Is there such thing as "luck" in chess?

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Mike_Kalish

The best debater on Facebook? Wow.....excuse me, but I question how high that bar actually is. I also question how many people actually uttered those words... "Of the billions on here, the vast majority of whom I never read, I deem you  the best debater on Facebook".  

I can say one thing....before I proudly cancelled my fb account a year and a half ago, NO ONE ever declared me the best debater on Facebook. Hopefully, no one said I was the worst either.....but then you have to look at what's important....that being not how WELL you debate on Facebook, but how MUCH you debate of Facebook, the less the better.

DiogenesDue
mikekalish wrote:

I came to the same conclusion you did, and just decided he wasn't worth my time or energy. He can't bully you if you disengage.

You're a little new here to be coming to such conclusions.  I engage with people kind for kind (save that I don't stoop to namecalling like Optimissed does).  Optimissed just reaps what he sows.  You'll figure that out, eventually.

Mike_Kalish

I'm kind of confused here. With all the quoting going on, who is it that actually spoke all that and claimed to be the best debater of Facebook and to have X-ray vision?

DiogenesDue
Optimissed wrote:

I could go into your Covid thread and copy and paste you trolling people who disagree with you, in order to push them into getting angry, which allows you to block them for abuse and then write about it in your little list at the top of that thread, which could lead to either you or Chess.com being sued for illegal data storage. You are a troll. I think the person who called you recently "an evil creep" was closest. You're hated here. You only dare talk where you feel safe.

Lol.  There's nothing in my Covid thread to go after.  There's no such charge as "illegal data storage".  The "evil creep" comment must have been in PMs...your favorite skulking ground.

 

DiogenesDue
mikekalish wrote:

I'm kind of confused here. With all the quoting going on, who is it that actually spoke all that and claimed to be the best debater of Facebook and to have X-ray vision?

Follow the links...those are all public posts made by Optimissed while bragging about himself.  Now he wants to characterize them as me posting his personal information wink.png.

DiogenesDue
Optimissed wrote:

I also think that anyone who is prepared to paste personal stuff like that from the past, none of which I have any reason to be worried about or regret, because I never write anything that isn't the truth, is clearly showing people that he's mentally ill. And you are mentally ill, I'm sorry to say.

There are a lot of people in the World who strongly believe that all this psychic stuff is invented or a delusion. Generally because that's what they've learned and when they're maybe 15 years old it can seem reasonable that people believe it for the wrong reasons and because they want to or maybe need to.

I don't think you'll ever learn though. You'll be all twisted up and hating people as long as you live. You've never grown up. I think your development as a normal adult was halted at about 13. What happened to you? Something, obviously.

Those are your own public posts, not "personal stuff".

I don't hate "people".  I don't hate you.  I just show you for who you are.  You'll notice that I never "attack" you the way you do to me.  I just steadfastly bring up your own posted junk and reflect it back at you.  If you didn't post it, I would have zero ammo.  It's not a hard concept.

Your last paragraph should be taped to the back of your Tshirt.

DiogenesDue
Optimissed wrote:

I'm going to follow the advice of mikekalish and I want to explain my motives. I've seen you personally attack very many people here and probably driven many people away permanently. It isn't because I perceive you as bullying me. I'm mentally tough and it isn't something that bothers me much but it can really hurt some people and I want it to stop. You are actually an evil person. Deliberately evil. A psychopath constantly lies and the motivation is to turn people against those that the psychopath wishes to harm. I believe that you don't like seeing people who are happy. If they are happy, self-confident and intelligent, you want to hurt them. You always start the name calling and abuse but you do it just inside the rules. Sooner or later Chess.com will have to make a decision about whether you should be here. You don't perceive yourself as hating people because you have rationalised all your sociopathic impulses.

What you have seen me do is stand up to posters that denigrate other posters habitually.  Time to read the tea leaves with your psychic powers and see that you routinely denigrate other posters' intelligence for no reason other than to elevate yourself.  You've done it dozens of times on this very thread.

