Is Chess Not For Everybody? |
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| Tuesday, 03 July 2012 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This article was inspired by a recent tirade by ex-World Chess Challenger Boris Gelfand: I think chess is not for everybody. Chess is for people who want to make an intellectual effort, who have respect for the game, and we shouldn't make the game more simple so that more people would enjoy it. It has stirred a lot of discussions in the chess community, and many people said they full agree. So, what makes this statement so attractive? In the modern world companies are not just selling us products. Their real goods are success stories. Buy this car and show how rich and influential you are. Wear this perfume and get all the girls. This phone proves you have a good taste, unlike most people. These messages are centered on a persons ego and his assumed exclusiveness. Gelfands words work in a similar fashion. The reader, in case he is a chess player, feels himself special: I am smart; I can make an intellectual effort. Why bother explaining chess to the average Joe who isnt as good as me? Besides that, there are many attempts to mire chess by saying, for example, that this game is just a senseless shuffling of wooden pieces; that chess is simply a memory game where the person who knows openings better wins. While most of such statements range from dubious to absolutely absurd, they still dominate the minds of a large fraction of the public. Therefore, I think that with his phrase Boris is subconsciously trying to defend his favorite game from people who spread such insinuations. Now lets give the quote a second thought. Is it really true? In my opinion, not quite. Lets follow in the footsteps of the legendary Mikhail Botvinnik and fall upon the assumption that chess is a combination of sports, arts and science. This will be our model. So, how does Gelfands statement relate to chess? 1. Chess as a sport. Sports are usually not intellectually demanding when it comes to watching them. One doesnt have to be exceptionally smart to enjoy the show. Chess is somewhat different in the sense that it is very hard to understand what is going on in the game unless you are a strong player yourself. However, one doesnt even have to know the rules of chess to be a fan. You can root for your favorite player or your country. You can keep monitor the chess engines evaluation and cheer when it goes up for your favorite and feel worried if it goes down. Finally, you can rely on the opinion of experts whom you trust. Therefore, I am not sure what Boris is arguing against. We dont really have to make chess simpler to entertain the fans. 2. Chess as an art. Most people are not keen on arts. Their perception of it is rather primitive. Basically speaking, the prevailing majority of us prefer paintings which resemble photos, or feature objects that we are interested in. Example 1: a portrait by a street artist. Example 2: lovely kittens. Another group is people who dont have their own opinion, but want to seem educated and civilized. They just memorize a few expert opinions and names of artists, as well as a few bold expressions. For instance, every day during the Anand-Gelfand match lectures on arts were delivered. One of the Twitter users tried to look smart and asked why they keep on talking about Repin and Vasnetsov when there are Picasso and Dali. Obviously, he fails to understand that mentioning some of the most popular and widely promoted artists doesnt make one an arts critic and expert. 3. Chess as a science. On the one hand, chess is similar to science in the sense that one has to apply a lot of intellectual effort over a significant amount of time to obtain a positive result; rely on the findings of others; have an analytical mindset. On the other hand, chess is clearly inferior to science in the sense that science is usually supposed to be either useful right away (create a model so that we can use it to develop a product), or at least potentially (come up with something awesome, and maybe it will eventually be used). The first type of research can be funded by private companies. The second type usually lies in the domain of the state. Meanwhile, competitive chess can hardly boast being beneficial for the society in the long run. Do professional chess players really generate something useful for the humanity? If it is only about entertainment and aesthetic pleasure, then chess is either a sport or an art, but not science. The only more or less adequate attempt to justify chess as a science would be to say that top chess players are developing the game, and the game can be used to improve certain human qualities of the players. Here and there we hear that kids who play chess are good at Math and generally do well in school. Many grown-ups are taking up chess to improve their tactical and strategic thinking. Some believe this is the right approach. Others smile and say that these mantras are just chess PR. We dont know for sure. Anyway, this article is not about chess being a science or not.
If we agree that chess is a science, then we can extrapolate the experience obtained in science to chess. There is real science and popular science. Real science is usually perceived by the qualified professional minority, while popular science normally deals with interesting real life issues that can be somehow explained using real science. However, naturally, the explanations are very superficial and primitive. One doesnt show 50 pages of calculations and sophisticated arguments to a coach potato watching TV. Only a tiny portion of the ideas is presented. Moreover, if the scientific discovery doesnt have an instant application or an easily understandable wording, interpreters will create an illustration for it. For example, the Poincare theorem that was proved by Grigori Perelman is not something you can phrase the way a layman will understand: Every simply connected, closed 3-manifold is homeomorphic to the 3-sphere. To avoid citing it, magazines started making up simplifications featuring balls, rolls and other real life objects that can somehow be deformed. While not being scientifically accurate, these interpretations create an image in the head of a non-specialist.
Likewise, a lot is being said about chess being too intellectually demanding to televise. Conservatively-minded critics often claim that if we feature half-naked girls; piles of cash; play blitz and the like, then we will kill classical chess and destroy its image as a game for noble and intelligent gentlemen. However, first of all, it is a matter of measure. One doesnt have to go into extremes when designing the format. Secondly and more importantly, why cant there be show chess (popular science) and tournament chess (real science)? Indeed, watching top GMs play in a tournament hall for hours can be boring, especially if one is deprived of commentaries and other or types of entertainment. But is observing a mathematician scribbling formulas and notes hour after hour in his ivory tower any better? Hence, we can safely reassure critics that chess can both be televised and not profaned in the process.
Finally, let me return to the initial quote mentioned in the beginning of the article. As an experienced speaker and debates coach, I have always been telling my students that they should carefully pick the right vocabulary and wordings to address their audience. Eloquence and smartness dont pay off as long as the audience has problems understanding the message you are trying to convey, or doesnt like your style. Dont talk like a professor when addressing truck drivers. Dont swear like a sailor when speaking to kids. If someone doesnt get you, its your problem, not theirs. Of course, one can adopt a different approach: I am good as I am, and if someone is too dumb to appreciate what I am saying and doing, then who cares. The drawback of this mentality is that no one would be willing to understand and support such a person. No one. Not even sponsors, government officials or us, chess fans. Peter Zhdanov is an IT project manager, debate expert, BSc in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science and final year PhD student in Sociology. In chess he is a Russian candidate master, author, husband and manager of grandmaster Natalia Pogonina.
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