpreter's permission.

This system put pressure on the Soviet players, but not really on their opponents, unless they had Soviet connections.
Indeed when Karpov played the defector Korchnoi, the Soviets threatened Korchnoi's family.

Korchnoi's wife and son were still in the Soviet Union. His son was promised to be released to join his father in exile if he gave up his passport. When he did so, he was promptly drafted into the Soviet army.
Korchnoi took the opportunity of the match to publicize the situation of his wife and son, drafting an open letter to the Soviet government to release them both.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Korchnoi

Fischer rightly felt the Soviet players would work together against him in tournaments (they did :( ), but it wouldn't have mattered much in a match.

2. 1975 Fischer - Karpov match negotiations

Sadly I have recently disposed of my British Chess magazine collection (as part of my first anti-hoarding clean-out!), which included detailed reports of the 1975 FIDE negotiations. But from memory, there were several camps, ranging from the Soviet diehards, through various neutrals to Fischer supporters. The voting on each clause reflected this.
Nevertheless my memory is that the vote went in favour of draws not counting and first to 10 wins. The '9-9 meaning Fischer wins' clause was rejected. These support me:

Fischer drew up a list of ten demands, chief among them the provisions that draws wouldn't count, the first to ten victories wins, and if the score was tied 9—9 the champion would retain the crown. This means that the challenger needed two wins more than the reigning champion, because the narrowest possible win for him is 10—8. The International Chess Federation (FIDE) flatly refused at first, but eventually conceded the first two.

http://www.answers.com/topic/anatoly-karpov

The tie clause was widely perceived as unfair and the majority of Grandmasters were against it. Robert Byrne described it as "absolutely stark naked cheating", Bent Larsen called it "the first unethical thing Fischer has done."
...
Fischer had broken his word to abolish the champion's advantage, costing him credibility and adding to his reputation of unreliability
...
Fischer himself had called the tie clause unimportant and unlikely to be invoked, yet refused to play without it, despite having gotten the pure Wins format, which was supposed to be the important thing.
...
Fischer never made any attempt to sell his proposals, either to FIDE or the American Public. Demanded them, yes. Sold them, no. His attitude was essentially "Gimme, or I'm not playing", but he never went to bat for the format and tried to explain why it was a good idea. Neither did he try to prove that the Pure Wins format could work in modern chess by actually playing the match.
...
Eventually FIDE agreed to all of Fischer's demands except for the 9-9 Tie Clause. However, Fischer had refused to negotiate on any of his points

http://members.aol.com/graemecree/chesschamps/world/world1975.htm

I really wish Fischer had played first to 10 wins - it would have been great.

I do wonder if he was feeling a reaction to having spent years 'fighting an entire country' and winning, achieving his ambition to be World Champion and then realising it was all effectively over. Eventually a younger challenger would beat him and he didn't have any life outside chess. :(

3. There is no doubt that Fischer was one of the greatest chess players ever and he never did anything wrong at the board itself.
As I've said, he wrote a magnificent book (and I wish he'd done more!).
He popularised chess to an unprecedented level.

However he had difficulty dealing with people and organisers, and finished his life as a sad embittered man.

Ah well.

[Liberal]

Blessed are the peacemakers, glee. :D I will concede that Fischer wasn't a good salesman, and that he suffered from a severe lack of tact and social skills, and that these shortcomings proved harmful to him when he made his demands. I will also concede that my own position (and the position of our group at the time) was outside the mainstream. But I maintain the right to hold my position, however eccentric it may be, and would appreciate the respect of others who hold a different position. I do not deserve to be dismissed with tired metaphors about taking balls home and abandoning the discussion. Is that okay?

[BarnOwl]

And blessed is the Liberal who writes so well.

[wolf_meister]

from part 3 of glee's posting
There is no doubt that Fischer was one of the greatest chess players ever and he never did anything wrong at the board itself.
As I've said, he wrote a magnificent book (and I wish he'd done more!).
He popularised chess to an unprecedented level.

However he had difficulty dealing with people and organisers, and finished his life as a sad embittered man.


I think that is an apt, well-phrased assessment of Mr Fischer's life. :)
Congrats to glee for finally letting this thread arrive at a peaceful conclusion.

I'd like to cite a non-chess, low-brow quote. From the Twilight Zone episode "Game Of Pool" spoken by Jonathan Winters as 'Fats' Brown "I'm a pool player. In all the world there's probably not a more unimportant thing ... but I am the best." :D

Yes, it must be something to be the absolute best at anything in this world.
And for a moment, Bobby Fischer had that distinction.
R.I.P. Bobby

[BarnOwl]

I agree with wolf meister.

Bobbie became irrational. Can we blame him for his crazy pronouncements? Fischer said the U.S. got what it deserved with 9/11. He was whacko by then so it didn't bother me.


