I would say you have to have an ego to be good at sports but you need not be an egotist. I think it's the same distinction you're making, Wafflemaster, just parsing the semantics differently. I agree you can be great at sports while having respect for others.
Is Chess the most egotistical game/sport?
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Irontiger wrote:
shahhussainkcl wrote:
Sure there are egotistical GMs (I would be if I worked hard at becoming a GM) but in my experience players of my level are very polite and well behaved. I've found Connect-4 and Pool to be more egotistical activities. Pool because it's a manly bar room game, I guess, but Connect-4 is a surprise discovery. Not sure how to explain it.
Good example of that attitude ! (...no, I get it, it is "I would be egocentric", not "I would be a GM" but the first reading is tricky).
Politeness is not correlated with humility, or negatively from what I can tell.
Is chess the most egotistical sport ? Certainly not, it is not a sport. The most egotistical game ? Games are not egoistical.
Are chess players more egocentric than other persons ? Maybe, but as much as you can expect men to be more than women (like it or not, it is culturally like that), rich people more than poor people (and chess players are rich). I don't think chess produces overinflated egos, but it maybe attracts them.
i think women are even much more ego, they are just master of deception.
TetsuoShima wrote:
i think women are even much more ego, they are just master of deception.
Not sure how it is in Japan, but surely not in Western Europe, nor in Africa.
And hiding the fact of being proud is the same as not being proud, as far as the others can tell.
Kingpatzer wrote:
I would say you have to have an ego to be good at sports but you need not be an egotist. I think it's the same distinction you're making, Wafflemaster, just parsing the semantics differently. I agree you can be great at sports while having respect for others.
Ok seems like we agree then. Like I said maybe I was being too picky on the words.
jason17 wrote:
A related topic, is the problem of chess players believing that knowledge of chess grants them purchase on intellectual issues. A lot of guys at the chess club I play at seem to think that playing chess is related to philosophy in a serious way, and this seems to inflate their egos quite a bit. But knowing the 7th move in the Sicilian Kan doesn't actually tell you anything about the proper end of a human being.
I know some players are legitimately interested in philosophy or history or mathematics etc. But in my experience the ones who are loud about it at the club, as if showing off how smart they are, aren't very good chess players 
also chessplayers are also very poor sometimes and to be honest. you cant distinguish between rich and poor. both can be annoying but i found mostly the a bit rich who think they are really rich are the most annoying, with their way to talk believing they are elite and in reality the are just a tad upper middle class... i hate them so much, they dont even realise they are not rich.
but also are annoying are the wannabe players form poor neighborhoods, their loud noisy style in trains and they think they are so cool, if they would just realise what losers they are and they are not even strong and nobody believe that they are cool.
but that being said i think most gms coming from fromer soviet union were rather poor and they were cool people. very interesting sosonko wrote very good books about them.
Irontiger wrote:
TetsuoShima wrote:
i think women are even much more ego, they are just master of deception.
Not sure how it is in Japan, but surely not in Western Europe, nor in Africa.
And hiding the fact of being proud is the same as not being proud, as far as the others can tell.
Ofc they are in western europe, dont tell me Polgar are not ego. They are probably way more ego then every male gm i ever saw.
Feb 28, 2013
0
#29
It is not more egotistical than another other sport. So far I have never heard of a chess player who wanted to make a statue of himself as is the case in football. But this may have to do with that football stars earn so much that they think everybody loves them. In reality the moment the money is gone so will the friends be. xD
Actually thinking about it i think the majority of chessplayers are poor.
sluck72 wrote:
It is not more egotistical than another other sport. So far I have never heard of a chess player who wanted to make a statue of himself as is the case in football. But this may have to do with that football stars earn so much that they think everybody loves them. In reality the moment the money is gone so will the friends be. xD
still better then the rocky statue
Kingpatzer wrote
Chess, being a game where even the best players have inaccuracies in their play, is actually pretty lacking in egos compared to quite a few other activities. Particularly in the class levels where many folks just play for fun and don't really care too much about results.
I would tend to disagree with you here kingpatzer. In order to be really good at chess you kind of have to develop an ego. As silman puts it in "The Amatuer's Mind" you should look at every opponent with a hint of disdain. This allows you to ignore their threats and continue with your own plan, and take full advantage of every mistake they make.
Also, at the tournaments I go to I notice a very disctinct class system. The players with the higher elo's get all sorts of preferential treatment from everyone. How many times have you seen a higher elo player walk over to some random game after it finishes and begin to explain to the players where they went wrong, without even asking the players if they want this sort of help.
Zacer wrote:
Kingpatzer wrote
Chess, being a game where even the best players have inaccuracies in their play, is actually pretty lacking in egos compared to quite a few other activities. Particularly in the class levels where many folks just play for fun and don't really care too much about results.
I would tend to disagree with you here kingpatzer. In order to be really good at chess you kind of have to develop an ego. As silman puts it in "The Amatuer's Mind" you should look at every opponent with a hint of disdain. This allows you to ignore their threats and continue with your own plan, and take full advantage of every mistake they make.
Also, at the tournaments I go to I notice a very disctinct class system. The players with the higher elo's get all sorts of preferential treatment from everyone. How many times have you seen a higher elo player walk over to some random game after it finishes and begin to explain to the players where they went wrong, without even asking the players if they want this sort of help.
after thinking about it, yeah maybe i should try the stonewall. maybe it was nakamura in disguise ;)
TetsuoShima wrote:
Ofc they are in western europe, dont tell me Polgar are not ego. They are probably way more ego then every male gm i ever saw.
This makes 1, supposing you are true. The question is a statistical one.
Irontiger wrote:
TetsuoShima wrote:
Ofc they are in western europe, dont tell me Polgar are not ego. They are probably way more ego then every male gm i ever saw.
This makes 1, supposing you are true. The question is a statistical one.
well it makes three supposing im right. Well and claiming women title because you are not strong enough for men and pretending it is totally fair and logical, is probably the most egomaniac thing one can imagine.
Anyway do they really help you otb after the game???
shahhussainkcl wrote:
Sure there are egotistical GMs (I would be if I worked hard at becoming a GM) but in my experience players of my level are very polite and well behaved. I've found Connect-4 and Pool to be more egotistical activities. Pool because it's a manly bar room game, I guess, but Connect-4 is a surprise discovery. Not sure how to explain it.
Connect 4 is solved though!
abiogenesis23 wrote:
shahhussainkcl wrote:
Sure there are egotistical GMs (I would be if I worked hard at becoming a GM) but in my experience players of my level are very polite and well behaved. I've found Connect-4 and Pool to be more egotistical activities. Pool because it's a manly bar room game, I guess, but Connect-4 is a surprise discovery. Not sure how to explain it.
Connect 4 is solved though!
but did it really need to be solved? cant believe its that difficult. Not that i can solve it, but i would believe its possible
Sure there are egotistical GMs (I would be if I worked hard at becoming a GM) but in my experience players of my level are very polite and well behaved. I've found Connect-4 and Pool to be more egotistical activities. Pool because it's a manly bar room game, I guess, but Connect-4 is a surprise discovery. Not sure how to explain it.
Good example of that attitude ! (...no, I get it, it is "I would be egocentric", not "I would be a GM" but the first reading is tricky).
Politeness is not correlated with humility, or negatively from what I can tell.
Is chess the most egotistical sport ? Certainly not, it is not a sport. The most egotistical game ? Games are not egoistical.
Are chess players more egocentric than other persons ? Maybe, but as much as you can expect men to be more than women (like it or not, it is culturally like that), rich people more than poor people (and chess players are rich). I don't think chess produces overinflated egos, but it maybe attracts them.