10 Chess Players Who Have Saved The World From Gigantic Meteorites
Hello chess.com readers! I'm absolutely thrilled to share with you some groundbreaking research on the little understood link between world chess champions and intergalactic debris avoidance.
You see, ever since there have been chessplayers there have been meteors, and scientists have long been mystified as to why they've yet to wipe out human civilization. (Meteors, that is, not chessplayers). Well, I think I may have discovered the reason and will now present my conclusions in an easy to read list of ten items.
10) Paul Morphy
The American "pride and sorrow" of chess took Europe by storm in 1858 and then disappeared as quickly as he had arrived. This you may know already, but did you also know that Morphy, whilst in France, secretly met with Léon Foucault to develop the Foucault knife-edge test which, as we all know, greatly facilitates the reliable manufacture of telecopes? And did you further know that, with the aid of these telescopes, the French Royal Astronomical Society was able to spot meteorite "Pépé" before it crashed into several gallons of their best Château Margaux?
9) Wilhelm Steinitz
Steinitz's contributions to positional chess understanding are legion, but he also was one of the first chess masters to become abducted by aliens when he, lying drunk in a Bavarian cornfield, was transported onto a large silver saucer and asked to refute the Evans Gambit. Aboard the extraterrestrial vessel Steinitz noticed a large asteroid heading towards earth and, in exchange for the captain zapping it, showed everyone the "Steinitz Gambit". The aliens have never returned.
8) Emanuel Lasker
Lasker was much more than just a chess player - he was a philosopher, a mathematician, a playwright, a breeder of pigeons, and friends with Albert Einstein. Though normally only applicable to abstract algebra, the "Lasker–Noether theorem" is an integral component of Einstein's Meteorite Death-Ray Mark II which has saved the world nineteen times since its invention in 1912.
7) Jose Capablanca
The Cuban genius, often called the "Mozart of Chess - er, not Carlsen, the other Mozart of Chess, oh, nevermind" was arguably the game's greatest natural talent. He reputedly never studied chess and could tell everything about a position from just a glance. These abilities gave Jose lots of free time and for awhile Capablanca amused himself by serving as an Albanian spy during the First World War. In this capacity he discovered "Operation Blow Up Zee Earth Muwhahaha", a dastardly scheme hatched by Greek-Macedonian-Serbian-Vatican-Illuminati Separatists to attract metorites with a gigantic underground magnet. Capablanca naturally defused this nefarious plot with his usual charm, skill, and impeccable endgame technique.
6) Alexander Alekhine
In "My Best Games Of Chess 1924-1937" Alekhine writes, "After failing to defend the World Championship to Euwe it became clear that I would need to abstain from all forms of alcohol, gambling, and advanced rocketry in order to properly prepare for a rematch. I was able to, with great effort, free myself of the first two vices, but was unable to stop firing projectiles into low-earth orbit in an effort to deflect incoming asteroids. Fortunately, this partial implementation of my training regimen proved sufficient to defeat Euwe in 1937 and regain the title I had so carelessly squandered two years prior."
5) Mikhail Tal
Tal once sacrificed a queen and rook vs meteorite 'NN1749', destroying it completely in the ensuing attack.
4) Bobby Fischer
Fischer's mysterious seclusion from chess and society in general after winning the world championship in 1972 can only be logically explained as having something to do with the destruction of dangerous interstellar objects. While details are admittedly fuzzy, it should be pointed out that Fischer's favorite country, Iceland, is near the top of the earth and thus closer to space than anywhere else.
3) Anatoly Karpov
It is an open secret that Karpov has employed top-level Soviet parapsychologists to hypnotize asteroids that even think about approaching the Earth.
2) Garry Kasparov
Once, after losing a game, Kasparov once punched an asteroid really hard, diverting it into the sun.
1) Hikaru Nakamura
A closely guarded government secret is that despite the efforts of all of the above (plus Kirsan Ilyumzhinov) the earth was struck in the late 90's by large meteor, destroying most life on our planet. Among the few survivors was none other than Hikaru Nakamura due to being submerged deep in a basement playing bullet chess. To save humanity the US Government decided on a desperate gamble based on temporal dilatations that have been known to occur near Nakamura's internet connection as a consequence of his mouse travelling near the speed of light. To harness this power Nakamura was forced to play a thousand games of 1 0 against Fritz, causing a hyperdimensional translation of our entire solar system several weeks backwards in time and destroying the asteroid before it ever entered our atmosphere.
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I hope you have enjoyed this list of chess players and meteorites. Please check out these other important articles:
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