That better be sarcasm, because that's just taking the entire concept of 'natural talent' too far. It is fairly obvious what is meant in the thread.

I can't be bothered reading more of the same from the same.  Anyone who expresses their opinions as '100% fact' all the time doesn't deserve to have their comments read.

For the most part, you aren't born with a natural chess talent... Almost no one is. It takes people who are willing to work hours upon hours at a time and sacrifice necessities like school and sports for their love of chess. I'm not one of those people, I can't devote 100% of my time to chess, maybe 1/2.

ADK

 You just said sports was a necessity.

Broaden sports out to excersize and you've got the picture.

You missed my point...which is:

Where do you exactly draw the line that distinguishes "natural talent" from "average mind"? We can also argue that a 2650 player requires natural talent, or maybe a 2600 player -- but exactly where do we draw the line? You can only say: "People with more natural chess talent are more likely to become better players." But you can't just arbitrarily draw the line at 2700. So everyone could become 2690 if they tried hard enough?

Also, "natural talent" isn't a yes-or-no thing. There are various degrees. Some people have more of these than others. You can't just say: "Person A has the natural gift. Person B does not." It's more like: "Person A has more of this talent than person B." It's a continuous variable.

Besides, my examples of disabled people without the ability to talk or walk are actually not that extreme, if you re-read cheater_1's post. He said:

"If you are born without the use of your hands [...] If you were born with gigantism and grew to 7’7” [...]"

lol...pretty extreme examples...

Im not going to quote your post SukerPuncher, for saving forum space. But I agree with everything you said. Sorry about my blindness earlier.

cheater_1 you lost to Light Force so I urge more strong teams above 120 people to challenge you.

Are you in hiding after loosing to the bright light?

Heh unmateable lol.

See, now we're getting somewhere. This is precisely why I DONT make posts like, "What's you're favorite opening?", or "Do you prefer two knights or two bishops?"

RICH has made a great point. Most AMERICANS are so politically correct that they they wont touch what he wrote, but I will. Regarding Natural/Innate athletic ability, Blacks, as a whole, DOMINATE all others ethnicities. Take the top 10 black sprinters in the world and the top 10 non-black and have them all race, I'll wager that the top 8 out of 20 will be black. That's not a racist statment, that's called a REALIST statement.

Masters of chess 'use memory'

I don't care about being 2700. My goal is to get to 2000 (not inflated online rating!) and hopefully master someday.

hahahahahahaah

also, it is terribly pathetic that you lived with your mother in your 30's and i would bet any amount of money that you have never satisfied a woman.

rich,

fancy giving credit for your well written post? or would you have us believe that it's all your own work?

I agree in general.  If you are born with it, does that not make it heredity by definition?  In most areas of human endeavor, competitive or otherwise, it is more or less true that the genetic fix is in.  Genetics establishes the ceiling, well-planned effort determines how close to the ceiling we will reach.  There is one problem with the sports analogy, however.  In sports, it is common for great athletes to be the children of great athletes.  Since heredity is the issue, are there examples of GM's being the children of GM's?

IMHO it's a good thing that we don't know our limits.  Posts 10 and 11 make the point well that we go through life focused not on where our ceiling is but on how close to it we can get.  While the ceiling analogy is scientifically true, it can easily be used as a cop-out by someone who is really just an underachiever.

I like parts of sheath's post. However, Just because you are born with something does NOT mean it was hereditary. A person born blind to parents who never had blindness in their history did not inherit blindness, because you cannot inherit something from nothing. Now if that person has curly red hair and both their parents have curly red hair: that is an INHERITED trait. 

I like the part of genetics establishing the ceiling: TRUE.

It would be very interesting for a study to be done on children of "super-GMs."

"because you cannot inherit something from nothing."

Actually you can. They're known as recessive traits, and if both parents are carrier then you have atleast a 1/4 chance of being born with the trait (Mendel's Law I think it's called). On the other hand if both parents have manifested a recessive trait then you will get it, baring any unforseen mutations.

Also, why do you so readily dismiss the ability of a child to 'learn genius'. Sure there are certain disabilities that stunt mental growth, but babies have a near unlimited capacity to

cheater, your observation about blindness is a sound point.  I believe (but am willing to be corrected) that non-hereditary traits fall into two groups:  defects (such as blindness) and mutations.  Obviously, defects would not be apt to cause one to be a GM, though not all defects would prevent it.  As to mutations, they do not occur on a widespread level.

The polgar sisters are prove that you can become a GM but you have to learn it from a very young age. (and by learning I do not mean the rules, but really the whole game.)

Maybe it doesn't even MATTER if chess greatness is innate and cannot be taught or learned.

Maybe the real question is why does chess greatness even MATTER? Even with all the chess greatness in the world, you will lose to some dumb automated script anyway!

I mean, Anand, we know you're great and the best and all, but seriously, no one cares what you or Kasparov has to say about the game itself. We'd all just much rather listen to FRITZ =/