But one of the top GOP preachers said God was punishing us with 9/11 because of our sinful ways. And he's supposed to be sane.

[BarnOwl]

At COSTCO today, I dropped off my Photog class assignment phots for printing, then got a book to read to while away the 15 minute wait time.

With this thread totally out of mind, the book I bought is "The Eight." On the page just before the story begins, therre is a by Ben Franklin: Life is a kind of chess.

Above that is a Bobby Fischer quote: Chess is life.

It gets mixed reviews at

http://www.amazon.com/Eight-Novel-Suspense-Katherine-Neville/dp/0345366239/ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201117466&sr=1-2

[treis]

Blessed are the peacemakers, glee. :D I will concede that Fischer wasn't a good salesman, and that he suffered from a severe lack of tact and social skills, and that these shortcomings proved harmful to him when he made his demands. I will also concede that my own position (and the position of our group at the time) was outside the mainstream. But I maintain the right to hold my position, however eccentric it may be, and would appreciate the respect of others who hold a different position. I do not deserve to be dismissed with tired metaphors about taking balls home and abandoning the discussion. Is that okay?

I spent a decent amount of time researching and writing responses to your position. I hardly think think counts as dismissing your positions. You're the one that dismissed mine with the "Is that what Wikipedia said". I still want you to respond to my arguments, but I don't think you will. Instead, it looks like you are planning on taking offense and going off in a huff. Hence my take your ball and go home comment.

[Liberal]

At COSTCO today, I dropped off my Photog class assignment phots for printing, then got a book to read to while away the 15 minute wait time.

With this thread totally out of mind, the book I bought is "The Eight." On the page just before the story begins, therre is a by Ben Franklin: Life is a kind of chess.

Above that is a Bobby Fischer quote: Chess is life.

It gets mixed reviews at

http://www.amazon.com/Eight-Novel-Suspense-Katherine-Neville/dp/0345366239/ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201117466&sr=1-2A fascinating coincidence. :)

[treis]

I agree that being unfit makes one a weaker player.

This is a true statement, but physical fitness should be minimized as a factor in chess. If the Kasparov-Karpov match had been the traditional 24 game match, Karpov would have smashed Kasparov 5 wins to none. It seems to me that the extended nature of the match and Karpov's ill health allowed Kasparov to come back. That's not a satisfying result for me.

[wolf_meister]

treis
Just when I thought this thread was coming to a peaceful conclusion, you had to step in and almost ruin it.
How about starting a new thread and just letting this one end on a somewhat happy note. (F# perhaps :) ) ?

[Liberal]

It's okay. It's understandable that passions can run high over a topic as rich as Bobby Fischer. Treis makes a good point that he spent a lot of time on this, doing research and formulating arguments. For me, though, it's personal because of my involvement over time. I don't deny that I brought my bias in here.

[C K Dexter Haven]

Uh hu. I smash your arguments and you take your ball and go home. Typical.
Moderator interjection: treis, you know quite well that this kind of personal insult is not permitted in this forum. Please refrain.

[brownie55]

Moderator interjection: treis, you know quite well that this kind of personal insult is not permitted in this forum. Please refrain.
Some day I will learn not to poke mods in the eye. But not tonight.

Please sir, explain why that was an insult. It's an accurate observation of exactly what happened.

Odd that Liberal linked to SkipMagic's post in his warning. Somebody got warned about being a junior mod in that one, same as Lib should have been warned here, IMHO.

Who will rid us of this meddelsome poster?

[glee]

This is a true statement, but physical fitness should be minimized as a factor in chess. If the Kasparov-Karpov match had been the traditional 24 game match, Karpov would have smashed Kasparov 5 wins to none. It seems to me that the extended nature of the match and Karpov's ill health allowed Kasparov to come back. That's not a satisfying result for me.

Certainly the fact that a world-class player can draw a lot (yes Peter Leko, I am looking at you!) means there is a risk of over-running in any 'first to n wins' match.

Maybe Kasparov would have chosen different opening lines in a 24 game match? - it's hard to say.

And you can't keep physical fitness out of international chess, because a single game can last up to 7 hours (and keep a player busy for another hour afterwards analysing it).

[Malacandra]

Liberal, I'm happy to disagree with you on some points of fine detail, for on one thing we're most certainly of one mind: that Fischer was a giant of the game the memory of whose play deserves to live on as long as chess is played. Chess is the poorer for having been deprived of his talent when he ought to have had so many good years still in him, no matter whose fault this was, and I deeply regret his too-early meeting with the one opponent who has a win-loss record a hundred percent in his favour (even if he can never remember how the knight is supposed to move).

[Liberal]

I appreciate your letting me know that, Malacandra. Thanks.