Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

annekadet.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 94 posts

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#81

Post by pdevr »

dmurray wrote: post #80
pdevr wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is, then white queen follows up with checks which eventually also attack the black pawn. Since the black pawn is at a3, there is no immediate threat of queening. If black moves the king away from the pawn, white grabs it. If black keeps the king near the pawn, white forces black king under the pawn, and then moves his king, and black is forced to give up the pawn. Every continuation is losing for black.

The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. It's on h2 at the point where White queens with check. Black plays Kg1 and reaches a well known drawing position [0]. This is one of the first chess endgames most people learn after how to mate with queen or rook. Like I said, anyone playing at more than a beginner level normally knows this. Kf2 (instead of Kg2) draws in the same way. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/…

>The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3.

Meant h3, sorry, result of mental calculations.

I just checked on an analysis engine, and it confirms: every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move.

You can try it out here: https://www.chess.com/analysis

Load FEN: 8/2K5/8/7p/P7/5k2/8/8 w - - 0 1

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#82

Post by dmurray »

pdevr wrote: post #81
dmurray wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. It's on h2 at the point where White queens with check. Black plays Kg1 and reaches a well known drawing position [0]. This is one of the first chess endgames most people learn after how to mate with queen or rook. Like I said, anyone playing at more than a beginner level normally knows this. Kf2 (instead of Kg2) draws in the same way. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/…

>The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. Meant h3, sorry, result of mental calculations. I just checked on an analysis engine, and it confirms: every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move. You can try it out here: https://www.chess.com/analysis Load FEN: 8/2K5/8/7p/P7/5k2/8/8 w - - 0 1

> every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move.

But white doesn't have the first move. From the post:

> Black to move. Black offered a draw...

> I agreed so we played ... h4 a5 h3 a6 h2 a7 h1(Q) a8(Q)+

If white was to move the story would make even less sense. You can try it out by changing "w" to "b" in your FEN.

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#83

Post by [deleted] »

pdevr wrote: post #81
dmurray wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. It's on h2 at the point where White queens with check. Black plays Kg1 and reaches a well known drawing position [0]. This is one of the first chess endgames most people learn after how to mate with queen or rook. Like I said, anyone playing at more than a beginner level normally knows this. Kf2 (instead of Kg2) draws in the same way. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/…

>The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. Meant h3, sorry, result of mental calculations. I just checked on an analysis engine, and it confirms: every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move. You can try it out here: https://www.chess.com/analysis Load FEN: 8/2K5/8/7p/P7/5k2/8/8 w - - 0 1

[deleted]

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#84

Post by pdevr »

dmurray wrote: post #82
pdevr wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The black pawn is on the h-file and never goes to a3. Meant h3, sorry, result of mental calculations. I just checked on an analysis engine, and it confirms: every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move. You can try it out here: https://www.chess.com/analysis Load FEN: 8/2K5/8/7p/P7/5k2/8/8 w - - 0 1

> every position is losing for black, as long as white does not mess it up, and has the first move. But white doesn't have the first move. From the post: > Black to move. Black offered a draw... > I agreed so we played ... h4 a5 h3 a6 h2 a7 h1(Q) a8(Q)+ If white was to move the story would make even less sense. You can try it out by changing "w" to "b" in your FEN.

I missed this part "Black to move. Black offered a draw" - thanks for pointing that out. In that case, it is a draw. Of course, unless black messes it up!

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#85

Post by malort »

syspec wrote: post #69
pclmulqdq wrote: post #68

They can also teach you how to cheat without getting caught. They will teach you how to double down on the lie when you get caught. I have played against chess hustlers 5 times in Washington Square Park, caught 4 of them cheating on the spot, and figured out the last one at the end of the game. I'm not an amazing chess player (~1500), but fairly comfortable playing blitz (a bad hobby from when I used to play chess in…

How were they cheating? Moving pieces when you were not looking? Adding more time to their clock?

