Isn't It Impossible to Compare Players From Different Eras?

How can you say Player A is better than Player B if they played in totally different eras?  

Knowledge of the game and correct/good play is a cumulative and progressive process.  Therefore, players from earlier periods are obviously at a disadvantage when comparing their play to players of a later era.   

you are absolutely right. judging by the number of threads some people still enjoy trying though. It is intruiging to know, if we transported all the world champions at, say, 5 years old and gave them each 20 years to prepare. who would win the tournament? impossible to say (like you said) but I for one would love to see those games!

There are lots of way to compare other than who would win in a time machine match. Like rating gap among peers, contributions to theory, tournament victories, unbeaten or other performance streaks, etc.

It's not that it's impossible to compare, it's impossible to definitively say who is better because "better" is subjective to one or more of the criteria you and I have listed.

did find this interesting, (for me it was)

https://en.chessbase.com/post/historical-chess-ratings-dynamically-presented

It is possible. For example, a drunk Morphy could crush me blinfolded and giving me queen odds.

waiting for the MODERN = BETTER!!!! crowd here with cpt. obvious and a baseball bat.

Of course its impossible.  But if we go by that logic, the forums would die.  We would be left with the eternal question on rematches, and the effect on the universe.

Also, the skill sets are different across time after the incorporation of computers into chess analysis.  

Everything was arguably more "pure" and "man-made" back in the pre-computer days.  Players' skills were all done and honed by the will of their mind (or, at most, the help of other human minds).

Computers today change that.  You can instantly see whether your thinking might have any fatal flaws to it or not through an engine check.  

It seems in the post-computer era there's a more blurred line between where a person's skills begin and end and where the computer's influence and assistance of his or her skills begins and ends.  How much of Player A's ability in the modern era is a result of computer study vs. figuring all that stuff out him or herself?

In the old days, it was all human thinking (at most, you could say that some players - like the Russians - had extra human help).  The skill sets were just different too.  Today it's think of something and CHECK it against the computer.  If the computer refutes it, move on.

Back then, it was think of something and discuss with peers at most, but NOT have instant feedback.  You could go months...years?...not seeing the flaws behind something maybe.

Easily! Just like this:

"Capablanca would have destroyed Carlsen, but Carlsen was so afraid to play Capablanca that he waited almost half a century after Capablanca died to be born just to avoid any chance of playing him."

People have weird ideas about the role engines play.

What did you mean?

Don't get me wrong, engines are useful, but also engines suggest impractical, and sometimes bad moves. They can give incorrect  (or misleading) evaluations, offer no practical evaluations (like winning chances or ease of play) and don't explain anything.

They are objective and consistent, and (more or less) don't miss any tactics, but with just an engine, you're not going to learn much. Much more useful from computers are things like online coaching, databases, learning materials, and an endless supply of human opponents.

This debate pops up from time to time. Why are you trying to compare them?

They didn't have computers, and data bases in most cases, at least like we have today. However I wouldn't be so quick to say if an older prodigy was transported to our time, and they were young, at least some of them would be top players if not possibly a champion. Morphy might. He was brilliant, and tireless on studying.

I don't see how Morphy's tireless focus on Law (and lack of enthusiasm for chess) is relevant, but, ok I guess

Lack of enthusiasm was later, he didn't start off with a lack of it. He also had his reasons.

Certainly you can compare players from different eras.  Calculating retrospective ratings is probably not the way to go.  Ratings tell you a player's competitive strength relative to their contemporaries. A rating does not tell you an absolute level of performance (as does, for example a stopwatch when comparing runners ... though even then it is impossible to say what runners of the past might have achieved on a tartan track, in modern spikes, and with modern methods of training).

What you can do, if you are strong enough, is to study the games of old and on that basis form an impression of the level of play.   I am not strong enough to make a true assessment of the greats of the past.  I would be demolished by the likes of Blackburne and Mieses,  or even by Staunton, or Philidor. Heck, El Greco would probably beat me too!  Nevertheless the impression I get is that in calculating tactical lines, and in some kinds of position  they were every bit as strong as modern players, but that they were experienced in a very limityed range of positions and even the most forward thinking and creative of them were incredibly dogmatic in their belief in chess "principles"  and in the narrow range of openings that they deemed correct.

For all that I have little doubt that the masters of the 19th century would have had no trouble walloping your typical club player or the majority of chess.com members.

I think you are missing some of the best ways to do these comparisons. Look at contemporaries who played in more than one era. For instance, Spassky played Tal, Fischer, Kasparov and Karpov. Karpov played Kasparov and others. Kasparov was active until recently and has played many of the modern GM's. etc. etc.

Now we know a player's strength ebbs as he ages, so we can make certain estimates on how much their play has diminished and make better estimates of the strength of the people they played at different times of life.

In this way we can interpolate quite a bit about the relative strengths of players from different eras. Not absolute strengths, but enough to make some pretty good guesses about who might have beaten who in a match.

Now, WHY a particular player is strong today vs. 100 years ago is a subject for another day. However, if we want to estimate how well modern players might have done against their predecessors I think we can make a pretty good scientific guess in many cases.

Lol, I think many of todays players have massive ego's. Morphy more than likely had a photographic memory. Also I believe the then current world champion, made a habit of avoiding him. As far as comparing all we have is tech that makes us different today. As well more people have more time to devote to hobbies compared to back then.

Also alot more people play today compared to back then as well, many couldn't even read or write, much less have time to study chess. However we will never know for sure, we can only speculate.

Steintiz is considered the first world champ after his match with Zukertort. This happened around 20 years after Morphy retired from chess.

Staunton seems to have avoided playing Morphy.

Staunton's major successes were from 1843 to 1846. By 1851, there were perhaps some who were willing to argue that he was still the best, but, I think it would be quite hard to find a record of anyone arguing that Staunton was still the best after Morphy's 1858 victories.