Chess for Oldtimers --- Good Idea !

So, when you say "you,"  I assume you're making use of the word "you" in its general sense -- as a pronoun referring to the collective -- as  a casual version of the more formal "one," right?  

--as in "You can't go home again," instead of "One can't go home again" -- which sounds more more academic, less poetic.

On the other hand, you may actually have been suggesting that I, mil, am in denial about my own creeping dementia .

Either way, it's OK, since one does what one can to fight the temptation to take certain things personally, doesn't one?

Yeah, I meant 'you' in the sense of an informal substitute for 'one.'  Actually, if I was thinking about anyone, I was thinking about myself, since in my line of work, academia, if you're not smart, you shouldn't be doing it, but I wonder, getting old, how I'll know when it's time to quit.

I guess it would depend on what you're teaching.  ....

Teaching advanced nuclear physics to workers at a nuclear power plant?  One might want to consider retiring at the first hint of dementia. 

Teaching the history of innovations in medieval agricultural practices in Eastern Europe during the the 9th and 10th centuries?  How much real harm could a guy do, no matter how demented?  Teach as long as you want to, is what I say.  ;-) 

Thanks a lot for all of the new posts.

Motherinlaw: I'm teaching law, which is part logical reasoning and part just remembering things, so it is intellectually halfway between nuclear physics and agricultural history.  I has nothing to do with mothers-in-law, however, surprising as that may seem.

Lol -- too bad. Somebody should  be teaching a course on mothers-in-law -- we're a fascinating subject!

I really could, but unfortunately I'm highly specialized on the dark side of the subject.

Also, the Spanish term is "suegra". I think it already says a lot...

Thanks for the posts.

A very cute little item from Max Asnas: " Money is something you have to make in case you don't die ". Short and yet right on target  lol.

The best thing that ever happened to the execrable Rod Stewart song is this segment from the SNL one week replacement, Bob & Ray, Jane, Laraine & Gilda.  I remember seeing this when it was aired in 1977.  It was funny then, it is funny now.  Loved Bob & Ray.

Returning to the theme of Chess for Old-timers:  I do agree that it is a "Good Idea!" even though I think the jury's still out on the neurological benefits.  (I'm assuming here that the word "chess" refers to the actual process of thinking through moves in a chess game, and the hypothesis is that cognitive decline can be slowed by time spent in that specific intellectual activity.)

What I do absolutely believe is that playing chess  can be very good emotionally, for old-timers who happen to enjoy it.   Any activity that's intriguing and engrossing and provides neurological arousal, with periodic little spikes in dopamine ("I set up a fork --and it worked!") is good for any of us.

Those of us who do enjoy chess can get a "chess-game-mini-vacation" -- a break from working on our real life problems and/or obsessing about them.  (Hmm, writing stuff in a forum does the same thing, doesn't it?  hmm...) Also, unless you play exclusively against a computer, chess is a social activity, and studies have consistently found social activity beneficial in terms of health, life satisfaction, and longevity.  Of course, there all always caveats and exceptions....  

*Chess for old-timers who use it as a vehicle for expressing their chronic hostility?   Not such a good idea.

*Chess for old-timers who can't help focusing on their mistakes, ruminating on losses, and getting more depressed the more they play?  Also, not such a good idea. 

*Taking a bunch of elderly people who hate playing chess and forcing them to play chess every day?  I have to admit that I don't know whether that particular experiment has been conducted, but I'll go out on a limb here anyway, and say "bad idea."  In summary:

1)  Chronic depression, chronic hostility, isolation, boredom -- Bad.  

2)  Enjoyable  hobby? -- Good! 

Good points, Mil, but I'm afraid chess is more than a hobby to me.  However, as I've written elsewhere on Chess.com I enjoy playing through the games of the historically great and near great to my own meager productions.  Unless one is an artist, I imagine more folks enjoy the different styles of painting from medieval to modern hanging in museums to scrawling a stick figure or dabbling in finger painting let alone trying to get something meaningful and beautiful out of a paintbrush.  The same with chess, at least for me.

In other words, it's the aesthetics of chess at the highest level in not only games but endgames studies and various categories of problems that keeps me forever fascinated.  On that note, I'm recommending one chess book to those who usually don't read chess books: Secrets of Spectacular Chess, 2nd Ed by Jonathan Levitt and David Friedgood.  I thought enough of this work to write an Amazon review in 2008.

Thanks a lot for the posts.

Just saw your post, bob.  Excellent point about the capacity to deeply appreciate the beauty of one's chosen avocation or vocation -- anything to which one has experienced a genuine calling.  I've been lucky enough to have 2 callings in my lifetime -- one in each category.  And the each provides me tons of chances to appreciate beauty and joy in the work of others, as well as my own.  I think we've all heard the word "beauty" used by scientists and mathematicians to describe their own fields.

At any rate, chess is fun for me, but it's not a "calling."    ..... hmmm ... now I'm starting to wonder if maybe, just Maybe,  this "calling" thing might be an explanation for, or at least a  contributing factor to, the difference in our online chess ratings.   In fact, I'd very much like to conclude that that's the only explanation.   I'd like to, of course, but, seriously, who's going to buy that, for Fischer's sake!  

well, mil, at the risk of offending the high rated players here, i think virtually anyone can get to 1800-1900 range by studying chess. for people like you and i, we play for fun, the losses really don't matter, and we do not spend time studying.  

(on second thought, i really don't care if i offend anyone!) 

I would love to go to the casino and play poker every day...

Thanks a lot for the new posts.

I heard a funny item recently on the radio: " Life is like a roll of toilet paper, the closer to the end that you get, the faster it goes ! "

Isn't that the truth, badenwurtca.  Besides, the end of the roll isn't nearly as nice as the beginning.  At least with TP, you can get another roll.  Then again, if you ignore the homophone and quote Shakespeare's melancholy Jaques in As You Like It, we play many roles in our life.