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On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

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Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#101

Post by ritchiea »

magicalhippo wrote: post #99
philjr wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything you put "work" in to (like serious hobbies, sports etc.) can still be considered a hobby / leisure. Lots of competitive low end golfers, tennis players, basketball players etc. I've found it one of the best outlets from work quite frankly, to have another committed side interest that requires dedication and commitment. You should try it :-)

When I studied I worked at a grocery store part time, and found it a very good fit as it was mostly mechanical work requiring very little mental capacity. After I graduated and got a programming job, I found that my hobbies took a big hit, as they all mostly required similar mental focus as work. So these days I generally do a lot less mentally taxing things. Sure I'll have bursts of creativity, but most days my brai…

Yea I don't think the response above you actually understood my comment. I do play chess somewhat seriously and it's similar mental labor as programming. And I can only do so much more serious mental work after a day at work coding. And I definitely could not commit to two hours of serious chess study every day. Maybe 30-60 minutes of games & puzzles.

Playing a sport is completely different from playing chess, the physicality of a sport is at least different type of challenge.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#102

Post by karatinversion »

jen729w wrote: post #65
globular-toast wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, to be able to spend 2 hours a day on this seems like an indescribable luxury to me. Is this how far we've regressed? I'm sure most humans through history have had more free time than you.

While agreeing with your general principle, I think you're being unfair. Two hours a day, every day, is a lot of time. I barely watch television and still, if you asked me to find two more hours every day I'd tell you that you were crazy. I already have hobbies. I relax. I spend time with my partner. I sleep, I cook, I work, I walk. I do not find myself with two hours that I don't know what to do with, and I'd challe…

Every hour ends up going to something. To make space for something new, something else always has to go.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#103

Post by hackerNoose »

sedivy94 wrote: post #31

Highly, highly recommend "The Queen's Gambit" on Netflix. Like wow.

It's not very realistic when it comes to the chess, except the actual games. I also found it frustrating that they obviously were inspired by Bobby Fischer whose real life would have made a great story, but decided he wasn't hollywood friendly.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#104

Post by globular-toast »

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #91
globular-toast wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once again HN readers revealing how sheltered they are in their little bubbles. If you pay attention to it you'll see how far removed from reality a lot of the readers here are. It's quite worrying really.

Can you elaborate instead of just dropping a sharp comment? I'm curious about what you mean.

Sure. I see it almost every time I visit HN. I've encountered many people with a slightly warped sense of reality but none more so that on this website.

There are two broad patterns I often see:

The first is where they think everyone on the planet is somewhat like them. You'll see comments like "everyone should be able to program" or even "everyone should program". I've even seen people claim that ability to program should be considered a fundamental life skill. In general it's hugely overestimating not only the IQ but the interests and mindset of the general public. The comment I replied to here is an example of this type.

The other one is where their perception of a baseline standard of living is far higher than that of average people even within their own country. It's usually that they think some luxury item is absolutely essential despite people around the world living healthy and happy lives without it. They seem to be completely unaware that these other people exist.

My theory is that these people have been fed through schools in affluent areas, through university and straight into ridiculously high paying jobs and have simply never had (and probably never will have) any contact with people from other walks of life.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#105

Post by tikej »

sedivy94 wrote: post #31

Highly, highly recommend "The Queen's Gambit" on Netflix. Like wow.

It is a cool series but nowhere near real description of chess. Of course it’s ok, but it’s worth to remember, that in order to get to the international level you need excellent coaches and years of brutal many hour practice. Talent is somewhat important but nowhere as important as training.

To have more objective outlook at “chess prodigy” story it’s interesting to look story of Joshua Waitzkin. He is a great and talented chess player but not at the level of grandmasters. He explained that he didn’t really wanted to “sacrifice” other things in his life to become a grandmaster.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#106

Post by arcticfox »

nurettin wrote: post #53
windowshopping wrote: post #28

I did something very similar with an old strategy game called Age of empires II. Over the course of two years I went from a 1300 rating to 1850. I don't play chess, so it's hard for me to compare the scales, but I will say the highest players were rated around 2600. I think being 1850 put me around 90-95th percentile for active players-- there were less than 50 players over 2300, and only a few hundred over 2000. My…

There is not even a modicum of similarity other than both of them being called games.

You might enjoy the games of Federico Perez Ponsa, chess Grandmaster. He plays Age of Empires II at a 2k+ level and is known as Fedex.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#107

Post by baxtr »

windowshopping wrote: post #28

I did something very similar with an old strategy game called Age of empires II. Over the course of two years I went from a 1300 rating to 1850. I don't play chess, so it's hard for me to compare the scales, but I will say the highest players were rated around 2600. I think being 1850 put me around 90-95th percentile for active players-- there were less than 50 players over 2300, and only a few hundred over 2000. My…

Ahh. So many nights lost (spent) :) AoE was sooo much fun. Dunno. Feels like nothing similar out there nowadays?

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#108

Post by MauranKilom »

fabian2k wrote: post #75
mrslave wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick second endorsement for this absolute gem of a website: lichess.org. I've gone from a player who can't beat the computer on level 1 (estimated ELO 800 LOL) to winning 50% of matches on level 3 (est. ELO 1400). Still pretty poor, but so is my study effort. And I'm OK with it. My colleague from another time zone struggled to recommend a book for my level and kinda laughed (albeit politely). But now we can play a…

I would strongly recommend to play against real humans, not the computer. The computer with a handicap just plays in very weird ways, and that is not really helpful for learning. I also played the computer at first, and level 3 is the first level where it actually puts up a fight. But it plays very weird combinations of strong moves and then completely blunders at times. The problem is that it blunders in a very non-…

That has also been exactly my experience. Beating level 3 is just about capitalizing on the obvious blunders it makes. It feels completely unrewarding.

Playing against humans, even significantly stronger ones, is so much more fun and rewarding. It's just way more exciting when both sides can capitalize on smaller mistakes, so the game becomes about building and maintaining an advantage. Or setting up a tactic that feels great to pull off.

The computers will usually not yield any incremental advances at all (and they won't fall for tactics) until they make a dumb move that invalidates all the advantage they built up. Whether you win or lose depends mainly on how often the latter happens, and learning how to make that happen is both opaque/unfun and useless for playing against humans.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#109

Post by noahtallen »

baxtr wrote: post #107
windowshopping wrote: post #28

I did something very similar with an old strategy game called Age of empires II. Over the course of two years I went from a 1300 rating to 1850. I don't play chess, so it's hard for me to compare the scales, but I will say the highest players were rated around 2600. I think being 1850 put me around 90-95th percentile for active players-- there were less than 50 players over 2300, and only a few hundred over 2000. My…

Ahh. So many nights lost (spent) :) AoE was sooo much fun. Dunno. Feels like nothing similar out there nowadays?

AoE2 is alive and well with the recently-released definitive edition! I’m also excited for AoE4, which will be set in the same time period, but otherwise different.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#110

Post by nurettin »

arcticfox wrote: post #106
nurettin wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is not even a modicum of similarity other than both of them being called games.

You might enjoy the games of Federico Perez Ponsa, chess Grandmaster. He plays Age of Empires II at a 2k+ level and is known as Fedex.

Thanks, that is interesting. I used to be 2000+ rated for AOE1 on zone.com and 1400+ chess on Yahoo! games back in late 90s, and to me it is a point of contention that I often bring up because chess is not motivated by capital greed whereas microsoft and their game studios are. And the dissimilarity between two games is pretty obvious to anyone who plays above 700 ranks.
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