• 0 Posts
  • 95 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: June 30th, 2023
  • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.workstoShowerthoughts@lemmy.world•Unlike in movies, most smart people aren't good in chess.
    334·
    8 days ago

    ITT: I don’t play chess. I don’t like chess. Friend play chess, he dumb, I am smart. I agree. You hear of Rubik’s cube?

    Your skill at chess is indeed very good at predicting one thing: your chess rating. I have been playing every day for almost 2 years and I take lessons, but I started as an adult after finishing my PhD in actual rocket science and supervising a research lab in that area for 10 years. Consequently, I will never be as good as the 10 year olds playing with coaching since they were 6. I have met exactly one good player through my connections to that lab in 17 years. So here are some perspectives on chess if you played in high school or you “learned how to play in 30 mins and think it’s boring”:

    1. It’s a game with layers. The first layer is knowing how the pieces move, the second layer is memorizing openings, and the third layer is some basic knowledge of tactics (I.e., forks, skewers, pins, removing the defense, etc etc) and THEN you learn the game. Most people never learn the game unless you went out of your way to do so.

    2. For reason 1, “good at chess” is a hugely subjective statement. You knew a few people who can beat all your friends? Cool. I was that guy and it took me MONTHS to get to what the chess world calls “intermediate”: 1200-1400 ELO. Your friend is probably rated 700 to 750. You have probably never met more than a handful of good chess players in your life unless you were in a university club or better.

    3. You do not have to be typically smart to be good at chess, but it doesn’t hurt. Top GMs are sometimes impressively smart or impressively… Uh… susceptible to misinformation cough Kramnik cough. But what they CAN do is master the shit out of board positions, visualization, and prediction.

    Case in point, Hikaru Nakamura, arguably world #2

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WsEQuoOz-c&t=490

    Or you can watch him play blindfolded chess against actual good players, or speedrun 1 minute games winning hundreds in a row while talking about his pineapple shirt. He’s alternatingly pretty entertaining and kind of annoying to listen to.

    If you are that kind of smart, the visualization and memory kind, yeah you’re probably going to also be a good chess player. Otherwise, there’s not a lot of traceability that I’ve seen research on.

    All that said, this thread is absolutely annoying to see the whole world show up and talk out of their asses about it.

    /end rant

    Edit:

    More Hikaru craziness https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhDYSNbPs_s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXDol9GqK64

  • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.workstomemes@lemmy.world•Oops all pants
    7·
    10 days ago

    Yo, better safe than sorry.

    Last international trip I took, my 1.5 y/o son got airsick and in trying to help him I got airsick myself. I threw up in the bag, but there was turbulence and no service, so I just put the bag next to my warm coffee between my legs until I could get a minute to throw it away. This was maybe 25 mins into a 4h flight.

    Well… Turns out when those bags get completely wet they leak. :/.

    I took exactly one pair of pants and one pair of shorts. So I realized after about 15 minutes the warm I was feeling was no longer just my coffee, but the puke juice I was sitting in. I really got to enjoy that for like 3 hours on the plane, customs, and baggage claim.

    Lucky me I packed sweatpants for sleeping, so I was saved from rewearing on the way home. But man, bring extra pants. You just never know.