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Learning Chess at 40

nautil.us

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Re: Learning Chess at 40

#71

Post by jegutman »

jlg23 wrote: post #53

I think the author's real problem is less his age but his tendency to stick to rules which are just meant as "rules of thumb". He says that this is how he is thinking but still primarily blames his age. Following rules and schematics in chess is great/necessary for end games (which he says he wins) because there you really just work through the algorithms and it also allows for quickly played openings (assuming you m…

I'm a national master chess player and I think the opposite. In middle games heuristics are more important because even the final positions in your calculations will often still be very dynamic so you need some tools to be able to evaluate these positions you've never seen before. In endgames the same thing may happen, but the confidence around my evaluation will generally be much higher.

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#72

Post by V-2 »

MichaelGG wrote: post #70
keiferski wrote: post #11

Probably the most interesting example of someone pursuing chess later in life is that of Marcel Duchamp, the famous Cubist artist. He grew up playing chess for fun, but at age 36 he basically stopped making art and started pursuing chess full-time. "I am still a victim of chess. It has all the beauty of art—and much more. It cannot be commercialized. Chess is much purer than art in its social position." "The chess pi…

I just don't see the beauty in chess. It's got a lot of unjustifiable, inherent complexity. Different pieces with different rules under different conditions. You wouldn't expect multiple designers to converge, or discover, that game. It even has cultural elements embedded. Whereas Go is nearly as simple as possible, yet much deeper. It's easy to imagine different designers coming to the same set of rules.

While it's obviously true that rules of chess are more complex, I can't see what it has to do with beauty or the lack thereof.

It's very unlikely that different writers would independently come up with "War and Peace", does it make it less of a masterpiece?

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#73

Post by V-2 »

pcmaffey wrote: post #41

I highly recommend speed chess (5 mins), as it allows for many more repetitions. You'll learn faster what works / doesn't. Intersperse every once in a while with a slow game to rethink your fundamentals and strategy. Also, speed chess is much more forgiving. 1 mistake is not the end of the game, as time is the great equalizer. Whereas in slow chess, going down a pawn unintentionally is often a loss.

While great fun, I don't think playing blitz is beneficial in the long run.

It encourages plenty of bad habits: guessing (instead of calculating), "gambling" (making bold but refutable moves in hope that opponent misses the correct answer), over-relying on simple tricks like common opening traps which wouldn't work and would get you into an inferior position in a serious game, etc. etc.

Good blitz players are good chess players who happen to put their skills to a use by playing blitz, but they haven't developed these skills just by playing blitz

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#74

Post by ludamad »

MichaelGG wrote: post #70
keiferski wrote: post #11

Probably the most interesting example of someone pursuing chess later in life is that of Marcel Duchamp, the famous Cubist artist. He grew up playing chess for fun, but at age 36 he basically stopped making art and started pursuing chess full-time. "I am still a victim of chess. It has all the beauty of art—and much more. It cannot be commercialized. Chess is much purer than art in its social position." "The chess pi…

I just don't see the beauty in chess. It's got a lot of unjustifiable, inherent complexity. Different pieces with different rules under different conditions. You wouldn't expect multiple designers to converge, or discover, that game. It even has cultural elements embedded. Whereas Go is nearly as simple as possible, yet much deeper. It's easy to imagine different designers coming to the same set of rules.

Sure, the rules aren't beautiful, the theory that's entirely emergent is.

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#75

Post by jlg23 »

jegutman wrote: post #71
jlg23 wrote: post #53

I think the author's real problem is less his age but his tendency to stick to rules which are just meant as "rules of thumb". He says that this is how he is thinking but still primarily blames his age. Following rules and schematics in chess is great/necessary for end games (which he says he wins) because there you really just work through the algorithms and it also allows for quickly played openings (assuming you m…

I'm a national master chess player and I think the opposite. In middle games heuristics are more important because even the final positions in your calculations will often still be very dynamic so you need some tools to be able to evaluate these positions you've never seen before. In endgames the same thing may happen, but the confidence around my evaluation will generally be much higher.