I'm not an evil person, I just have a different philosophy than you are used to dealing with.  I don't back off when you get aggressive.  I'm like a guy at the park, who walks up to the annoying guy standing on a soapbox with a megaphone, spouting some crap...then I pull out my megaphone and point out all the holes in the logic of said crap, politely, but at the same volume.  When the guy finally gets off his soapbox and he and his 2-3 followers walk away mumbling about how evil and hateful *I* am, you know that the rest of the innocent bystanders do?  They cheer.

How can you tell the difference?  I only pull out my megaphone when somebody is already pontificating on theirs.

Mike_Kalish
btickler wrote:
mikekalish wrote:

I came to the same conclusion you did, and just decided he wasn't worth my time or energy. He can't bully you if you disengage.

You're a little new here to be coming to such conclusions.  I engage with people kind for kind (save that I don't stoop to namecalling like Optimissed does).  Optimissed just reaps what he sows.  You'll figure that out, eventually.

btickler, my apology! I wasn't referring to you here. I apparently was a little confused as to who was quoting whom, who was bullying whom, and I was actually referring to another poster, CooloutAC. I came to no such conclusion about you, and I will acknowledge that my conclusion about CooloutAC, or cookout as spellcheck prefers, was hasty and based on  very limited information, so could easily be way off. I did decide to disengage from him, however, as I saw red flags. But again, sorry for the confusion. My fault. 

 

Edit:  In fact, I still may be a little foggy on who is who and what's being alleged, but my comment about "the same conclusion" was about CooloutAC, as I got a negative impression. I should have been more clear, and understand how my lack of clarity led to your thinking I meant you. I hope this clears that up.

DiogenesDue
mikekalish wrote:
btickler wrote:
mikekalish wrote:

I came to the same conclusion you did, and just decided he wasn't worth my time or energy. He can't bully you if you disengage.

You're a little new here to be coming to such conclusions.  I engage with people kind for kind (save that I don't stoop to namecalling like Optimissed does).  Optimissed just reaps what he sows.  You'll figure that out, eventually.

btickler, my apology! I wasn't referring to you here. I apparently was a little confused as to who was quoting whom, who was bullying whom, and I was actually referring to another poster, CooloutAC. I came to no such conclusion about you, and I will acknowledge that my conclusion about CooloutAC, or cookout as spellcheck prefers, was hasty and based on  very limited information, so could easily be way off. I did decide to disengage from him, however, as I saw red flags. But again, sorry for the confusion. My fault. 

Lol.  No worries.  Having had 6 months or so of Coolout, I don't think your conclusions will change.

Love the F-5, by the way, cleanest lines of any fighter jet past or present...

lfPatriotGames
Ziryab wrote:
mikekalish wrote:

IQ is a completely meaningless and undefined term. It is a human construct, designed to create an artificial distinction between humans and it creates a false means of comparison. Tests that supposedly measure IQ actually only measure a very narrow segment of human brain capacity, and typically one that doesn't correlate to success (another ill-defined term) or happiness in life. Sure, parents get to brag about their 4 year old who is reading at a 6 year old level (woohoo... 150 IQ), but by 13, hormones have leveled the intellectual playing field. 
Anyone who is willing to spend serious time and energy discussing IQ..... well, I'll reserve my comments, but I think they should find better things to talk about..... like chess for example. 

 

I'm in general agreement with a point at the heart of your statement, but might less enthusiastic with how far you take it.

Money is a human construct. It is a measure of certain kinds of success.

IQ tests and standardized tests like the SAT used in American college admissions are excellent predictors of academic success. 

Ronald Reagan was not bright by the standards of IQ and other measures of knowledge and critical thinking, but his speechmaking moved people far more than most of his predecessors and successors. His biographer, Lou Cannon, struggled with whether he was "intelligent", which led him to Howard Gardner's notion of multiple intelligences. Reagan was socially brilliant.

