I would like to mention that making good rice puddings is probably more important than playing chess well.

Yes. Solve feminism by forcefully applying them to kitchens everywhere. Bring back the maid system, I don't see why it's such a horrible idea.

You can mute the chat automatically in the settings menu.

This, exactly. Women are underrepresented because they just tend to be less interested in the game. If an equal number of women and men played chess, you might see that the top players would be a mix of men and women. 

I must agree with this. I haven't had a decent rice pudding in ages!

Unfortunately, my mother has died. That could explain it.

I always considered my mother an excellent pastry cook, although not the best. Her mother was a league above her. Her mother never weighed any ingredients .... my mother weighed them. Then, when she hit about 70, I noticed that my mother's pastry had improved and was now officially "sublime". I cross-questioned her and it turned out that she no longer weighed any ingredients.

Long live mothers everywhere!

Oh, and she'd no more consider playing chess than jumping off a cliff.

Ur horrible....& probably just frustrated w/ the opp sex - leaving u w/ ur other suitable choice. (squinting)

Signed,

It's Monday

are men better at chess?

It depends who you ask, Judith Polgar would give anyone a whupping in her prime.

Btw, I'm a decent cook. My mother taught me when I was quite small. I can also sew by hand, use a sewing machine etc. My mum taught me when I was young, because I wanted to learn. I even had a go at trying to knit but it was no use. I decided that knitting is too monotonous and that might suit the female mind better. Being able to cope with monotony is one of the greatest strengths we can acquire. My mother considered things like chess a waste of time but she wasn't against mental excercises. It was just that the mental intensity of things like chess seemed to her rather unhealthy.

Nah, I just make insensitive jokes here because I care for none of you.

He's completely lacking in empathy. Isn't that horrible? If a fly walked across the road he might even stand on it. He's a brute.

No I'm not! I'm Donirtha!

....or worse, speed up & hit it with his windshield.

I think if you asked "if given equal opportunities to take up the game, are boys/men more likely to become interested in learning chess and becoming an active player than girls/women"? The answer would likely be yes.

You can use that as an explanation why men appear to be better than women- because they have played more! The only way to get better is just to play again and again until you start to notice patterns and know what to look for so you can turn a position into your favour.

But with that aside, I am wondering if men have evolved to be better at strategic planning than women- throughout history almost all the wars and battles in real-life have been planned by men and fought by men. Virtually all weapons and what they are best used for have been developed by men.

Therefore most men today may not feel like going out and hurting other people (because of course we know that's wrong plus it's illegal) but when we sit down at a chess table that instinct may come out as we make our moves.

We see chess as just a game, but to our deep-down survival instinct, maybe it's more than that?

We are very much in agreement. Note that I did say there might be a mix of men and women atop the rankings, but no one can be sure of that unless we saw that situation actually happen. But yes, there are differences between men and women and there's nothing wrong pointing out that fact. Men are better at some things (in general) and women are better at others. 

eg. cooking

They are demonstrably not the same.  When men finish a game they have a proclivity to analyse some key points that transpired during the game, women I have never seen do this after the game.  Why I cannot say.

"I refuse to fall into the the trap of thinking men and women are the same"

You are intelligent. Majority of women in my country are feminist cultists and believe both genders are equal in every way. Personally, I do not think it's a competition between the sexes, we compliment each other and have no reason to compete, so this whole gender and race politicization really irritates me since it distracts from actual issues.

Back to the topic, it has been known for quite some time that male and female primates generally are interested in different things. For example they put a bunch of toys and dolls on the ground and let a bunch of monkeys explore them for the first time. Female monkeys went for the dolls, and male donkeys started exploring the toy cars etc.

I think this shows a deep truth about humans as well, since we are primates. It explains why engineering is such a male-dominated endeavor and why nursing is such a female-dominated endeavor.

Another thing about our deep nature is the fact that females throughout history has been valued just for being female. The gift of child-bearing is essential for the human race to live on, therefore it becomes natural to protect females, and only send males to war, for example. To become valued as a male, however, you actually had to contribute something, since child-bearing is off the table, you had to either provide food, or housing, or something else that was beneficial to the group as a whole.
And to provide food or housing, you need resources and skill in how to use objects and tools, something we're already interested in by nature, so it's natural for males to spend a lot of free-time just exploring and using different tools - even if it's not for the immediate benefit, it can be beneficial in the long term.

This all lead up to where we are today. It really doesn't matter what field or what sport you are looking at - in general men are going to be better than women. Even cooking, which is supposed to be a "female thing", the best chef in the world is most likely a male.
The explanation why is really quite simple - men have put in A LOT more hours with their craft, honing their skills. It's not that men are smarter, or more logical, or have better memory, it's the fact that they have put more than the double amount of hours in, just out of sheer necessity to even be able to compete at the top levels.

Chess is one of the few sports that can be completely equal between the sexes, but it will take a bit longer until the female player pool is as competitive as the male pool and the females have to put in as many hours to become just as good. Racing is another sport, where it can potentially be completely equal, but it's the same problem there, since the female pool is smaller, the top players don't need to put in as many hours as the male race drivers, and so the top male race drivers will easily beat the top female drivers.

So, to answer the question, "are men better at chess?", the answer is yes, but it's not because of the gender, it's because of the competitiveness forced men to play and study more than women. And I think what the Polgar sisters proved (or their father) was that, no matter the gender, you can become incredibly good at whatever you set your mind too, if you practice and study a lot.