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2013-03-08 14:48:37
21 votes, rating 3.4
21 votes, rating 3.4
Ethical issues with speed chess
One of the amazing things about chess is the exploration of variants and openings and to prove or disprove the value of certain plays. A task truely only possible on the highest levels of skill. It is in fact not intersting to win just because your opponent wasn't focused. You need your opponent to be at his best. He is not just your opponent, he is your partner in crime helping you to explore the depths of the universe. You can only get as far as he takes you. You want him to be stronger, stronger, stronger. Hell, let him reverse the last 8 moves he made and play on from there if it helps.
And yet, we have speed chess. The fast food of the mind. Played in cheap chatrooms on the internet between hookers and their clients while eating fried american food.
The game of wits detoriated to a real time strategy game. A form that has as much to do with strategy as WOW with RPGs.
A game that suddenly becomes more about on the spot tactics than precise planning.
Is that bad? Should you, would you happen to play a game of chess with your sister at your parents insist on her taking her time during a game of speed chess? Claim the victory is worthless if you only win because you put her under pressure? Because she was not at her best? Maybe because it is not even a competative game? I think we all know the answer to that. The game is less about exploring the game itself and becomes more of an exploration of the own mind and its own capacities. How good is your memory? How quick can you analyse the situation and take advantage of it? The truth is: It is a very different kind of game with very different objectives. In a world where computers dominate it is nice to see that there is some way to play left that is more about the player than the process.
Two players who would both prefer that different kind of game but yet both joined into the same game probably wouldn't enjoy much to play each other. Yet. If you agree to play in a certain way, you should accept the rules as they are and try to arrange yourself with them or to find another game. It is not possible to always accomodate everyone but clarity helps for everyone to know what he is getting into and make it a more pleasant experience for everyone.
And yet, we have speed chess. The fast food of the mind. Played in cheap chatrooms on the internet between hookers and their clients while eating fried american food.
The game of wits detoriated to a real time strategy game. A form that has as much to do with strategy as WOW with RPGs.
A game that suddenly becomes more about on the spot tactics than precise planning.
Is that bad? Should you, would you happen to play a game of chess with your sister at your parents insist on her taking her time during a game of speed chess? Claim the victory is worthless if you only win because you put her under pressure? Because she was not at her best? Maybe because it is not even a competative game? I think we all know the answer to that. The game is less about exploring the game itself and becomes more of an exploration of the own mind and its own capacities. How good is your memory? How quick can you analyse the situation and take advantage of it? The truth is: It is a very different kind of game with very different objectives. In a world where computers dominate it is nice to see that there is some way to play left that is more about the player than the process.
Two players who would both prefer that different kind of game but yet both joined into the same game probably wouldn't enjoy much to play each other. Yet. If you agree to play in a certain way, you should accept the rules as they are and try to arrange yourself with them or to find another game. It is not possible to always accomodate everyone but clarity helps for everyone to know what he is getting into and make it a more pleasant experience for everyone.
Comments
Posted by neoliminal on 2013-03-08 14:55:13
emo.
Just trying out a ne phrase.... interesting read.
Just trying out a ne phrase.... interesting read.
Posted by Jeffro on 2013-03-08 15:20:48
Excellently stated. Which is why leagues are the bomb, and why we want to play in leagues with people we enjoy playing against.
Posted by the_Sage on 2013-03-08 15:32:18
2 minute a turn (average) is slowish. So not speedchess. It gives time to think about your moves.
4 minutes is really very long for experienced coaches. Not because I'm afraid the other guy has too much advantage because he can think about things, but because it feels like I'm waiting 3/4 of the game, instead of half of it. =D
4 minutes is really very long for experienced coaches. Not because I'm afraid the other guy has too much advantage because he can think about things, but because it feels like I'm waiting 3/4 of the game, instead of half of it. =D
Posted by licker on 2013-03-08 16:01:58
Not really sure what point you are trying to make, but simple speed chess is very different from blitz.
Some would even consider 10m clocks 'speed'.
The issue I always had with the blitz aspect is that it's really not about playing 'chess' as it is about just trying to force your opponent to waste time so that you always win by clock.
Of course the relative skill levels of the players matters immensely in how you go about trying to win the game. Just as in variants like siamese.
In any case, you are right about know the rules you are playing by and don't complain about them if you agree to them.
Some would even consider 10m clocks 'speed'.
The issue I always had with the blitz aspect is that it's really not about playing 'chess' as it is about just trying to force your opponent to waste time so that you always win by clock.
Of course the relative skill levels of the players matters immensely in how you go about trying to win the game. Just as in variants like siamese.
In any case, you are right about know the rules you are playing by and don't complain about them if you agree to them.
Posted by pythrr on 2013-03-08 16:33:33
is this an AN aL OH GEE?
