So if chess skills fluctuate, and emotional/psychological factors are "de minimus;"
what does that leave except that intelligence fluctuates?
Only one person said that idiot.
I left the "if" in there. I'm just trying to put pieces together logically. It's too bad there has to be a lot of inductive reasoning.
Mental exhaustion, like physical exhaustion, can happen with much play. I always play better after a break, say of a few days, and come back to the board. When I play a great deal and "chase" my losses with trying to win, i simply keep losing.
As for emotions...I used to look at the wall chart to find the rating of my opponent. When he/she had a high rating, i knew i was in for a real fight and was nervous about the game. Then I tried an experiment...I did NOT look at the rating of my opponent...had no idea the level of his/her strength...I just played as well as I could. The result was I had better results and my rating went up. Emotions are a big part of chess...if you are intimidated by an opponent, you are well on the way to losing.
By the way, when one person is given a battery of IQ tests over a period of time, it is my experience that the scores fluctuate. A test is a measurement, not an absolute; I think that is all we will ever get out of a rating, a measurement, not an absolute.
I'm like Charlie in "Flowers for Algernon." I start out brilliant but by move thirty I'm a complete vegetable.
By the way, when one person is given a battery of IQ tests over a period of time, it is my experience that the scores fluctuate. A test is a measurement, not an absolute; I think that is all we will ever get out of a rating, a measurement, not an absolute.
So you are saying intelligence doesn't fluctuate, but by nature of the test, results fluctuate.
Accepting this, I still wouldn't understand why when I play a series of chess games, I get a lot of winning streaks and losing streaks.
I'm like Charlie in "Flowers for Algernon." I start out brilliant but by move thirty I'm a complete vegetable.
So as the game simplifies, your ability to play it simplifies faster?
I feel like that in Blitz games :)
Understandable.
By nature of the WAY we perform on the test, our results fluctuate.
So the test itself doesn't matter, because the WAY is the same?
That is, if rating fluctuates, it could mean some of our qualities (such as intelligence) are changing?
The test remains the same, the way we perform flucuates. Some days are "on" days, and some days are "off" days. To say we are more intelligent on our "on" days, ...well that's the discussion :) Define intelligence.
Suppose I define intelligence (of this type) as: The ability to recognize patterns.
I highly doubt emotions have anything to do with chess.
You'd be highly wrong.
I don't understand: It's all on the board, isn't it?
It's all pure logic.
Well, yeah, the game itself is, but your emotions affect your ability to logically think.
I think it depends, incredibly largely, in my experience, on your attitude; I would go as far to say that a bad attitude may be even worse than "being tired." The times I have done well in, say, Tactics Trainer are the same times where I felt the blood pumping, the same ones where if I got a problem wrong I would meticulously look for the real solution. In other words, I tried to enjoy the beauty of chess's complications rather than get frustrated by it, and that results in much better thinking and about a 2300 tactics trainer rating, sometimes even 2400+. At my worst, when I just superficially guess a move each time, I get down to 2100-2000s and I'm frustrated and unwilling to understand the problems I get wrong and just want my rating to get back up again.
Ever feel tired when playing a game (any game or sport) but then you start to go on some streak, or the game starts to get interesting? You suddenly get all fired up and feel full of energy, and I think it's because your interest and motivation increase.
I would say fluctuation in chess ability is more based on the conditions in which you are playing: good conditions have you using your intelligence more efficiently, while bad conditions (such as being tired, among many others though!) impair your ability to do so. To just say you get much smarter and dumber in a matter of days seems like a strange way to interpret things to me.
"Suppose I define intelligence (of this type) as: The ability to recognize patterns."
With that definition, I'd be forced to concur. But to casually call someone smart or dumb because their base intelligence is fluctuating a bit as everyones' still seems strange. I guess you can put it this way if you want to, though.
Just keep in mind it doesn't happen magically but as the result of several variables at play.
"So you are saying intelligence doesn't fluctuate, but by nature of the test, results fluctuate.
Accepting this, I still wouldn't understand why when I play a series of chess games, I get a lot of winning streaks and losing streaks."
...the answer to this may lie in "number theory"...the same reason why there are streaks with flipping a coin, or on the famous roulette table -black or white...
"So you are saying intelligence doesn't fluctuate, but by nature of the test, results fluctuate.
Accepting this, I still wouldn't understand why when I play a series of chess games, I get a lot of winning streaks and losing streaks."
...the answer to this may lie in "number theory"...the same reason why there are streaks with flipping a coin, or on the famous roulette table -black or white...
The way you put it here sounds like chess game results are random.
But if there are too many streaks, one may ask if there is not some "gnarly pattern" like that of the powers of three in binary, or the prime number spiral.
(@ jesterville) Do you know much about number theory? (I am curious because I myself am interested in number theory and plan to get into it)
@ Elubas: Well stated and very convincing.
Please, no name calling! Being able to express appropriately is one of the markers of intelligence.