You can see a classic example here (around 2:20): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5vnpOp0U_g

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#86

Post by pclmulqdq »

pdevr wrote: post #73
pclmulqdq wrote: post #68

They can also teach you how to cheat without getting caught. They will teach you how to double down on the lie when you get caught. I have played against chess hustlers 5 times in Washington Square Park, caught 4 of them cheating on the spot, and figured out the last one at the end of the game. I'm not an amazing chess player (~1500), but fairly comfortable playing blitz (a bad hobby from when I used to play chess in…

I agree with this, since I have seen this in action. They cheat a lot, and argue with you when they lose. However: >But stealing, robbing, lying—if you eliminate that from your program, you’ll be 99% better as a person. Biblical references apart, this is the key point. The choice they made is a much better choice for most of them, and for the society around them. Playing chess helps many of them to focus on something…

Cheating at a game when there is money on the line is no less of a grift than robbing convenience stores, and there's plenty of lying involved. That's why they are called "hustlers," not because they do it for money.

Tax evasion (which one of these guys admitted to in the article) is the icing on the cake.

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#87

Post by siskiyou »

Comment from my 87yo father in law, a retired attorney: "Years ago I represented Yasser Seirawan, then the U.S. chess champ. He was interested in the Washington Square scene so I took him downtown. Of course, the hustlers were after him: he looked like a reasonably prosperous guy. He accepted after playing a little hard to get. The shock was obvious when he played much faster than the clock and won easily. He wouldn't take their money and when he told them his name they loved having played against him especially since he didn't complete the hustle by taking their money."

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#88

Post by RockyMcNuts »

rhexs wrote: post #47
RockyMcNuts wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet the poor get audited more than the rich ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/irs-audit-eitc-five-times-as-li...

At low incomes, your tax return is highly likely to be incredibly simple. If you’re doing something so wrong that it generates an audit, the IRS clearly knows they’re going to strike oil with the audit. They aren’t stupid. What’s your solution? The poor should be able to commit tax fraud because going after millionaires is more important? Everyone should have to follow the tax code we’ve collectively created. It make…

since you asked, my solution

1) VAT to replace income tax for bottom 50% or so

2) simplified income tax only for high earners (for normies consumption is an excellent proxy for income)

3) don't privilege capital income with low rates and infinite deferral

4) no corporate income tax which is a poor substitute for 3), and anyway corporate income is mostly accounting fiction

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#89

Post by prmph »

riotnrrd wrote: post #57
mi100hael wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed that the #1 positive thing I learned from chess is rarely mentioned by others, and I'm not sure why that is. For me it was: Pattern recognition. I many cases (at least at the intermediate level), winning/losing games doesn't come down to who can "think three moves ahead," it comes down to whether someone can recognize that a pattern of three moves will result in a particular outcome. It may be a nuance,…

That's a well-known aspect of "expert" level chess player thinking! There's a famous experiment that demonstrated this. Researchers briefly showed set-up chess boards to novices (little to no chess experience) and expert players (2000+ ELO) and then asked the players to recreate the board they just saw. If the set-up was from a real game (not necessarily a famous or studied game) experts performed far, far better. Ho…

Yes this is an interesting result that I recall from my days when I was into chess.

But this result speaks to something more general that is interesting as well. It seems high levels of skill in many other fields is associated with incredible ability to recall details about a performance in that field. If I recall correctly, Bobby Fischer was able to perfectly recall positions (and his analysis of them) from games he had played years ago (and consider how many games a professional chess player might play in a career).

The question I have is, what exactly is the connection? Is this association essential? And is it the incredible memory that leads to high skill, or the it's the reverse?

Re: Life advice from NYC chess hustlers

#90

Post by blindmute »

toss1 wrote: post #70
alar44 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah that's bullshit. "Too many great minds have been wasted programming UIs." Both quotes are tongue in cheek, you're not supposed to take them seriously. If you're good at something, fuckin do it. Seeing a lot of comments in this thread from people who probably consider themselves intelligent, but haven't put the time into understanding chess, so you all have come up with some pretty creative excuses why you don't l…

aaannnd . . . . Whoosh!! It isn't about how good you are; in fact it is the opposite. My grandfather was an engineer and focused on building actual things - being a productive member of society. He was also pretty alert about avoiding addictive things. His point was that the gifted minds — who can get and ARE very good at chess — tend to get addicted and squander years or decades just chasing the next tournament, the…

Why is learning physics and chemistry a better use of time than learning chess?
Post reply on HN