Posted by Mr_Foulscumm on 2013-03-08 16:53:53
"helping you to explore the depths of the universe."
Did you type this part with a straight face? :D
Did you type this part with a straight face? :D
Posted by blader4411 on 2013-03-08 17:02:18
Substitute "the universe" with "Shadow" ;)
Posted by B_SIDE on 2013-03-08 17:09:45
As far as exploring the depths of theory, you don't need an opponent for that. (Having FRITZ helps.) Chess qua chess is beautiful in its complexity and elegance. The study of chess is a noble endeavor on it's own.
But to play chess is a different thing from it's study. On a chess board, the mistakes are all there just waiting to be made. A game of chess is just that- two people sitting across from one another, making mistake after mistake. The winner is he who manages to err _second to last_.
I've seen chess games at time controls of 20, 10, 5, 2, and one minute. Speed, Blitz, Rapid, whatever you care to call it. Is it still chess? I think it is, as long as the time controls are not so restrictive that the physical skill of moving pieces has greater significance than the cerebral task of deciding which piece to move and where.
But to play chess is a different thing from it's study. On a chess board, the mistakes are all there just waiting to be made. A game of chess is just that- two people sitting across from one another, making mistake after mistake. The winner is he who manages to err _second to last_.
I've seen chess games at time controls of 20, 10, 5, 2, and one minute. Speed, Blitz, Rapid, whatever you care to call it. Is it still chess? I think it is, as long as the time controls are not so restrictive that the physical skill of moving pieces has greater significance than the cerebral task of deciding which piece to move and where.
Posted by lizvis on 2013-03-08 17:37:35
no blog on fumbbl has ever deserved to be rated a 1 or emo'd more than this blog.
emo
emo
Posted by Wreckage on 2013-03-08 18:19:17
foulscumm wrote: ""helping you to explore the depths of the universe."
Did you type this part with a straight face? :D"
I know I should focus on answering to responses that are actually intelligent and ignore the rest but I'm in such a mood I think I'll take this one today. I mean life is just more fun with some halfassed responses, right? ;)
I'll elaborate for you. If you think about how the world was created without any prior knowledge of the universe the incredible complexity will blow your mind. How can something like a meadow be created out of nothing? Even in absence of any dimension?
I mean, imagine you would want to create a meadow out of nothing with all it's physical laws. How would you go on about it? You don't have time or space or pretty much anything.
From an abstract perspective the idea of a simple surface is an issue because the surface needs determinable spacial parameters just to be there and you get stuck up on matters like: What is it the surface based on? A tortoise? Or 4 elephants? Or both? But in the end you get stuck with an infinity dilemma. It has to start somewhere. I mean, if you are on the surface you can be happy with knowing that you just don't know what is at the bottom. But from the perspective of the creator you are kind of stuck.
Of course you *could* create a simple surface in space and build parameters around it but the effort seems awfully hard and forced.
Now we take the universe like we know it into account. A 4 dimensional construct, created out of itself with no middle start or ending and lots and lots of balls flying around.
Doesn't that sound like a much better start to create something abstract like a universe?
What I am trying to get at with all this is: Connecting math to reality isn't possible without axioms. Axioms are essentially things we consider to be true in math no matter if they are actually true. You just gotta start somewhere.
But if you look at the universe from a creating perspective and start at 0 and work your way up from there you realise that the creation of parameters is envitable, that these parameters are recurring and to some extend are even predictable. You could speak in context of those parameters as the foundation of truth, parameters essentially every universe as we understand it would have to share. But beyond that with all the physical knowledge about natural laws we have even much more specific informations about how our universe was designed.
The universe is a construct just like the game of chess is a construct. (The board and the stones aren't part of it, the construct is limited to the games possibilities of events.) The universe is much too complex to take it all in and neither is this how a human mind can really work.
But in this miniature universe, if you look at the stellar constellations on the board and move, you can see things with this refreshing clarity. 20 dead ends and 2 possible routes and lots of other routes going from there spinning like a forrest from the place you have come from to the place you could be, trapped in a moment in time. Trapped just like the universe is trapped by it's own abstract made up laws. And if your mind opens for a new pattern, any concept that is new to you and you can connect it to the string of theoretical mathematical ideas, fracturing your world view over and over and over and over. Then you get the chance to see things clearly. To get a little bit deeper into understanding the universe.
But really that would just go out of hand to add that just so that can you believe that I wrote that sentence with a straight face when it was really irrelevant for the blog i wrote if my face really was straight. If you know what I mean.
Posted by Calcium on 2013-03-08 18:24:48
really....REALLY?
I hate you Wreckage for making me agree with Lizvis. Now I need to go whip myself etc...
I hate you Wreckage for making me agree with Lizvis. Now I need to go whip myself etc...
