Is there such thing as "luck" in chess?

You are not understanding the definition of luck, which I have as something akin to "success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's own actions".

Just because a person performs an action (flips a coin, spins a wheel, chooses a card, moves a piece, etc.), and gets a result from that action (lands head, hits red, Ace of Diamonds, e4, etc.), does not mean that we label the success or failure associated with the action as directly and exclusively attributable to said actions. 

We can only determine one's relative competency/skill through multiple trials, since there is no way to separate randomness from the actual selection of the move itself.  You cannot, after a move has already been made, say it was a result of skill anymore than you could claim, after Monty Hall's proverbial door has already been opened to reveal a car, that the person exhibited skill in their selection. The naive, baseline assumption is that any move in any position has an equal probability of being selected. 

That is why for example a 900 rated player who gets an accuracy score of 99% in a single game is not immediately banned by chess.com's cheat detection. They recognize that said person did not suddenly assume engine strength, but just got lucky. Their skill did not change. 

As I see you have not given the quote or post number, I accept your apology for making up things to argue against.

1) "So my definition of skill verse luck [i]s 'sucess or failure based on random chance rather then ones own actions, or being able to increase ones chance of success with practice or knowledge', is unreasonable? LOL how convenient for you bud. Is this not the standard definitions? How convenient for you to change them."

Oh! Wow! Okay, I had no idea that you were freely admitting that you took the definition I used from google, and added a whole sentence at the end of the definition based on what you felt like the definition should be. Yes, taking a dictionary definition and then adding a whole clause or sentence at the end of it is unreasonable (unless you have a source that is in agreement with the definition you pulled from thin air?) No, the definition you provided is not the standard definition. That would be exactly what I pulled from Google: "success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's own actions."

2) "if pros are "inconsistent",  which imo would not make them pros,   then how can consistency be a measurement of skill?" 

Please tell me I not arguing with someone this dense... If a player plays in half his tournaments at a 2900 level, winning many major tournaments, and the other half at a 2500 level, he is inconsistent and yet still an amazing player. That kind of player is also preferable to the person who plays all his tournaments in a range of 2675-2725 and just comes in 5th all the time. Or more obviously, the person who always plays at an 1100 level. 

3) "Tell me again that you played "high level baseball" as if that matters...."

I only brought this up when you falsely said I had no knowledge of competitive sports. I agree it has nothing to do with the question, which is why, as I have said all along, you bringing up competitive sports does not matter/is irrelevant. Because all sports accept luck as a part of the game. For example: https://sabr.org/journal/article/calculating-skill-and-luck-in-major-league-baseball/

4) "But lets be honest here,  you even contradict the first part of the definition you are still saying you agree with you.   Because google defined luck as without human action yet everything you mention to prove luck is with human action!"

It is like you just read something, make up what you want it to say, and then argue against that. I gave explicit examples of things that are a result of human action--the rolling of a dice, the flipping of a coin, the selection of a card-- that we universally identity as luck. Or are you saying you don't believe the flip of a coin, roll of a dice, etc. is a function of luck?

Since you seem to be swayed by big letters and like to make things up, I will attempt to speak in your language.

First I thank you for agreeing that luck is 

Sucess or failure based on random chance rather then ones own actions, or the inherent part of every chess game

It took u a while, but after u stoped claiming that chess doesn't fit the criteria to be a sport, you came around.      When you say things like there s no difference between flipping a dice and selecting a move, i think you are taking it to far tho.   or that basketball isn't a sport because balls bounce.   skill is still involved as per my reasonable definition that i made up and you agreed with "the ability to do something well or the part of chess that isn't due to the inherent non-negligible aspect that is rightfully attributed to luck".     but then you contradict the very thing you agreed with! 

When you imply that you are able to consistently able to beat Magnus Carlsen, or that the only reason people have a higher rating than you is that they are cheating, that is pretty disgraceful and disengenous imo. These are people who won big tournaments. and u do that.    Shameful.     

And all from a supposed "broadway dancer" lol.   Like someone would pay for that.   bunch of people  fraduelent people just showing off for no reason. This is similar to how you finally admited that fruit is better than vegetables for determining the winner. Again which is u literally pointing at something that is luck,  and calling it skill too desperately prove there was luck involved.

But again my friend, I thank you for finally agreeing with the definition we all agreed on, which is never forget: Sucess or failure based on random chance rather then ones own actions, or the inherent part of every chess game

there is no randomness involved with selecting a move.

I have never played 1.e3 intentionally, but I have played it.

Only if you accept there is no randomness in selecting a door offered by Monty Hall

No luck is involved in chess, no random factors are present. But high level of uncertainty is dominant on long lines, due to increasing complexity of calculations. This may seem luck to us.

I don't disagree. What I am disagreeing with is coolout creating his definition, imagining a consensus around it, passing it off as if it was the definition, and thinking that is a reasonable process.

Of course, to look for evidence of an agreement/consensus surrounding something, it is imperative to search through multiple opinions. That is how the meaning of words come to be. So as capable humans with a search engine, we can get evidence around the consensus/lack of consensus surrounding the meaning of a word by proxying how others choose to define them. And we get a tremendous amount of information when none of the sources in this proxy choose to define the word as having any characteristics associated with the second part of coolout's definition.

We also get a tremendous amount of information when we think about why coolout would add the second part of his definition to a verbatim one pulled off google

You haven't looked at many of MY games, have you?

Dog hairs. Optical mouse. No lack of practice. I've played more than 170,000 games online, although many tens of thousands have been on a mobile device.

You offer enough suggestions to show a glimmer of understanding of the impact of random possibilities defeating clear intent.

I've looked at @CooloutAC's games. Plenty of randomness there.

This assertion has been refuted by data. Please read what others have posted here.

Let's consider some data anyway.

More consistent, therefore more skilled:



Less consistent, therefore less skilled.



I think the evidence (rating) proved you wrong.

As I recall, Humpty Dumpty adhered to a similar philosophy.

mouse slips are accidents, not randomness.

This is the bit I had in mind:

You are consistent because you lack skill.

Acts 9: 13-15, 26-27

Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem:

And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy name.

But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way:  for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel.

And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples: but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple.

But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus.

Is it random luck or accident that gives us the small selection of second and third century manuscripts that people have translated to produce the Bible?