Since chess and chess.com forums are so closely intertwined, I consider them a single entity with no distinct delineation. I hope that clarifies my question.
Does Chess Make You Dumber?
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Nov 22, 2016
0
#103
Great question, I found that after playing chess for 15 years I wanst dumber, but I was still virgin.
GulagSurvivor wrote:
Great question, I found that after playing chess for 15 years I wanst dumber, but I was still virgin.
Life experience also counts towards being smart / dumb. In all regards, I'm an absolute moron, but that's still n=1. We need more idiots to confirm a positive answer to my question.
Nov 22, 2016
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#105
The other day I heard someone saying that smoking makes you smarter and here someone questions if chess makes one dumber. The case in point is that dumb people will remain dumb or grow dumber and smart people will remain smart whatever they may do (but then there is a possibility that they go crazy). If a dumb plays chess with someone smarter than him, he would obviously suck in it and by doing so, he would be reminded how dumb he is and therefore chess is of no help to him if he hopes to become smarter. On the other hand, if a smart person plays chess keenly, then he would get better in it.
But only in chess. You must not complain that you cannot run 10 miles despite doing a hundred push ups every day. Likewise, you should not complain that you suck in grammar despite practising math every day.
A smart person is likely to acquire skills or learn things easily that need some ratiocination, as against a dumb who would be slow or even disabled.
StairwayToTruth wrote:
StairwayToTruth wrote: You're allocating your mental resources and time towards games of chess and brilliant chess.com forums versus other intellectual pursuits. Given the notion of zero-sum mind games, I don't see any other outcome except chess making people dumber. If that's true then you must have played a lot of chess.
You're allocating your mental resources and time towards games of chess and brilliant chess.com forums versus other intellectual pursuits. Given the notion of zero-sum mind games, I don't see any other outcome except chess making people dumber.
The_johnjohn, you are correct. I'm going to pretend that I don't understand your implication and ask you: why do you think I have played a lot of chess? Is it my elite blitz rating of 1337?
nwolf832 wrote:
Reading these comments has made me more dumber
Exactly, thus chess(.com) has made you dumber. Thanks for adding another n=1 to my sample.
Nov 23, 2016
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#112
Games like chess are meant to make adults feel like kids... hence dumber 😎
Nov 23, 2016
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#113
StairwayToTruth wrote:
Drawgood wrote:
I actually do think that chess can have negative psychological effects and perhaps in some people a detrimental effect on the functions of the mind.
Chess is a game that obviously requires the players to think according to the unchanging rules and a limited field of scope. It is an abstraction of a contest which doesn't even represent the real world well. It lacks chance, it is a full information deterministic game. Life in the real world is pretty much opposite of opposite of chess. I disagree with the claim some make alleging that chess represents life.
However, because chess requires certain patterns of thought that are required to win at chess it wouldn't be surprising if players who played since childhood, when their minds were forming, can get into the habit of viewing the world and analyzing it same way they play chess. This kind of development has to be detrimental if not balanced by more natural activities.
Perhaps a person who has been playing chess regularly since childhood will be perceiving the world incorrectly as a zero-sum game where there are necessarily have to be winners and losers. Maybe they'll tend to believe they have to constantly compete with others. I know from personal anecdotal experience and observations of my own character that chess players are unnecessarily confrontational in life. Maybe these people will unrealistically expect everyone to play by some set of rules. When someone deviates from some norms or rules the chess player may be less able to deal with that.
Of course it cannot be the case with every person who plays chess. But from what I've seen it is common for sure.
Chess is a game that obviously requires the players to think according to the unchanging rules and a limited field of scope. It is an abstraction of a contest which doesn't even represent the real world well. It lacks chance, it is a full information deterministic game. Life in the real world is pretty much opposite of opposite of chess. I disagree with the claim some make alleging that chess represents life.
However, because chess requires certain patterns of thought that are required to win at chess it wouldn't be surprising if players who played since childhood, when their minds were forming, can get into the habit of viewing the world and analyzing it same way they play chess. This kind of development has to be detrimental if not balanced by more natural activities.
Perhaps a person who has been playing chess regularly since childhood will be perceiving the world incorrectly as a zero-sum game where there are necessarily have to be winners and losers. Maybe they'll tend to believe they have to constantly compete with others. I know from personal anecdotal experience and observations of my own character that chess players are unnecessarily confrontational in life. Maybe these people will unrealistically expect everyone to play by some set of rules. When someone deviates from some norms or rules the chess player may be less able to deal with that.
Of course it cannot be the case with every person who plays chess. But from what I've seen it is common for sure.
Thanks for the great input, Drawgood!
I'd disagree on chess being a zero-sum game, as you could also have draws produced by positions with various material on the board. Sometimes a draw is even considered a preferable outcome. Additionally, losses are virtually guaranteed in chess over an increasing number of games. In theory, this should also teach about sportsmanship and appropriate response to various outcomes (notice I said in theory). However, the rest makes sense.
