Did you know... random chess facts!

you are perfectly correct.. but this legendary story was a real one, & it happened with the medieval INDIAN KINGS..

#1 has several versions, depending on where you read it. The most reasonable version I've read refers to the number of atoms (not electrons) in the observable universe (I assume to the naked eye). That factoid was around for quite a long time. I think the Hubble Telescope may have altered that one just a bit, hence the term "observable". Just my thought. I have no direct references to back that up.

Regardless, it's a whole sh*tload of possibilities. Makes winning the Powerball look like flipping a coin!

16. Capablanca is my favorite chess player.

Yes, there are many more electrons than atoms. More than atoms, maybe (although I find it hard to get my head round it, could be right), but electrons? hmm.

Its neither India, nor electrons.  Chess was created in Indiana (Colfax, Montgomery County) on "election" day, 1849.  I read it in the Enquirer.

Al Gore didnt invent chess ?!

hey man..! chess also did exist at around AD 1500..

 Has he ever been in Colfax, Indiana?  There used to be a good place to eat fish there, but it burned.

 I heard that Dan Quail and Al Gore met in Colfax Indiana and invented chess and the internet.

My source is anonymous. Reporters rights. 

 XD XD XD

You gotta love the numbers...

• There are 318,979,564,000 ways to play the first 4 moves of a chess game.

• There are 169,518,829,100,544,000,000,000,000,000 ways to play the first 10 moves (geez).

• Using the short scale (common in the USA), that reads as 169 nonillion, 518 octillion, 829 septillion, 100 sextillion, 544 quintillion and probably some change that they didn't bother including (I mean at that point, why bother with the quadrillions, right?).

• There are 400 possible positions after 1 move each.

• There are 72,084 possible positions after 2 moves each.

• There are over 9 million possible positions after 3 moves each.

• There are over 288 billion possible positions after 4 moves each. (Note that this is a different number than the "possible ways to play" the first four moves each.)

      318 billion+ ways to play the first four moves?  That sounds a little high.  20 or 30 tops.  That's just like they tell me the speed of light is 186,000 miles per second.  7 times around the Earth in one second?  I doubt it.  Maybe light travels
about 55 mph.  The same as a car.

Let's think about this...

White and black each have 20 possibilities for their first move. Therefore:

20 x 20 = 400 possible ways to play the first move. Wow.

If I've calculated properly, white and black will each have approximately 58 possibilities for their second move (it depends on what each player's his first move was).

400 x 58 x 58 = 1,345,600 possible ways to play the first two moves. This is approximated.

The number of possible board positions is far less because many of these "ways to play" will transpose into identical board positions. I don't know how many possibilities exist for the third move, but it's probably in the hundreds for each player. Madness.

For the last one in the OP I may be wrong but I think it should be 2^65 -1 [/mathnitpick]

Al Gore didn't invent chess.

did you know that joe henry blackburne attacked willy steinitz?  crazy but true

 And that Fischer and Benko got into it once. I think Benko took pity on Bobby as I've read about Benko being kinda strong and having some skills.

wow crazy! i wonder if tal ever got binto any bar fights?  he liked to drink smoke and chase women...two out of three can get you into trouble...

all three can kill ya

 I remember a story where Tal was making a move on some woman in a bar and her husband worked him over. I don't think Tal was an effective brawler.