I'm pretty much going to agree with Loomis' first post. Although all of the stated trends/generalizations are correct on the nationwide level, statistics just don't apply to individuals. NOBODY is "the average American", we're all different people. And as Loomis said, it only takes one exceptional individual to be a champion.
Why an American will NEVER be a World Champion
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Oct 31, 2008
0
#83
I absolutely guarantee you if America was a communist country, which had chess schools for the gifted (like Russia and other European Countries). We would have more GM's than any other country based on America's diversity.
...so we just have the one world champion...Fischer, high school drop-out, recluse, anti- semitic-wack-job-chess-genius. That's cool.
Fischer had shitty parents, its no wonder he turned out the way he did.....he could have become a serial killer or something given the parents he had, instead he fell in love with a game and buried/lost himself in it. His father abandoned him and his mother was a kook from the word go, what chance did he have to be "normal" ?
Oct 31, 2008
0
#86
Nature vs. Nurture debate (don't think it is going to be solved here :)
Yes Aus is much the same as America just not as bad YET! in education. I reckon politically we are a communist country on the inside where it counts and a democratic one from the outside, what we let the rest of world see mostly. Kids are getting dumber even here, not a wonder when they get calculators before high school for maths and other helps. No one can say if America will preduce a chess champion or not its the future and anything can happen. Would be great to see an Australian world chess champion too, but i seriously doubt that could happen, not enough interest and not enough people in our Island country...
Fat avaricious trick-or-treaters feeling entitled to my hard-earned candy are currently walking under my entranceway adorned with a sign saying "ABANDON ALL HOPE".
I assume my point requires no clarification.
America's lack of chess champions says less about America than it does about chess. Chess is a scholarly game, true...but it doesn't pay to devote your life to it. There have been plenty of obese GMs and IMs, so McDonald's has nothing to do with it. The public education system, while it is hardly good, has nothing to do with it (although I will happily say I'm in favor of privatizing education) because chess isn't taught as a subject in any school -- but almost every high school I know of has a chess club.
Americans excel in other competitions that require peak physical and mental fitness. American football is the most demanding sport (both physically and mentally) in existence. Chess excellence requires only that a rare, brilliant mind devote itself entirely to learning the game. In this sense, chess champions are special in the same way that tennis champions are -- no more, no less. The right genetic makeup + the correct education in the chosen competition (chess, tennis, or tiddlywinks) = champion.
The next American champion will be crowned within the next 15 years, because interest in chess has been growing, not waning. Anyone who feels that Americans are somehow inferior to anyone to anything that matters is as delusional as the fools who claimed in the mid-1900's that America would never have a world champion pianist. They ate their words only a few short years later when Americans placed 1st and 2nd at an international competition held in the USSR with Soviet judges.
LOL
first time i agree with you! about lazy americans, i feel the same way about my country ( i guess stupid people are everywhere :~|), but just in order to dissagree with you about something i must say that maybe a korean child pridogy refugee might become an american citizen and might become a world champion if he is not poisonned by society...
another thing, there are (were, not sure when, saw it on discovery channel i think, i believe it was quite recent) experiments of unleashing savant (like in the movie "rainman") abbilities in normal people through magnetic pulses into the brain, maybe one day people would wear magnetic pulses caps and stupidity will be vanished off the face of the earth (not exactly, but it would be a better place...)
This guy is WRONG, 100% THE PERCENTAGE OF THE WORLD THAT CARES
IF CHESS LIVES OR DIES IS 75% any where else than the usa... meaning out of
100 people 75 people think chess is vital...Americans i.e the usa just DONT CARE
AT ALL... Sorry but if we cared about chess THE WORLD WOULD BE CRUSHED...
guess the MILitary aspects dont apple to chess? OR DO THEY.. LOL, WHAT A JOKE.. what a HIPPIE visions based on nothing....
1 OUT OF 100,000 AMERICANS CARE IS CHESS LIVES OR DIE.. get over it...
" if your house if burning do you care about enjoying an iceam?".. LOL
horrible intellect... AND you are from the united states.. my god...
what a JOKE...!
Cheater 1, The only problem I see with your reasoning is the chance that there is a sure chance of pure accidental chess genius in the U.S. Because of the sheer population of the country, it is definitely plausible that it can produce a champion.
Yeah, this argument deals with the average of Americans, generalized them all under one category. It's true that if we pick average Americans, none of them would be able to be a World Champion, but the same is true for every country. However, because we have so many cultures and ethnicities here, we have so many different ways of thinking and are able to produce very smart people. Probably why we're among the top (battling for #1 with Chian) in terms of technology...
Oct 31, 2008
0
#95
Take a look at this list of FIDE's HIghest ranked players.
http://ratings.fide.com/top.phtml?list=men
http://ratings.fide.com/top.phtml?list=women
Number 34 is the highest rated USA woman and number 16 is the highest rated Man-- and NEITHER of them were born or educated in the USA!!!!
Without a doubt...with 100% certainty the next USA World Chess Champion has yet to be born.
When OBAMA gets into office this trend of no chess champion will not go on............. Oh Sorry, I pretending I was in Iraq again....... Obesity, YEAH!!!!!!
It only takes one prodigy... there's still hope that one will emerge.