Of course, this entire post assumes that a person's entire life experience is rooted, in isolation, in chess only. We must obviously consider chess in context of other life experiences that are considered normal to the everyday person (that's also variable dependent on many other factors, but it's not worth getting into that now).
So the question becomes, does chess make one dumber in context of other life experiences? And, do we consider the brilliant chess.com forums as a part of chess? (I must do so; otherwise I dare say my time spent on this website has mostly been a waste!)
My guesses about potential negative effects of chess on the mind are meant with the assumption that chess actually does have some effect on the player's psychological buildup and thought process. It's like a response to those people who just loooove telling everyone how chess makes kids and adults more intelligent and other similar myths. I actually think that the claims about the positive effect of chess on players are either totally false, myths, or at most exaggerated. But if it were actually true that chess does affect the behavior or thoughts of players then we cannot assume these effects are only positive.
From my anecdodal experimece. At least from what I've seen. There is some tendency or correlation between chess and the ability of people to be able to normally socialize. If you can imagine a stereotypical "autistic" individual of any age it will be the type I've encountered more. For example more than once I've noticed that chess players I've played with do not know how to shake hands at all. It's probably not their fault. They either were never taught how or it never came up in their lives to learn. They extend a hand that feels limp and don't even know they have to squeeze for a split second. Few other people I've met are unaware of common social interaction norms. They either will openly say things that you usually do not say in front of people you do not know, or they do not know what to say when the other person or persons talk about something in their company. They'll stand there with an open mouth and just stare.
What I described above doesn't make anyone fitting that description a bad person by any standard (except if they say something very offensive I guess) but to me it just says something about their social ineptitude and makes me think to what extent chess may have played a role in it.
Dec 4, 2016
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#115
Drawgood wrote:
However, because chess requires certain patterns of thought that are required to win at chess it wouldn't be surprising if players who played since childhood, when their minds were forming, can get into the habit of viewing the world and analyzing it same way they play chess. This kind of development has to be detrimental if not balanced by more natural activities.
Are those early child chess players in your example doing nothing but playing chess? If they're 'Bobby Fischer' obsessively-compulsively be-all end-all focused since that young age, then yes, chances are, they might turn out to be more withdrawn from the 'real world' and more 'analytical' than 'regular' people would otherwise be. On the other hand, I would think that a person goes through life adding multiple activities to fill his/her day, whether your a child or a 90-year-old senior. If all I cared about was math/music/day dreaming/food production/work and absolutely nothing else, then my single-tracked habits might indeed cause a single-tracked type of world view.
I'm a chess player since I was 7, but it turns out that I in fact saw the world in a way that eventually also made me a music composer/singer/teacher, among more than a few other primary things that I define my daily habits by. Furthermore, I'm not, nor have I ever been, obsessive-compulsive about any of these things.
Chess has not quite the 'negative psychological impact' on me as you believe it would.
A dominantly analytical view of the world, one which 'causes defensiveness/confrontation', as you say, is every bit as valid as the next person's dominantly subjective dreamy "could be" view of the world; and everything in between. Some people in fact have an almost-exclusive single focus in life that would cause them a single daily living strategy. Others, like me, do a multitude of things and see the world through many eyes. In the end, the world is what we make it to be, and there will always be people whose strategies of coping with it is incompatible with your own. No strategy is wrong; it's simply how you choose to use it to better yourself and others around you.
I'd say there's a certain intellectual value inherent in being able to recognize, replicate, and apply patterns. Does this make one more intelligent? Probably not, but I'd say it does require a particular caliber of mind to do this well in a game as complicated as chess. As for "lazy and dumb": correlation does not imply causation.
Well, I'm lazy because I'm dumb, and I'm dumb because I'm lazy, so there's your correlation implying causation.
Dec 9, 2016
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#118
StairwayToTruth wrote:
Well, I'm lazy because I'm dumb, and I'm dumb because I'm lazy, so there's your correlation implying causation.
Beautifully reasoned! Uh-oh. You've just disproven your premise. That comment was way too perfectly thought out for a "dumb" person, so you can't be dumb! Hard to tell about lazy, of course, but if you were wrong about dumb, how can we take your word for it that you're lazy? I'm just saying .....
Dec 9, 2016
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#119
Smoking makes you dumber because you know you are killing yourself. Chess make you smarter because, you know, you are challenging yourself!
"Does Chess Make you Dumber?"
Are you asking specifically about chess.com or chess in general? In your OP you mentioned the troubles of chess.com taking away from other uses of one's time.
If you're asking chess in general, I would say: it makes you dumber if you disregard the firmness of rules and try to break it as often as possible. Then, we have an issue: we're training our brains to fall standards in game structure.
If you're asking specifically about chess.com, I wouldn't be able to answer, since every single member uses it for their own specific reasons. Addiction to it does take away time from other enjoyable activities, yes. Does it make us dumber? It may or may not; again, it depends on the person.