Chess Scotland Noticeboard

Paul Denham · Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2010 10:58 pm Post subject:

Cheers Geoff,

Appreciate the pep talk.

Guess it sets a wee challenge down to me;

1. Win the Scottish U-1500 championships some day
or
2. Get my grade poking above the 1500 mark so I would be barred from the U-1500 championships.

You have been so decent I won't use my; should the plastic set have brown or green squares for the dark squares? facetious question on you. (I am sure the answer is brown despite me having a green one... showing my prediliction for anything green and white... which though there isn't as strong as my prediliction for the bishop pair. As a little aside I have seen me so barking mad on my bishop pair dogma that after winning the bishop pair I go on Mission Irrelevant II - and do anything to snap of his 2nd bishop) Confused

As for the Borg comments. Fair enough. I prefer to think of myself as a Bjorn Again chess player.

I agree with you 100% on some propaganda from a very well known german chess software developer.... some of that Steve Lopez stuff is pretty Orwellian. Its a bit like reviewers of books who say nice things about everything they review as they don't want to tell it like it is and impede sales of a fellow writer from the same publishing house's book or another titled author. I think its pretty easy to see through some of the spin and hype... mind you I do have Fritz 12 but it was a present from the sister in law.

PD

PS Admin is going to run my "Fritz tactics" experiment this week with me. Where I give him the game in pgn. He runs it through a 7ply, 9ply and 11ply blunder check at 60 hundreths of a pawn and then tells me if there are any tactics I missed or my opponent missed e.g.
"Neither of you missed any tactics"
" You missed two tactics that could have won you material but he missed 3 that could have won him material, find them Paul"
... type answers.

PPS Aren't there any eager chess parent's out there of some top talent's (e.g. Mike Scott) out there willing to try the Chandler-Denham tactics experiment of having some sessions where they use two club sets and set up the position of a tactics puzzle on one board and whilst the junior is solving it, the set up the next tactical puzzle on a 2nd and so on and so forth, always trying to have the next position ready by the time the previous one is solved (its a 3-D approach, using real set and no postage stamp diagrams, but without the diminishing returns on time and "peek at the answer" feeling you can get when as you set the position up, you see with 5 pieces still to play that the puzzle is a back rank theme" and spoil it????????????????????????

Phil Thomas · King Joined: 26 Mar 2007 Posts: 758

PaulBlair · Bishop Joined: 05 Jan 2010 Posts: 34

I have no shame in using tactics trainers, timed ones at that. I use them because I have to learn things by repetition. Doing the same things again and again and again. Making them stick in my head and apply them to a game setting.

And so far this season, I have done this on numerous occasions. Things that I have done in tactics trainer, I have achieved in a game setting. Things that I have learned on a computer, I have brought forward to live face-to-face games. So I do not see the issue with using computers for visualisation reasons.

And especially when people can visualise games from books just by reading out notation and can play blindfold chess. Board visualisation exercises encourage you to do this!! They say THIS is one of the most important things to learn. Visualise WITHOUT a board. And before you say it, this ISN'T coming away from your point about having to learn at a board. It's just making the point there's more to it than that.

Now I know I am not a top class player of any sort (For the record, I'm a guy at 26 who just started playing again last Summer after a long break of chess from the age of 17). But I know what works for me.

I think with Fritz, you're a complete imbecile if you think you can understand 10/ths of a pawn. There's not many people out there who could. But surely theres no reason why if analysis springs up a change of 0.5 or more that it's not showing you a point of future analysis.

I do agree however that if people solely rely on computers then they never will get anywhere. But if you have done in depth analysis by yourself THEN looked at Fritz then perhaps it can flag up some things you have missed. Computers may be way past our comprehension but they CAN show us the little things. It's about how you use the tools.

Your point about "what we did before computers" is a bit insulting. I have and always have had a struggle when it comes to reading. It's my learning style, its who I am. I had a nightmare getting through university but walking away with a 2:1 proves I do have the capacity. But I had to react to the learning methods out there.

I don't think I could have managed university in the 70's and 80's. Without the internet and the wider variety of learning mediums out there today, I would have never got a 2:1. Yet I can still quote as much material as the person who did things the "1970's" way. Why can the same not be for chess? Reading IS essential, looking at things over the board IS essential. But some people need variety to keep them inspired otherwise they get bored. Even of things they really love.

It's just some people's nature's. More people play chess today because of computers and the internet than did without them OVERALL. There's things you CAN learn from a computer and if you can't realise that we'll, thats your problem!

Mike Scott · King Joined: 01 Feb 2007 Posts: 676 Location: Edinburgh

PD said

Alan Bell · Queen Joined: 01 Mar 2007 Posts: 89

Angus McDonald · King Joined: 08 Apr 2009 Posts: 162

Geoff Chandler · Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2010 10:35 am Post subject:

Hi Paul Blair.

I totally agree there is things you CAN learn from a computer.

Nothing that you cannot learn from a book and board.