Explaining the success of Don the Con, however, is gonna take something different. 

I had an interesting day yesterday. I played nine holes of golf with one of his speechwriters. He's obviously a bit older than me, but we had a fascinating conversation. I didn't know they had that many, and how different their roles can be. 

Most importantly, he won. Had I been a bit more lucky I think we would have tied. 

lfPatriotGames

Well I have never heard of anyone claiming there is no luck in golf. Or any sport for that matter. You are the first. It's a unique position, given all the things that can happen that people have no control over. 

lfPatriotGames

I can think of one example from yesterday. On a long par 3 I hit my ball short of the green. But it was a pretty easy chip. I needed to hit it about 10 feet on the green and let it roll the rest of the way up to the flagstick. But I mishit it. I hit it way short. I knew instantly it was going to be a bad shot and there was no way it would ever run out far enough. But it hit the "bumper". I hit it so bad, and so far short, that it hit that exact spot where the short collar grass meets the longer fairway grass. So the ball just shot forward on a flat trajectory. It ended up less than a foot from the hole. Tap in par.

I had no plan or intention to hit it that short or that bad. And certainly nobody in the world is good enough to hit that exact spot from that far away on purpose. So if that's not good luck, I don't know what is. I can see where similar situations might arise in chess. A move is made with no plan or purpose, no intention one way or another. Simply a random move that is made because any ol' move will do. 

lfPatriotGames
CooloutAC wrote:
lfPatriotGames wrote:

Well I have never heard of anyone claiming there is no luck in golf. Or any sport for that matter. You are the first. It's a unique position, given all the things that can happen that people have no control over. 

anyone who knows the difference between games based on luck and games based on skill absolutely will claim such.  Including the dozens in this thread you pretend don't exist.  Because the topic of this thread poses a question to distinguish between them, and it seems you can't comprehend the distinction.

Give me an example of something you had no control over in your golf game.  Are you going to bring up an animal eating your ball again?   Which would not affect your score since you are allowed to drop the ball where it was picked up?    Are you going to tell me about the wind and trees which are accounted for by the golfer?   Here is a test to see if a shot is truly random or controlled by you,   if you were to go back in time and replay the shot again can you increase your chances of success or failure?   Then it was by your own actions and nothing else.

Wind. Wind is something you have no control over. Many golf courses have what are called microclimates. conditions can change, sometimes drastically, in as little as 200 yards. So a person can hit their best shot possible, and while the ball is in the air, a gust of wind picks up and sends the ball in a vastly different direction than planned. Sometimes it can be a good result, sometimes it can be a bad result. It all comes down to luck. 

To answer your question about going back and hitting that lucky shot again, it would probably take at least 20 tries, maybe 50, good shots to get it that close again. But it was the one bad shot that actually got it that close. That's luck. 

Kotshmot
CooloutAC wrote:
Kotshmot wrote:
CooloutAC wrote:
Kotshmot wrote:
CooloutAC wrote:
Kotshmot wrote:
CooloutAC wrote:
Kotshmot wrote:
CooloutAC wrote:
Kotshmot wrote:
btickler wrote:
Optimissed wrote:

I mean, btickler agrees with you, and that's certainly a bad sign.

Your memory is failing you again.

Btickler argues, imperfectly, that luck doesn't exist in chess but I don't believe hes ever made the even more insane claim that there is no luck in sports.


it all depends on who btickler is dishonestly trolling in the moment.  Look at his most recent post and you will see he is contradicting your assertion.  He will argue there is luck in chess when arguing with me.  lol

But my friend.  You sound somewhat contradicting yourself,  when you say its crazy to argue there is no luck in sports,  but its not crazy to argue there is no luck in chess.   First of all,  you are diminishing your own arguments regarding chess.  Secondly, chess is another sport and you are confirming one of the most common motives many have in this thread.  You are simply not competitive and lack any sports sense, resenting those that do.