Posted by xnoelx on 2013-03-08 20:14:02
Am I the only one thinking of that Bill Hicks bit? 'Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves.'
Posted by lizvis on 2013-03-08 20:20:16
here's tom with the weather
Posted by JimmyFantastic on 2013-03-08 20:23:27
wtfbbq?
Posted by Mr_Foulscumm on 2013-03-08 21:01:52
Wreckage, sorry but a half-assed response is all this quasi intellectual drivel deserves to be honest.
Apart from that, my original question was an honest one because I couldn't read it and keep a straight face. :)
Apart from that, my original question was an honest one because I couldn't read it and keep a straight face. :)
Posted by Nelphine on 2013-03-08 21:41:49
Hey Wreckage
I like the way you think.
However, chess is exploring the DEPTHS of the universe, as opposed to the nature of the universe. Just like in physics, when you study chess, you study something with known rules, and you specifically try to work within those rules. You are exploring what exists within the universe as we know it. For me, the issue is that this is too tame. I wish to explore the nature of the universe, and why it is the way we know it. To use chess for this purpose I must look to see why chess is the way we know it; why did it get invented, why are the rules as they are, why do those rules manage to continue to hold after so much time has passed, and why have other rules changed. The rules themselves are simply details; speed chess vs the perfect chess game is but an extra condition added onto the already existing rules - it is largely irrelevant.
If I wish to explore anything with the creation of the universe, I would instead try to find a game whose very nature demanded that it exist, before any person had postulated the idea of the game. Examples might be the 'oldest trade on Earth', or the game that businessmen or politicians play. These were not designed by us; rather, someone realized that what they were doing was very akin to what people called a game, and so they labelled it as such.
But even that is a little misleading, because these inherent 'games' that were played even before the thought of what a game might be came to be, are not really inherently games. Rather, they represent inherent traits in the present day human mind - and so far, it does not seem to be obvious how humanity could have inherently existed before the very idea or form of a human was created.
So the study of games to find roots of the universe, for me, always feels flawed, and becomes rather a different way of studying physics.
And as we all know, physics is dull.
I like the way you think.
However, chess is exploring the DEPTHS of the universe, as opposed to the nature of the universe. Just like in physics, when you study chess, you study something with known rules, and you specifically try to work within those rules. You are exploring what exists within the universe as we know it. For me, the issue is that this is too tame. I wish to explore the nature of the universe, and why it is the way we know it. To use chess for this purpose I must look to see why chess is the way we know it; why did it get invented, why are the rules as they are, why do those rules manage to continue to hold after so much time has passed, and why have other rules changed. The rules themselves are simply details; speed chess vs the perfect chess game is but an extra condition added onto the already existing rules - it is largely irrelevant.
If I wish to explore anything with the creation of the universe, I would instead try to find a game whose very nature demanded that it exist, before any person had postulated the idea of the game. Examples might be the 'oldest trade on Earth', or the game that businessmen or politicians play. These were not designed by us; rather, someone realized that what they were doing was very akin to what people called a game, and so they labelled it as such.
But even that is a little misleading, because these inherent 'games' that were played even before the thought of what a game might be came to be, are not really inherently games. Rather, they represent inherent traits in the present day human mind - and so far, it does not seem to be obvious how humanity could have inherently existed before the very idea or form of a human was created.
So the study of games to find roots of the universe, for me, always feels flawed, and becomes rather a different way of studying physics.
And as we all know, physics is dull.
Posted by JigerJones on 2013-03-08 22:36:14
On one hand, I really enjoy chess.
Yet I hate long games of blood bowl.
(Me ponders)
Yet I hate long games of blood bowl.
(Me ponders)
Posted by huff on 2013-03-08 22:42:56
A push was ok.. A push. I mis-clicked and destroyed the integrity of our game of wits.
Well said sir. You do want a good opponent who is also stoving to get better/be the best.
Well said sir. You do want a good opponent who is also stoving to get better/be the best.
Posted by Wreckage on 2013-03-09 03:08:12
OK, I admit it. I just wanted to troll you guys with another comment on an already 10 pages long thread by pointing out that I love fast food and speed chess and hookers (although i never had or met one but that is purely for sociological reasons and the way my parents raised me, not because I actually believe there is something wrong with hookers. And I also don't want to catch infectious deseases. ) So.... I guess i was just trying to say that I really like hookers. And you should do too. Unless you are discriminating against people. Wich would not be good. That or I was trying to make a similar point I can't remember at 3 am.
Posted by maysrill on 2013-03-09 03:59:32
seek 3 0 rated
Posted by Mr_Foulscumm on 2013-03-09 05:58:00
I was right! What did I win? :D
Posted by Badoek on 2013-08-27 23:32:03
I mean life is just more fun with some halfassed responses, right? ;) 《《THIS! :D