Yes, heuristics are a very good guideline and I am grateful to have learned those at a very early age (that's how you were introduced to chess in the GDR).

I too apply them but my point is, in mid-game I'm much more free to ignore them than in openings or end-games in which I usually let my forearm do the thinking.

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#76

Post by atoponce »

I played chess religiously as a kid. I attended chess clubs, went to private tutoring, and completed in U.S. Chess Federation tournaments. I even have a few trophies in my room that I'm still proud of.

Some time in high school, while studying openings and their variations, I was curious if computers would ever beat the great Grand Masters regularly and consistently. It seemed to me that the key to this success would be a full comprehension of knowing which opening to start with, how to respond to your oponent's opening, and how deeply that opening variation was memorized.

So, it wasn't surprising to me to learn that the Grand Masters are Grand Masters because of their memorization of opening sequences, the depth of that memorization, and when to use which variation.

Then while studying old games played by the masters, I saw a trend that disturbed me: more and more, Grand Master games were ending in draws. I recall reading an article recently that more than 50% of said games are draws.

This bothers me for two reasons: first, that the game is designed so poorly, that draws can occur as frequently as they do. But, more disturbing, is knowing that they are ending in draws because of a mastery on the opening game.

I am no longer a chess proponent, and won't play it when asked (although that might change if my daughter wants to learn). The only chess I will play is Chess960, by Robert Fischer, where the back row is randomized to 1 of 960 possible starting positions. This way, the game is less sensitive to opening sequence memorization, but on more on basic tactical strategy, such as control of the center board, when to pull out your queen, and how knights can compliment bishops.

Now, I'm a large advocate of Go. The game is much more strategy based and less memorization (although there are a good amount of tsumego and joseki that should be memorized, and you should know opening theory). But, due to the size of the board, the games are considerably different, and it is less sensitive to tactics. Thus, draws occur mostly based on evenly matched strategies, and less on cognitive capacity.

Another game I am enjoying is the currently developed Tak by James Ernest (http://tinyurl.com/takgameks (link to Kickstarter campaign (I'm not a paid schill, I just enjoy the game))). A simpler game than chess and go to explain, yet deep with strategy, and new enough, that patterns and sequences are still being studied.

Don't get me wrong. Chess is entertaining. I am glad there are people that enjoy it, teach it, and play it. It's just no longer for me. Again, unless the game is Chess960.

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#77

Post by billforsternz »

As someone who has lost to a child on national television;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL5GE6S7LEk

I can sympathise with the author of the article. The cruel truth is that it is very difficult to improve as an adult. I think the analogy to learning language is a good one - to get really good learn as a child.

As far as I know there are no instances of a player learning to play as an adult and reaching grandmaster status. Akiba Rubinstein, an all time great who didn't learn until 16, was (nearly) an exception. Another famous (almost) counter-example is one of the pioneers of the Russian school of chess who learned chess from scratch twice - the second time as an adult after suffering total memory loss from a war injury. Unfortunately my Google Fu is failing me and I can't summon any confirmation or recall his name.

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#78

Post by billforsternz »

billforsternz wrote: post #77

As someone who has lost to a child on national television; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL5GE6S7LEk I can sympathise with the author of the article. The cruel truth is that it is very difficult to improve as an adult. I think the analogy to learning language is a good one - to get really good learn as a child. As far as I know there are no instances of a player learning to play as an adult and reaching grandmaster…

It turns out it was Alexander Ilyin-Zhenevsky, I thought as much but his Wikipedia page makes no mention of it.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessplayer?pid=20026

Re: Learning Chess at 40

#80

Post by rpgmaker »

billforsternz wrote: post #77

As someone who has lost to a child on national television; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL5GE6S7LEk I can sympathise with the author of the article. The cruel truth is that it is very difficult to improve as an adult. I think the analogy to learning language is a good one - to get really good learn as a child. As far as I know there are no instances of a player learning to play as an adult and reaching grandmaster…

I never knew about chocolate chess. Thanks for posting it!
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