Einstein, Buddha, and Elon Musk on Chess as a Waste of Time

Elon musk now not worth listening to so only 2/3 even consider

You mean when the guy says chess is too easy ... Even if he's right once a day probably shouldn't listen lol tbh I have no idea about credibility of Einstein and Buddha on the topic . But the point of there are better things to study your entire life than chess is fair but casually it's not really that much of a waste of time as long as you control how much you do .

“Waste of time” is such a pointless term. Time is yours. You have one life, a limited amount of YOUR time. YOU get to choose how to use it, doing whatever you want. Chess was a waste of time for Musk, Buddha, and Einstein because after briefly playing, they realized they did not like very much and decided to have the pessimistic view that the experience was a waste of their time. However, if you don’t feel the same- then it’s not a waste of time! There will be a countless amount of human lives in the grand total span of our species, to think that everybody has to be doing something important is absurd. Do what you want to, nobody should be able to tell you otherwise.

Chess has been known to be good exercise for the brain, like crosswords, snakes and ladders, ludo, proving fermats last theorem etc etc etc. not if you don’t work hard at it of course!

don’t listen to the doubting thomases no matter how well regarded in different fields.

Chess …… to only go where Einstein and Beethoven didn’t.

When somebody is very good at something - they might actually become more inept at something else - or develop as more inept.
Bobby Fischer's chess skills didn't seem to 'help' him much with other things.
Similiar with Morphy.
Einstein had discourse with both Lasker and Freud.
Outside of physics - was Einstein impressive in any other way?
Or perhaps he was like most other people - except for his fame and stature.
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Einstein was gifted - in physics. Did he have other skills?
Remarkably - Einstein was not strong in mathematics !
Now there's these things called epistemology and ontology ...
(I keep forgetting their meanings - but the way the modern internet is - it becomes easier to keep up)
and many people might think that philosophy has nothing to do with science.
Its not so. There's quite a connection.
Einstein might have been very strong in ontology.
Not in a classroom or academic way - just in something that set him apart from his peers in physics. In such a way that he suddenly had no peer.

quite right! being a Nobel peace prize winner doesn’t make you good at stopping arguments.

yea

Read #265.

yeah... the einstein sucking at math thing is a complete myth. He incorporated minkoswki's mathematics of space to create his new model. 
i dont think you understand what ontology is. Einstein was no ontologist. in private correspondence he expressed love of Spinoza, but this amounted to a love of the determinist rational universe, not any real proficiency with Spinozistic metaphysics which is quite complex.

no, philosophy has almost nothing to do with science, dont let the factoid that science as we know it began as natural philosophy or whatever that dumb quote is tell you. Most scientists working knowledge of philosophy of science ends with a rudimentary understanding of popper. They could care less what philosophers of science, much less philosophers in general research.

I'm not saying you are wrong but this kind of mentality is natural in an individualist society and alien to a collectivist one. What do you mean the time is yours? the energy and resources parents spend on you isnt yours, the resources the state likely invested in educating you is no sense entirely yours. If you buy into the pedestrian idea that you have a duty to contribute to society, then time clearly isnt only yours. There is nothing inherently obvious about this line of thinking if you dont presume an atomic individualism of the self.

the easy part is just bragging but the general response involves comparing chess to more complex games. Look at the Carlsen Caruana WC match for example. Due to over-prep, we had 12 draws in a row and needed to go to tie-breaks. In the last WC match, we saw some of the weirdest opening choices made entirely for anti-prep reasons. There is a real sense in which the level of play at the top has reached almost human peak thanks to computers.

heck even fischer warned of this over analysis death in the game ages ago. when you compare it to the type of games like starcraft musk is referring to, one grasps this. Compared to both the mathematical possibilities and the room for improvement at the highest levels, chess is a bit...stale.

