What i love about this article is it tells me that it is not my fault i am not good at chess. I don't have innate ability therefore i couldn't be good anyway. I feel so much better now

(if you couldn't tell i was being sarcastic)

Great advert for the game.

good

I think there was a link to this video in the original post on Carlson but since this latest posting is basically links, here it is again. It is Mike Wallace's interview with Fischer prior to the 1972 Championship. I think it contrasts well with the Carlson interview.

http://tinyurl.com/79kkjnq

I thought the Carlson interview was pretty good - yeah, the background videos of him playing in London may not have accurately presented the facts about his opponents or his standings in that tournament, etc. but it was not geared for chess freaks like us. It was where the interview was taking place so they worked with footage they could get - it was not a recap of the LCC.

Ok! I missed the program, but I would like to thank those persons who made it possible for me to view on the web. Here's my take. Carlsen is good and I have watched some of his games; however being number one in ratings is not the "World Champ"...Great standings however. I also would like to thank "60" minutes for presenting a "Chess" program to American viewers again. The last time that I can recall such wonderful moments was with the great BOBBY FISCHER. Its been a VERY long time. Perhaps more Americans can get interested in this wonderful mental sport - like the rest of the world; and produce another real American world champ like BOBBY FISCHER! LONG LIVE THE MEMORY OF BOBBY! BOBBY......FOREVER!

Why is all the comments so negative about MC?

Carlsen was just born to be amazing, and look where he is now!

BTW when Magnus enters the Chess Classic on 2:11, I am the guy wearing black behind him :)

Melvinbluestone really nails it. And the kind of observations he makes can be said of almost any news report given by any outlet. It's the reason I never take any news story seriously.

But in terms of chess & it's history Americans are still beginners yes ?

So to gain success will require much hard work.

You've got to be kidding me! So you're saying that the American soil people are born on tell us to play chess in a certain way?

It's strange that you ask that because I have many '' verbal-spats '' with Americans on that very thing.

The answer is how the chess-board is '' visualised '' rather than simplifying to key-squares & theory. USA will not have another world-champion until they appreciate this subtlety.

The 16-pieces are treated as an '' entity '' that may move in certain ways or suffer damage to an extent. 

And this is all I will say :)

If I had an awesome coach, started at three, loved logic, studied 8 hours a day, and had my parents tell me chess was the best career out there, absolutely! Environmental factors bring huge possibilities, and I think sometimes people forget about those.

Let me ask you a question: Why do you think there are so many good Russian chess players? Is it really the "Russian blood?"

@  Elubas

Correct in the respect of '' effort in, results out '' but the broadacasts show proof of remarkable talent from a very young-age & would be very difficult for anyone else to replicate that without innate capabilities in the first place ?

Would you have been able to draw with Kasparov at his age ?  (Of course he was annoyed at not winning !)

You know, the oos and ahs of what Carlsen did demonstrates precisely the fallacy that makes people believe in innate ability: Carlsen is so good that it's hard to fathom how he could do it. But he's not magical at all; he's just really good at chess, so someone who doesn't play will obviously fail to find what Carlsen does imaginable. It's the same thing for sports! The reason why that guy can't imagine a great chess player like a great tennis player is because everything in chess goes on in the head -- sports players make outward movements that everyone can see, if not understand.

Carlsen just has tons of well understood patterns about chess and logic in his head. When you have tons of patterns in your head, the game comes naturally to you, yes, but only because you took the time to store all of those patterns.

Mozart was said to be on a training program since he was three, getting in several thousands of hours of experience before five or six. How do people respond to that kind of information?

My point: Just because someone is really good at something and beyond the scope of your (current) ability doesn't automatically mean that person is superhuman. Yes, humans can get really, really, really, good at something, and people just have to accept that doing so is within human capacity. Note that Carlsen is pretty specialized in chess; this shows that you often have to isolate yourself from other parts of your life to pursue your passion to its fullest. If you try to just be really good at one thing in your entire life, it's plausible, I think, that you will at least be pretty good at that one thing.

I think it's just too strong of an assumption to say that Magnus got his ability from birth JUST BECAUSE HE IS REALLY GOOD AT SOMETHING. Come on! Maybe he does; I just don't think one should assume that it simply must be true!

Watched with interest ( Do you Americans really have to endure that level of advertising interruption on TV ?  Dreadful... )

What did come through is his '' natural-talent ''. He is at ease with the pressure & demands of top-level chess in comparison with the other masters in the broadcasts.

A pretty mediocre report, but I guess it was tailored for CBS's mass audience, or what's left of it. Clearly the piece was intended to sensationalize Magnus Carlsen. Of course, he is a fantastic talent, but there are others. They show him at the London Classic, but fail to mention who actually won it, Kramnik. They show him winning a blitz game against Nakamura at the same event, but fail to mention Nakamura finished the tournament ahead of Magnus. And of course, nothing about his loss to 17 year old Anish Giri in 22 moves..... I'm a big fan of Carlsen, it's the 60 minutes piece that was quite flawed. By depicting one player as towering miles above all others, they cast an image of chess, to the uninitiated, as one-dimensional and dull, with the only interesting facet of the game being the top player and his freakish abilities....... And to think I missed a Law & Order rerun for that!

I agree with mathiasburton, it always seems that the interviewers go out of the way to comment on how "unusual" their talents are. And why is it weird that Magnus is thinking about chess on the off day of a huge chess tournament? Would you say the same thing about Kobe during the NBA finals?

Interesting, I found his recall of a game from 1851 more impressive than his blindfold chess exploits. 

I watched this, I thought it did many of the typical things that media does of portraying chess players as super wunderkind people, but was still kind of interesting