Fun Facts

(p. 215)
      The worst losers in chess history

Mike Fox and Richard James, in their delightful
The Even More Complete Chess Addict, nomi-
nate the following three candidates for the title
of worst loser in chess history. In their own
words:

In third place, former World Champion
Alexander Alekhine, a notorious tempera-
mental loser. At Vienna in 1922, Alekhine re-
signed spectacularly against Grunfeld by
hurling his king across the room.

In the silver medal position, another famous
loser, Aaron Nimzovich. At a lightning chess
tournament in Berlin, he said out loud what
all of us have at one time felt. Instead of
quietly turning over his king, Nimzo leapt
onto his chair and bellowed across the tour-
nament hall: "Why must I lose to this idiot?"
Not nice, but one knows the feeling.

But the gold medal, plus the John McEnroe
Award for bad behavior at a tournament,
goes to the lesser-known Danish player (re-
ported in the Chess Scene) who lost as a
result of a fingerslip involving his queen. Un-
able to contain his despair, he snuck back
into the tournament hall at dead of night, and
cut the heads off all the queens.

Eade, James. 1996. Chess For Dummies. Foster City, CA: IDG Books Worldwide, Inc.

Here's another interesting thought about solving chess that I found couple minutes ago while surfing the forums here.-

rtr1129 wrote:

In the spirit of "anything is possible", then sure, a breakthrough in computing or storage might allow us to solve chess in theory. But the advances required are staggering. We are talking about needing to store data about 10^43 total positions, or compute 10^120 total games. For comparison, there are 10^34 atoms on the surface of earth. So we will likely need to take over a planet bigger than earth and dedicate it solely to the solving of chess, and then wait 10^26 years for the calculation to finish (there have only been 10^10 years since the beginning of the universe, so we have to wait many trillions of times the age of our universe). That is assuming we are tackling the smaller number of 10^43. Scientifically speaking, it's more likely that an advance in psychic ability would give us the answer before advances in computing power or storage capacity will.

18. As late as 1561, castling was two moves. You had to play R-KB1 on one move and K-KN1 on the next one.

19. The first mechanical Chess Clock was invented by Thomas Wilson in 1883. Prior to that, sandglasses were used. Sandglasses were first used in London in 1862. The present day push-button clock was first perfected by Veenhoff in 1900.

No, that won't happen. People here sometimes think quantum computers or faster computers will completely "solve" chess, but that's just not true. Quantum computers don't work on tree-type problems, and computers won't ever be able to tackle problems of combinatorial explosion to that extent, either. What *will* happen eventually is a breakthrough in artificial intelligence will allow machines to think in the same way that humans do, but one million times faster. At that time, for all practical purposes, such machines will become unbeatable, even by other machines that will be able to at least draw with their metallic bretheren.

Another piece of chess trivia, but not so "fun"...

(p. 214)
      Did Kasparov cheat?

During one tournament game against Judit
Polgar, Kasparov made his move and seemed to
take his hand away from the piece for a split
second. He then moved the piece to another
square. The shocked Polgar did not make a
claim, but later indicated that she thought the
champion had indeed taken his hand of of the
piece. Kasparov denied doing so.

However, the game was being videotaped, and a
careful review of the tape showed that Kasparov
did in fact let go of the piece. Unfortunately,
there is no instant replay in chess, and not protest
was possible after the game was concluded. If
even world champions break the rules, what
hope do the rest of us have?

Eade, James. 1996. Chess For Dummies. Foster City, CA: IDG Books Worldwide, Inc.

Sqod wrote: shine5 wrote:

In the spirit of "anything is possible", then sure, a breakthrough in computing or storage might allow us to solve chess in theory. But the advances required are staggering.

No, that won't happen. People here sometimes think quantum computers or faster computers will completely "solve" chess, but that's just not true. Quantum computers don't work on tree-type problems, and computers won't ever be able to tackle problems of combinatorial explosion to that extent, either. What *will* happen eventually is a breakthrough in artificial intelligence will allow machines to think in the same way that humans do, but one million times faster. At that time, for all practical purposes, such machines will become unbeatable, even by other machines that will be able to at least draw with their metallic bretheren.

I agree. Chess will eventually be solved, but I think it is unlikely to happen in the near future.

I only posted facts I found on the internet. If anyone can share fun facts or incidents related to chess from any chess books , like 'Chess For Dummies' or any other book you own ( thank you Sqod for sharing) it would be fun.

LukePaul124 wrote:

Chessgames.com list four games between Max Weiss( Means white in German ) vs Jacques Schwartz ( Black in German ) from 1880-1890. Weiss played as White twice and Weiss was Black twice. Of course Black ( Schwartz ) was Black twice and back to White twice. All games ended in Draws... Nice!  Now I am going to be singing Edelweiss and Black is Black at least thrice. LOL

Nice rhyming. :)

(p. 22)
      - 47 -

   The first historical document known connected
with chess is an inscription on a tablet in a pyramid
at Gizeh, dating back to 3000 years before Christ!

Chernev, Irving. 1937. Curious Chess Facts. New York: The Black Knight Press.

Here's the quickest way to win by only moving one piece:

(And as you can see, there are many variations of this type of mate.)

pineconehenry wrote:

Concerning comment #86, does anybody know how good Einstein ever became at chess?

I think Einstein never took chess seriously. But if he had he could be atleast master lever I think.

I was able to find some info about Einstein as a chess player,

Einstein had an interest in chess. In 1936, he told a reporter that he played chess as a boy. In 1927 Einstein met Emanuel Laskerin Berlin, and they became good friends. Einstein called Lasker "a Renaissance man."

Einstein is quoted as saying: "Chess grips its exponent, shackling the mind and brain so that the inner freedom and independence of even the strongest character cannot remain unaffected."

        Mate in two is possible for Black from the starting position, but only with an absurd degree of incompetence or cooperation frm White.

Yes, but not by moving only one piece.

LOL nice