I totally agree there is things you CAN learn from a computer.

But in doing so you pick up bad habits that you would never
have picked up if you studied with a book and board.

Sheer laziness, lack of 3d vision and how to play against a human
who will blunder, set traps and fart.

I totally agree there is things you CAN learn from a computer.

I'm saying todays players are getting told it is the ONLY way.
And some are using their box as their brain and stagnating in front
of my eyes.

Look at the list of Scottish Boys Champions on the front page.
Look at the other players names look how good these guys are.

None of them got to where they are by using a box.

You do not need it. It is not essential.

You may know some of the lads on the Boys Champions list.
They are living proof.

Now before some Elmer comes back with...

"But todays good players find computers essential."

Agreed - 100%

But first you have become that good player, and to become that good
player you do not need a box.
(And if you want to become that VERY good play, don't use a box at all.)

Hi Mike,

You have been dragged into this....I'll let you tip toe back out.

Hi Phil.

"Therefore I predict more Grandmasters in Moscow than in Perth."

Actually most of the top Russian players came from outside Moscow.
Tal, Keres, Petrosian...there are dozens of them.

So your statement should be more GM's go to Moscow.

I agree, however.

Motwani, McNab, Shaw and Rowson have some time or other
been in Perth.

So if we cut this down to per head of population...

Statiscally there have been more Scottish GM's at Perth than
there has been Russian GM's. born in Moscow.

(give up............you are not going to win.) Smile

Hi Paul Denham.

I'm not really in favour of using the kids as an experiment.

It's not fair on the one's who have to sit in front of a monitor.

Re boards:
Someone, somewhere will confirm this. Ruxton will and so will Neil Berry.

We have had this conversation.

I believe the kit you study with is important.

If you are studying for a particuliar tournament try to study on
exactley the same kit.

On the whole I do practise what I preach.

At the board Chandler the myth takes over (Re: Zebras where Rowson
has nalled down perfectly) but I cannot help it.

Re: sister in law giving you Fritz12.

She has obviously been 'got at' by The Borg.

The do this. Assimilate family members to help them turn the
non-believers. Watch her.

Note to future posters.
Please do not use the full Quote feature.

It's annoying have to scroll down and down past the same stuff
I have written.

Paul Denham · Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2010 12:39 pm Post subject:

Geoff,

The future is bright, the future is..... a postage stamped box;

http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5719

Look at the pride on that man's face holding aloft the silverware (and no doubt pocketing a cheque to go back to Borg HQ in Hamburg). The lad who came in 2nd (and is trying to avoid the attentions of the older women on his left) just looks sheepish with his teensie wee trophy for 2nd place. Who remembers a 2nd place. Bet he is thinking, wish I hadn't wasted my life and instead made something of myself like that smart programmer fellow there with the big trophy.

The concentration on the programmer's face during the games is immense even though he is being paid not to think!

Elmer Borg

Wink

PS In all seriousness it's evidence that these people have taken equal opportunities and cyber-human rights and equality a bit too far. I think they should have banned the programmer for using computer help (after all that's what Kramnik was accused of and Topalov and a French WIM last year) and then arrested at the airport for stealing the organiser's money. Wonder if the draw was a repetition or was agreed between the "players. Wonder who wears the trousers in that relationship, the programmer or the pocket PC when it comes to judging if there is play left in the position. The programmer claims to have Fritz "in his pocket" but that proves nothing Laughing

PPS Didn't Fischer call patzer's "fish"?? Maybe the chess genius had seen into the future and foresaw of Rybka swimming around its Aquarium.

Phil Thomas · King Joined: 26 Mar 2007 Posts: 758

Geoff Chandler · Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2010 6:21 pm Post subject:

Paul Denham · Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2010 7:11 pm Post subject:

Hi Geoff,

As ever it was a bit tongue in cheek. Sure you can tell by now when I am pulling your leg.

I was HORRIFIED by the article. It was like something out of a Sci Fi book, by Isaac Asimov.

If the mini-box got 9.5/10 and show the humans up .... then the damned thing can lift its own trophy and take it home. But boxes don't have homes unless Borgs give them one.

PD

Phil Thomas · King Joined: 26 Mar 2007 Posts: 758

Ian McLachlan · Rook Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 63 Location: Lanark

Paul Denham · Posted: Sun Jan 17, 2010 7:56 pm Post subject:

In Latvia, Estonia and Georgia (by birth)/Armenia (by ethnicity) respectively they came from outside what is today Russia and even outside the major parts of the USSR such as Ukraine, Belorussia and Russia.

PD

Geoff Chandler · Posted: Sun Jan 17, 2010 9:50 pm Post subject:

Well 'La De Dah'

If you two were as good at Chess as you are at Geography
then your pictures would up there along with the GM's.

Now I know you did not learn your Geography from Fritz.

So why are you using Fritz to learn Chess.

Solution:

You want to be a chess grandmaster?

Go and see your geography teacher.