Luck and chess is a more complex debate and it's more difficult to distinguish skill from other variables, that's why I have more understanding if someone makes the claim that luck doesn't exist in chess. In fact chess does the best job of minimizing the element of luck out of any game/sports.

In sports like soccer it is incredibly easy to tell apart which event is caused by skill, and where luck is in play.

The example Ive given before is good. A player attempts a pass to his teammate, but a failed kicking technique results in the ball going straight in the net. No soccer player would ever claim that they scored by skill when this happens. Their level of skill did not have an effect on this finish. This is an easy argument.

 

Chess is no different then any sport,  you tell yourself otherwise which is an obvious motive now.   You probably think flagging someone is lucky,  and that players should resign in losing positions.  You probably think chess is too hard for society to understand,  you probably think speed chess is not real chess compared to classical,  etc.. etc..   

For example,  you think any player can accidentally pass a soccer ball into a goal,   when I gave you the example of myself as someone who never could.   The players put themselves into the position for that to happen,  like good players put themselves into winning positions in chess when not planning for them.   Its very simple to understand that human ability is skill,  and any result from any action determined to be from it,  whether conscious or not,   is not luck by definition of the word itself.

When I said earlier you ramble, that first paragraph is it. Just total garbage lmao. I dont care to compare chess to another sports what I said is its a more difficult discussion in terms of luck. Flagging isn't lucky, players can resign when they want. Chess is hard for some people, easy for some. We done with this? Wasting time in this, deflecting the relevant points is why I dont like to have this one sided debate with you.

And you're right, it is skill to be well positioned to score a goal. All of this leading up to the moment can be skill, but still a failed kick that leads to a good outcome is luck. Your argument here is "there were many skillful actions done leading up to that lucky action, so it can't be luck". No, because goal still wouldn't be scored without the failed, lucky kick, so your argument is wrong.

There was no human ability involved in the goal scoring moment, because the kick FAILED, but goal was still scored. Same goes with chess but with different examples.

 

And what I am saying is you only believe it is more difficult,  because you don't consider chess a sport.   Its not a failed kick if it ended up being a goal.  Its only luck to you because it was not planned for by the player even though that contradicts the definition of luck since it was his own action that caused it.   And what I have repeatedly said to you is better players will always get lucky  according to your logic more often then lesser skilled players,   which is why we can conclude no force of luck plays a role.   

This should already be common sense and self evident,  but the word exists as it applies to gaming to differentiate between human force of action,  and other forces out of ones control,  specifically for people like who you lack a comprehension of this simple distinction.   This is to prevent sore losers and poor sports like yourself,  from diminishing rightful human achievement.   

Any  failure resulting from a kick is simply an unskillful kick,  not an unlucky one, which is probably something you would admit.  But for you its out of sheer selfish convenience the winner is always lucky,  which is a contradiction to the technical definition of the word.

"Its not a failed kick because it ended up being a goal"

So a kick that was meant to be a pass, but was misshit to another direction, cannot be considered failed just because there was a great outcome? Thats just fundamentally wrong thinking (consistently bad with the other stuff tbf).

"Winner is always lucky"

No, this is just your assumption based on nothing. Luck as I describe it is completely random and doesn't correlate with winning or losing. A losing team could get a lucky goal, a lucky block, anything and still lose the game. Someone who fails a kick 3 times in a game and still doesn't lose the ball still might be on the losing side. So I don't know where you're going with this? Just lost I guess with desperate rambling?

 

first of all it wasn't necessarily mishit,  it could be the receiver who missed the ball or wasn't in the proper place to receive the setup.  It could of been the poor skill of the goalie.    If you want to see a real mishit put me in that situation lol. But the reason they were in those positions in the first place was by design.  This is why according to your false logic good players always get luckier then bad players,  because the truth is even when not precisely planned they put themselves in better positions just like chess pieces on a chessboard.      Second of all absolutely YES.     Because no other force of action hit the ball except the player himself.