I never claimed he was an ontologist.
Whatever gave you that idea?
Its not about us.
Nor did I claim that science arose from philosophy.
That's another strawman.
There does appear to be quite a connection of philosophy to science though.
There's even a philosophy of science.
(lets see - if somebody's good at chess they should decide for everyone else whether that connection exists or not? Try no.)
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Yes its apparently a myth that Einstein flunked math in school.
My saying 'not strong' was apparently a bad choice of words. But I didn't say 'flunked'.
Got this just now:
"However, he did struggle with certain advanced mathematical concepts early in his career, particularly when developing his General Theory of Relativity. He initially had difficulty with tensor calculus, a complex mathematical framework essential for describing gravity in his theory. To overcome this, he collaborated with mathematicians like Marcel Grossmann, who helped him refine the mathematical foundation of his work.
Additionally, Einstein made some mathematical errors in his research, such as his cosmological constant, which he later called his "greatest blunder" ...
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Here's a definition of ontology:
"Ontology is a branch of metaphysics that explores the nature of being and existence. It examines fundamental questions about what exists, how entities are categorized, and the relationships between them. In philosophy, ontology seeks to define the basic structure of reality, distinguishing between concepts like universals and particulars, abstract and concrete objects, and substance and properties.
Beyond philosophy, ontology is also used in computer science and information systems to create structured frameworks that define relationships between data, helping with knowledge representation and artificial intelligence"
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then I got:
"While Einstein wasn't formally an ontologist, his work had profound ontological implications, particularly in reshaping our understanding of space, time, and reality itself.
Challenging Classical Ontology: Einstein's theories of relativity revolutionized how we perceive existence. Before him, time and space were considered absolute entities—fixed and separate from one another. His work dissolved that classical framework, showing that spacetime is interconnected and dynamic, influenced by gravity.
Redefining Reality: His insights forced scientists and philosophers alike to reconsider what "reality" truly is. The idea that time moves differently for different observers (due to relative motion or gravitational fields) was ontologically groundbreaking—it suggested that there’s no single, universal "now."
Quantum Mechanics & Ontological Paradoxes: Einstein also wrestled with quantum mechanics, which he was famously skeptical about. He challenged the idea that reality could be purely probabilistic, questioning whether an observer plays a fundamental role in determining existence—an argument still central in ontology.
In a way, Einstein had an instinct for ontological inquiry, even if he didn’t approach it in a traditional philosophical sense. His theories forced humanity to rethink the very foundation of existence."
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In other words you don't have to be an ontologist to have a strength or gift in ontology.
Similiarly - you don't have to have a chess title or a degree in something - to discuss the subject or any subject.
Do you have to have travelled to the moon to talk about the moon?
There are people who operate that way though. (Wittgenstein?)
I call it credentialism.
Philosophy also connects to whether something's a 'waste of time' or not.
Definite connection there.
But philosophy has much more individualism than science.

Chess is a fun strategy game, it might not have a direct correlation with intelligence, but it is an amazing game of the mind! What about people like Blaise Pascal who say or is a gymnasium of the mind?

Like all hobbies, it uses time for fun!!!

At least in my opinion.

As long as they say 'a' gymnasium' rather than 'the' gymnasium.
There are many such gymnasiums.
Tennis could be regarded as a 3-d 'gymnasium of the mind'.
And golf too.
Chess is only 2-d.

With great great powers comes responsibilities, yes! but does that mean we can not have a little fun? everyone is opinionated, why not? why can't a man speak out what he thinks and feels. At present right and wrong is in a grey area guess what the people of North Korea feels what is right? I don't know! and for sure it will be very much different than mine and until and unless that person tries to change my way of life.

Here comes chess, it is a distraction which I believe is required for me, is it useless? I don't care and how would you know something that you do is useless or not? what you feel for a moment is not something that impacts the world order or the general day to day functions of anyone unless you do something about it.

Musk's is opinionated and so am I, He shows his stupidity while nonchalantly dismissing chess. Not cool Elon. Not cool at all. Chess is a tactical game where both the players are equal with just an exceptions on who starts the game, you can not buy or update your pieces but what you can do is increase your neurons.

you are comparing a board game to a video game though tbf

Elon is just some guy born into great wealth who, like countless others before him, made a large amount of cash off family money, yet tries to portray themselves as somehow self-made or singularly special. Take away his privileged start and he probably ends up in a trailer park in a besmudged wife-beater T-shirt, drunkenly yelling at the neighbors barking dog. The people who buy into his grift also bought into SBF's and Elizabeth Holmes' scams or whomever is the next financial genius to appear on the cover of Inc. or Fortune. Some worthy third person from history should be substituted for the smoke-blowing frangible.

bit surprised he didn’t develop a brand of cologne and self-title it tbh.