From: dcrosgr@uoft02.utoledo.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess
Subject: Re: TO THE GM's/IM's FROM DON
Date: 20 Dec 92 23:33:36 EST
Organization: University of Toledo, Computer Services

In article <34463@rnd.GBA.NYU.EDU>, mginsbur@rnd.GBA.NYU.EDU (Mark Ginsburg) writes:
> In article <1992Dec20.101509.578@uoft02.utoledo.edu> dcrosgr@uoft02.utoledo.edu writes:
> 
>>
>>
>>[...] Simply stated, Fischer played well because he won.
>>NOTHING else matters.
> 
> Oh, I see (?!?).

My personal philosophy on life can be boiled down to:

A working imperfect solution is better than a non-working perfect solution.

I have little respect for 'critics' who lack the ability to climb to the top,
and it spills over....


> 
>> Whther it 'looked' sloppy to someone as revered as
>>Benjamin or not siply does not matter, as neither you, nor I, nor Benjamin, nor
>>any of the others out there, Mr. Wedding included, can ever, ever know what
>>went on inside of Fischer's mind and what his strategy was.
> 
> When chess games are analyzed, a very strong computer can point out better
> moves.  We don't need a [potentially biased] human to do so.  These
> corrections do not take away from the match participants, yet they do
> provide instructional value.  It's funny to see the analysis reduced to
> what is perceived as personal attacks.  Chess moves are just that, chess
> moves.  They are not an attempt to get "inside of Fischer's mind" or know
> "what his strategy was."

Well, when you couple that with statements which indicate the author believes
that this is proof that Fischer is not as strong a player, you take it out of
the realm of textbook discussion into one of arguing about someone's skill,
which is so much MM. 

Let me give you an example the Irving Younger once gave in one of his lectures.
(Younger was one of the MOST revered experts in the field of hearsay,
corss-examination, etc.... He was as much an expert in those fields as Prosser
was in Torts.) He said that there is a time to break the rules in examinign a
witness. In the middle of a long trial, when you have a witness the other side
has called who has done no damage to yor case, and a cross-examination will not
do anything but bore the jury, stand up and do the following:

You: Mr. Witness, you stated your name was X, isn't that correct?

W: Yes.

You: Thank you. No further questions your honor.

The other side will wonder what you are doing, and the jury will be awake,
because they 'know' you just did something very tricky and important. If the
case was close before, you have just taken a lead. Further, when you get up
for summation, the jury will be hanging on your every word because they want to
know why you only asked the one question a week earlier. (Of course, you
link that to your theory of the case, whatever that may be.

Yes, perhaps a computer can sit back and do calculations and determine
strengths and weaknesses of positions. And, if Bobby Fischer had been playing a 
computer, one could argue that he should have made move X. But he was playing a
human who already had great respect for his skill at doing the impossible with
the pieces. Maybe Fischer made less than excellent moves at times because he
wanted to make his opponent spend time examining some trial structure of the
pieces.

Reminds me of a story from Sun-Tzu (Clavell's edition). A town was about to be
atacked by an invading army the next day, and their army was stilll two days
away. On the day they were to be attacked, they left the city gates wide open,
and went about business as usual. When the attacking army came upon the city,
they saw the gates open and the people moving freely, the general ordered his
troops to stop, fearing a trap. They set up camp, and studied the city long
enough for the defending army to arrive and defeat them.

Reducing chess to math is to leave out 99% of the game.

> 
>> Isn't ot a widely
>>held belief that in the match decades ago Mr. Fischer took the initial rounds
>>lightly as a way of creating a protracted environment to physically wear down
>>his opponent? Isn't there a belief out there Fischer was inentionally playing
>>for draws?
>>
> 
> Huh??  I can only surmise DMC is not familiar with chess.  He must mean
> Kasparov, playing for draws against Karpov.  Fischer never did this.
> Wait, DMC somehow unqualified to spew forth?  Say it ain't so!  

Anyone care to enlighten either myself or the others to this event???

> 
> 
>>Gee, his not going for the 'well-structured-and-planned-plays' back then did
>>make people claim his winning was a fluke. That he was second-rate. No, the
>>press loved him as he was an American winning the crown at the time when the
>>Cold War was blazing. He was deified.
>>
> 
> He deified??  Yeah, the Cold War was blazing and I'm sure DMC will next
> tell us the USSR and the USA were pushed to the very brink of
> Agammemnon.  

Ahh, an attempt to draw attention away from your own weak arguments by
paraphrasing my arguments into something they are not.

Not a bad tactic, if not done so poorly and hamhandedly. Pelase, stick to
what I say, and not the words you WISH I had said.

Unless you believe that the Cold War was not a major factor in the US's love of
Fischer, and that it was not looked upon as both nations complete ideologies 
were up there competing more than the two chessplayers. If that is what you
claim, please say so clearly so a host of other people who can remember the
matches, like myself, can enlighten you.


		Then, somebody put out the Cold War and Fischer came back
> and how dare any GM (including Roman Dzindzihashvili in _Chess Life_)
> criticize Fischer. 

You are trying to link two events which do not link in anywhere but your own
mind. Please, explain your ideas better so we may all understand them.
 
			He won, didn't he?  Good point.  So how can the winner
> make any bad moves?  The bad moves are in a greater context of
> a deep winning match strategy.  Excellent point, except that it makes no
> sense.

How does it not make any sense? Is the purpose of a match to never make bad
moves, or is the purpose to win the match by the conditions set forth which
determine the winner?



> 
> Looks like Mr. DMC is (in Mr. Wedding's words) a "worthless non-Grandmaster"
> and we can safely file this stuff away.

Ad hominim attacks should be better disguised than this! Please, try to privde
a little more substance (at least some) before adopting such a tactic.


> 
> I hear that Dennis Baker is also readying a rebuttal...and we can leave
> them to it.

Good idea. Serious debate should not include loud voices with silent thoughts.