Nothing is completely random in your scenario for the reasons I have described above.  It seems you don't even know what "completely random" means.  

These "what if" arguments do absolutely nothing. For the arguments sake you have to assume it was misshit when I say so for the practical example lmao, you can't just say "well maybe not, then it's not luck". The fact that you resort to this kind of nonsense hints to me that you don't believe yourself.

Whether they we're in position or at the hot dog stand when the incident happened, as I stated before it doesn't matter. If skillful actions lead to a lucky event, it's still lucky.

I do agree that in terms of humans, our attempts are skill or lack thereof. But if only skill is determining what FOLLOWS your action, then a failed attempt would always lead to a bad outcome. Otherwise again, we would have to say "He scored by his lack of skill" instead of "it was a lucky shot". Clearly this is not the case.

Yes you can train your passing to develop your skill, there is no luck there. But where the luck comes in is when you have failed your attempt. AFTER the failed kick, you're not in control of the ball. How do we know this? You have no idea where it will go after the failed kick.

 

But my friend,  you are the one making what if arguments. You are literally talking about soccer related to chess.  You are talking to me about what if a players pass goes into the goal,  as is very common in soccer.    I'm saying there are many factors as to why its not considered lucky.  from the players positions, the goalies unskillful play,   to the fact it was human force.  

 

Skill or lack thereof is exactly the action for what followed.  How can you say that and then argue it is not?  You contradict yourself, yet again...  Saying it was a "lucky shot" is simply a  phrase of sportsmanship not to be taken literally and technically.  It fails to take into account all the circumstances I have previously stated.  

 

Exactly, I can train my passing,  no matter how bad I miscalculate,  that is not luck.  And here you go contradicting yourself, yet again,  when you say but a mishit is lucky or unlucky.   It is not, its simply an unskillful hit.  In the case of soccer its a team game,  its a player verse player game,  and all those things are taken into account as well as the fact it is human action and no other force making the plays.  There is no element of luck by design,  there is no element of luck as a factor at all.  Much like chess.

"Mishit is just an unskillful hit"

Absolutely I agree. But what does it become when an unskilful hit, or a pass, turns into a beneficial outcome, ie goal like in my example? Is it a win by unskilful play, instead of calling it lucky?

This is the problem we are getting at, the outocome as opposed to the action itself.

Mike_Kalish
btickler wrote:
mikekalish wrote:
btickler wrote:
mikekalish wrote:

I came to the same conclusion you did, and just decided he wasn't worth my time or energy. He can't bully you if you disengage.

You're a little new here to be coming to such conclusions.  I engage with people kind for kind (save that I don't stoop to namecalling like Optimissed does).  Optimissed just reaps what he sows.  You'll figure that out, eventually.

btickler, my apology! I wasn't referring to you here. I apparently was a little confused as to who was quoting whom, who was bullying whom, and I was actually referring to another poster, CooloutAC. I came to no such conclusion about you, and I will acknowledge that my conclusion about CooloutAC, or cookout as spellcheck prefers, was hasty and based on  very limited information, so could easily be way off. I did decide to disengage from him, however, as I saw red flags. But again, sorry for the confusion. My fault. 

Lol.  No worries.  Having had 6 months or so of Coolout, I don't think your conclusions will change.

Love the F-5, by the way, cleanest lines of any fighter jet past or present...

That was the T38, the trainer version of the F5 fighter, but same basic aircraft..... and yes, very sweet.  I did indeed "Slip the surly bonds of earth and touch the face of God" as the poem goes. (Awesome of you to recognize it!)

Ziryab
lfPatriotGames wrote:

I can think of one example from yesterday. On a long par 3 I hit my ball short of the green. But it was a pretty easy chip. I needed to hit it about 10 feet on the green and let it roll the rest of the way up to the flagstick. But I mishit it. I hit it way short. I knew instantly it was going to be a bad shot and there was no way it would ever run out far enough. But it hit the "bumper". I hit it so bad, and so far short, that it hit that exact spot where the short collar grass meets the longer fairway grass. So the ball just shot forward on a flat trajectory. It ended up less than a foot from the hole. Tap in par.

