Chess=Math?

I think it refers to the rules regarding draw by repetition or 50 moves.

By recursive transformation change I meant a chain of transformations done recursively. You have a state: a position in a chess game. You make a transformation to that state (making a legal move), which gives you another position. You feed that position back into the same transformation (make another legal move). Feeding the result back into the tranformation is recursion. This repeats until you get a result in {1, 0.5, 0} (white's score for the game). That's the termination of the chain of recursive transformations.

Thanks for the clarification, I had a pretty good idea of what you meant, except for the termination...part.  By that rationale, yes, you could say chess utilizes math, but to me that is not enough of a justification to say chess = math.

both need brain works..!! so, i AGREE..

 Why not? That is, what would you consider enough of a justification?

theoraticly chess is a math-problem, practically it isn't.
So chess has practically nothing to do with maths

Honestly, I don’t know what it would take for someone to convince me chess = math. I’ve never contemplated my guidelines for such a thing.

Your, overly technical, interpretation of a chess game can be applied to every turn based game ever made, possibly extending even further than turn based games. Its like saying soccer = physics

I think the difference is that I hold the word "equals" in higher esteem than you do, atleast in this case.

• You say I'm not meeting requirements that you refuse to define.
• You insist I explain myself and when I do you claim I'm being to technical (when talking about math).
• You say I'm using the wrong definition of a word I never used.

I guess my response would have to be: "whatever."

Wow, what a horrible overreaction

First off let me just clear up I deleted the explain yourself part because I knew it would come across wrong (exaclty the way it appears it did).

Secondly point out where I claimed you were using the wrong definition of a word.  I said you were using a different definition than I was, your guidlines for equals (or is) are more relaxed than mine appear to be.

I simply told you I don't know exaclty what my requirments are, believe it or not thats a very reasonable answer, ever hear the phrase "some things are easier recognized than defined"

Anyway the whole point of my statement was that I cant pinpot why I don't think chess = math. I mentioned I thought your explanation didn't quite apply, and mentioned how I thought we just had a difference of philosophies.

God knows why you went off the deep end

 Best Response Ever!

I don't know why so many people think their answer is the right one because it's their answer.

Paranoid and other supporters of the music-camp:

I myself am more inclined towards the math side of this discussion, why?

Because 'I' am interested in math. For example I believe that music has a lot to do with math, you probably disagree with that statement but that's your opinion, who am I to say that you are wrong and I am right? Also I can't see any music in chess nor in math or other kinds of science, that doesn't mean there isn't any music in those subjects, it only shows that 'I' can't see them. So when you say you don't see all that much math in chesswe learn that 'you' don't see math in chess. When you say that math isn't really creative I think you must be crazy, from this we learn that you don't find math creative and I do but we do not learn anything about the creativity of math. If we did that would be like being able to say something is delicious because someone says it is and someone else says it isn't.

Now the math-vision thing: I think that if one can imagine a complex polyhedron and all the relations between vertices and faces, that personwould be able to imagine or "see in one's mind" the relations between different chess pieces. Granted this is not the same thing but to me these two things are very much alike.

Now an answer to the original question, I think Eiwob made a very good remark an earlier post but that's not a real answer.

My answer to codebreaker would be 'probably' but unless someone can show me the results of some worldwide research program, I guess we'll never now.

Actually now I come to think about it, before we can give an answer we have to know what codebreaker's vision of a good chess player is, likewise what kind of mathematics exam are we talking about: high school, university, a random test everyone can participate in( in the lines of the IMO "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Mathematical_Olympiad"). Before we know what we are talking about how can we answer a question?

P.s No hard feelings and excuse me for the somewhat lengthy post.

This seems about right to me.

Chess=math

hm... but chess is allso:

remembering patterns, know where to place your army, when to defend/attack

To solve that with math you need to do a lot off pointless calculations.

If you start with understanding of the current position before math, you play much better chess. That goes for the computers too. (Rybka vs old Fritz)

Chess is mostly understanding and experience, you "only" need math to make shure it works.

Math is a Language, saying chess=math, is like saying chess=english or chess=spanish. You can use Mathematics to describe the nature of the game.

As far as people being good at math and good at chess. I have a degree in applied mathematics and started playing chess about two years ago. You can look at my rating and games judge for yourself.

Oh and math is exremely creative, If you want to compare math and chess, what you learn about math in high school would be like learning how all pieces move in chess.

In Laskers manual of chess he talks about how Tarrasch excelled in every subject but math.  And then goes on how Tarrasch was able to conceieve broad plans, but when it came down to executing the minute details there he often failed against the greats like Lasker. 

 I am a very famous chess player some say that I am #1. And I am exelent at math and that is why I am so good.

  tacit wrote: Actually now I come to think about it, before we can give an answer we have to know what codebreaker's vision of a good chess player is,likewise  what kind of mathematics exam are we talking about: high school, university, a random test everyone can participate in. Before we know what we are talking about how can we answer a question?

     My vision about a good chess player is one that can calculate and visioning any move or any other possibly moves he/she or the opponent might used.Then what is the impact towards the game(chess) and what one can make to avoid or overcome that impact so he/she can continue or develop an opportunity from that situation.

    NM tonydal wrote:As for me...I'm pretty good at doing sums in my head (figuring out how much my grocery bill will be before it's rung up, for example)...a lot of people I've encountered don't seem to be so good at doing that, so maybe I'm above average there.  Can I solve one of those a+b things from high school?

        "doing sums in my head"that is one example of visioning in math.We need that vision in both chess and math.

       Math exam that I meant is additional math and modern math.Especially,additional math because we are using it practically in our daily life.

no! Chess aint math! 

I suck at math! Really man! But I love chess! And Chess is more than calculating! 

So Im the best example lol that this statement aint true.

(So bein good at chess doesnt mean good at math)

(maybe being good at maths means good at chess though!?)

- I dont know that lol since Im really not good at it :P

Huh?  Please explain further, as I don't understand how mathematics correlates to the power computers have running through various lines and the speed with which they do it.