As much as I'd love to study chess til I inevitably go crazy, I just don't have the time. I don't worry about it for that reason.
GMs going CRAZY in the end - Makes you scared?
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Thay (Fisher and Morphy) are maybe crazy after his career. But I am mad from my birth day :-) :-) :-)
There are many ways how to be a crazy and one of this ways is playing chess.
I hope that I understand, because in english Im biginer :-)
Cuba :-)
hehe, cool!
The risk isn't high anyway, but I think if there is any correlation, it might be because of the link between madness and genius. Thus, it may very well apply to geniuses of all walks.
BTW: It's notable that Fischer went crazy AFTER he stopped playing chess. Thus, not playing chess is what makes one insane. 
I don't think Morphy ever went insane.
The two masters you cite were under tremendous pressures outside of chess. Fisher was a fatherless NY street kid who found identity in chess. His following the teaching of Armstrong alienated him from society. The nature of FIDE and the players during the 50's, 60's,and 70's caused many to drop OTB play, not just Fisher. Morphy came from a culture that looked down on chess players as charlatans and gamblers. He wanted to play the best, but was ostracized by family, and friends. The avoidance of top players, while trying to get matches and not wanting to accept monies for winning matches, would create a conflict in anyone. Chess doesn't drive you mad, the idiot's you deal with do.
Maybe the pecentage of chess players that go 'mad' is lower than your percentage of mad folk in everyday life, therefore, chess is a cure :)
Sight and sound deprivation drives people mad. So, it you want to torture an ememy get out the earmuffs and blindfolds, not the board and pieces.
Oh, right, you weren't talking about torture - sorry I've strayed off topic :(
I don't know much about chess history, but I don't think that it has anything to do with chess specifically. I think someone who is arguably the greatest at anything is bound to be eccentric. Sometimes those eccentricities seem to others as insanity. Sometimes those eccentricities lead to alienation from society. I think that alienation is what leads to insanity. Being ostricized or isolating yourself from society destoys a persons grasp on reality. Of course I'm no doctor or socioligist so this could be way off. It just seems to be true for all great talents. Elvis, Michael Jackson, Madona, OJ Simpson, Britany Spears, Phil Spector, Kurt Cobain, Nietzche, Henry VIII, Hitler, & Stalin are a few arguably great people either for their acievments or their public appeal. These people are all eccentric and are arguably insane. It is my belief that it takes someone who is insane to rise to their level. Let me repeat that I'm no expert and I don't really know anything.
Anthony
IM NOT CRAZY *licks bloody knife while moving knight to g5*
TheMoonwalker wrote:
Hello, I have heard of a lot of GM's that get crazy after having spent a whole life on chess, e.g. Morphy and Fischer. When you guys hear about this stuff, does it make you believe that it is dangerous to be a proffessional chess player? Does it affect your effort and commitment to the game? just wondering..;) Moon...
You must remember that average people often call most geniuses "Crazy", due to the inability to understand what they can't. For instance, "Crazy like a fox".
Fischer, Morphy, the fictious Luzhin (based on actual chess players, mostly von Bardeleben), Rubinstein, Diemer ("during a period of 25 years he is said to have mailed over 10,000 letters" on the subject of Nostradamus, according to chessgames.com), Kiesirietzky (admitted to mental hospital shortly after playing the "Immortal Game"), the list is much longer.
I think successes in chess require 1. nearly (or indeed) obsessive interest in the game, and obsessive interest focused on such an abstract field is by itself not the best foundament for a well-balanced personality. 2. coping in a highly competitive environment (not unlike business, for example, where nervous breakdowns are also more common than average); and chess is a sport that puts an exceptional strain on the nerves, since you compete with your brain (the very same part of yourself that is subject to psychological stress, anxiety etc.)
So, now, if potentially vulnerable personalities are combined with enormous pressure, I think you are kind of guaranteed to get relatively many "crazy people"
Well, there are plently of champions and grandmasters who remained completely sane their whole life. Lasker, Smyslov, Botvinnik, Bronshtein, etc.
Good point, but I think as Vibovit says, that compared to the amount of people in this "sport", the number of people loosing it in the end is quite high compared to other businesses.
Right?
yes you re
TheMoonwalker wrote:
Hello, I have heard of a lot of GM's that get crazy after having spent a whole life on chess, e.g. Morphy and Fischer. When you guys hear about this stuff, does it make you believe that it is dangerous to be a proffessional chess player? Does it affect your effort and commitment to the game? just wondering..;) Moon...
well in someway players may be crazy after all but it depends if all you do all day long is chess chess chess chess.if your daily routine is chess,eat, and bathroom then you'll get crazy, but if you have control over you mind and body then you wouldnt be...that's why for myself i dont worry enough...(:
Hehe ok, but you also sleep, right? :)
TheMoonwalker wrote:
Hehe ok, but you also sleep, right? :)
You sleep, but do you sleep well ;)
[Kramnik] "I tried to get the two rooks out of my mind, and to stop trying to coordinating them in different attacking patterns. I think it was four o'clock in the morning when I was able to sleep." Peter Leko: "I needed till five a.m. to get rid of those two black rooks."
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=1927
"The current world record holder is Janos Flesch - but his feat of 52 boards (+31 -3 =18) in Budapest 1960 was poorly documented. We understand that subsequently Flesch had to spend some time in a sanatorium as he could not get the positions on the boards out of his head, long after the exhibition."
(http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1012353, quoting the Feb 1994 "Chess Monthly")
my shrink can tell you that i'm not crazy
TheAOD wrote:
Being ostricized or isolating yourself from society destoys a persons grasp on reality. Of course I'm no doctor or socioligist so this could be way off. It just seems to be true for all great talents. Elvis, Michael Jackson, Madona, OJ Simpson, Britany Spears, Phil Spector, Kurt Cobain, Nietzche, Henry VIII, Hitler, & Stalin are a few arguably great people either for their acievments or their public appeal. These people are all eccentric and are arguably insane.
What indicates that Madonna or OJ Simpson are insane?
Hello,
I have heard of a lot of GM's that get crazy after having spent a whole life on chess, e.g. Morphy and Fischer.
When you guys hear about this stuff, does it make you believe that it is dangerous to be a proffessional chess player?
Does it affect your effort and commitment to the game?
just wondering..;)
Moon...