I had no plan or intention to hit it that short or that bad. And certainly nobody in the world is good enough to hit that exact spot from that far away on purpose. So if that's not good luck, I don't know what is. I can see where similar situations might arise in chess. A move is made with no plan or purpose, no intention one way or another. Simply a random move that is made because any ol' move will do. 

 

I haven't played golf in decades, but I would say that I was pretty lucky when I got a 2 on a par 3 because I was one foot from an ace. Chipping a ball into the hole from 50 yards off the green was a pretty good stroke of luck too. Bad luck has included bounces from innumerable gopher holes at Indian Canyon in Spokane.

DiogenesDue
mikekalish wrote:

That was the T38, the trainer version of the F5 fighter, but same basic aircraft..... and yes, very sweet.  I did indeed "Slip the surly bonds of earth and touch the face of God" as the poem goes. 

(Awesome of you to recognize it!)

Yep, the F-5 intakes and nose look sleeker/better, and I didn't want to imply anything by mentioning trainer aircraft wink.png.  I saw the Talons a number of times when the Thunderbirds were flying them.

I used to carry around the Observer's Book of Aircraft like a bible when I was young.  Funnily enough this photo below is much larger than actual size, the "observer" line of books could almost fit in a shirt pocket.

Mike_Kalish

I only flew it in training, but 240 hours worth....about 30 of those solo. Fully acrobatic as you realize, but even in training we did 2 and 4 ship formation, which was really a kick.... 500 knots with a few feet of wingtip separation.  Now,  the T38 is all computerized and the cockpit looks completely different. There are some great T38 videos on YouTube for when I'm in one of those "I'm just an old guy, but I used to be cool" moods.  :-)   PS  If you could see a closeup of my picture, you'd see that I didn't yet have wings. This was a few weeks before graduation, so I was still a student. The training program was an intense 53 weeks. We started with 78 and 47 graduated.  (Webb AFB, Big Spring, TX..... which is now the site of a federal prison)

DiogenesDue
mikekalish wrote:

I only flew it in training, but 240 hours worth....about 30 of those solo. Fully acrobatic as you realize, but even in training we did 2 and 4 ship formation, which was really a kick.... 500 knots with a few feet of wingtip separation.  Now,  the T38 is all computerized and the cockpit looks completely different. There are some great T38 videos on YouTube for when I'm in one of those "I'm just an old guy, but I used to be cool" moods.  :-)   PS  If you could see a closeup of my picture, you'd see that I didn't yet have wings. This was a few weeks before graduation, so I was still a student. The training program was an intense 53 weeks. We started with 78 and 47 graduated.  (Webb AFB, Big Spring, TX..... which is now the site of a federal prison)

Funny how that happens happy.png.  This is where I was stationed in the late 80s:

...and this is the site now:

Mike_Kalish
btickler wrote:
mikekalish wrote:

I only flew it in training, but 240 hours worth....about 30 of those solo. Fully acrobatic as you realize, but even in training we did 2 and 4 ship formation, which was really a kick.... 500 knots with a few feet of wingtip separation.  Now,  the T38 is all computerized and the cockpit looks completely different. There are some great T38 videos on YouTube for when I'm in one of those "I'm just an old guy, but I used to be cool" moods.  :-)   PS  If you could see a closeup of my picture, you'd see that I didn't yet have wings. This was a few weeks before graduation, so I was still a student. The training program was an intense 53 weeks. We started with 78 and 47 graduated.  (Webb AFB, Big Spring, TX..... which is now the site of a federal prison)

Funny how that happens .  This is where I was stationed in the late 80s:

 

...and this is the site now:

 

Where is that?  Thule, Greenland?