By the way, we in the American educational system aren't all obese and incompetent, as stereotypes would lead you to believe. There are tens of thousands of incredibly talented kids up at the top, if you haven't noticed.
While I agree with main points of this rant about the US, I don't believe that it is the only criteria by which to judge whether we can produce another World Champion. By all intelligent analysis, New Orleans should never have produced someone as strong as Morphy. Cuba didn't have enough strong palyers to produce a Capablanca. Sultan Khan was an illiterate servent who had incredible natural talent. And that is the operating phrase--natural talent. One never knows who Caissa will bless next. But I agree that a WC will not be made in the US, he/she must be born to it. The dumbing down of this nation is in full swing, and is getting worse every day. There are honor students who cannot write a complete sentence. "Are you smarter that a fifth grader?" No kidding.
cheater_1 wrote:
WARNING. TRUTHFULNESS AHEAD. NOT FOR THE EASILY OFFENDED!!!
As an American myself, it pains me to write such an editorial, but what follows is entirely true. There has been only ONE American (Robert Fischer) as World Champion since 1862 -- that's right 1862. The first reason is that we Americans are LAZY. Overweight and obese people abound here in America. HEY, chess is a mind game, it doesn't matter how FAT the person is, is what you're saying. True to a degree. But obesity equals lack of discipline, lack of self control, lack of focus. When is the last time a person with no discipline, self control, or focus became the world champ of ANYTHING?
Secondly, we Americans have a sense of ENTITLEMENT about us (BLAME OUR PARENTS). We don't want to work for anything. We expect things handed to us on a silver platter. That's why the Lottery/Gambling generates BILLIONS of dollars per year. That's why you can sue and win 1.5 million if your car gets wrongly painted at the repair shop, or you too can get 6 million dollars from a bicycle company because they fail to mention that reflectors dont PREVENT accidents-- so he turns off his bike lights and gets hit, no permant injuries but 6 million $$ richer. We want the quick fix--free money--free anything--instant success.
Thirdly, YOUNG Americans are not smart, as a whole, compared to other countries. BLAME THE PARENTS and the EDUCATION SYSTEM. Most parents of preschool kids shuffle them off to daycare at 7:00 AM and pick them up at 5:00 PM. They're in bed by 8:00 PM--3 whole hours with their parents--WOW!!! These types of SELFISH parents will never be up for parent of the year, and if I had my way I'd arrest them for NEGLECT. Why even have kids if both parents have to work to support them? The formative young years are the MOST important to a young child--BE THERE FOR THEM. School aged Americans are routinely in the lower percentile in Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic and that's where the school system FAILS. I was just at a store the other day and the cashier (a 16 or 17 year old) had to use a calculator to subtract 12 from 44. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT!!!??? If a 16 year old cant subtract 12 from 44 and get 32, then what is wrong with Americans??? Kids graduate from school and enter college and dont even know the difference from to, two, and too--then or than--lose or loose. WHAT??? I have seen college aged ADULTS spell with the accuracy of 9 year olds. How did they get through the system? How did they pass? Well, the USA Education system pushed them through. Below average was more than enough to graduate them. Grades were inflated to make both the system look good and make the teachers look good. Look how "smart" my students are--90% of them got A's. HA!!! Remember, this is America looked at as a whole. The BIG picture.
Fourth, we put more emphasis on throwing a ball through a hoop or hitting a ball out of the ballpark than being smart. Listen to any U.S. Pro sports athlete speak and you'll wonder if their IQ is the same as their age. Who cares if he sounds like a MORON, he didnt even have to graduate college and got drafted into the NFL, now he makes 15 million a year by catching an oblong ball and trying to run to the other end of the field without falling down for 16 games a year. THE AMERICAN DREAM.
We Americans have a strong points, but Chess will never be one of them. We will produce great chess players, no doubt, but we will never see another Bobby Fischer again.
SCHOLARLY Links to Factual Statistics:
http://www.obesityinamerica.org/bythenumbers.html
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=1
http://www.assetprotectioncorp.com/stupidlawsuits.html
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/more/specials/fortunate50/2008/
all that stuff you wrote made me fall asleep...lol
Duffer1965 wrote:
I don't think that the point about athletes is unique to America. David Beckham being just one example that jumps to mind. The adoration of Brazilians for Ayrton Senna was probably much greater than anything I've seen by Americans for any sports figure in my life. If this phenomenon is a harbinger of doom, then I'd say there are no safe countries.
Yeh, but there are good role models and then there are brainless battering rams as role models :).
Intelligent, intense, fit, hard-working, gifted... I'd say Senna was a pretty good role model (aside from the mean side to his competitiveness)
Maybe your post will change America cheater_1. Wow, to say an American will NEVER become WCC you must be psychic. Can you message me the winning numbers for the roulette table? Obesity is a problem, but another problem is people like you. You have no faith in your country. You don't want to see America succeed in anything because you get a kick out of being cynical and pessimistic. Sure there are problems with our chess system and education system and many other systems, but why don't you offer a solution to these issues. The reason you don't, because you like to be cynical.
You have a way of annoying people and getting them to respond to you. Instead of being a self-hating American, why don't you participate in making our country great again? And before you attack me and say, "well you don't do anything to help, rabble, rabble, rabble...", I do my best to educate young chess players by volunteering my time to a local chess school. What do you do besides write "death to America" articles?