What? Just because of reputation? What are you even talking about...
Have you ever heard of "innocent until proven guilty"? The burden of proof is on the accuser. We should be shown evidence, or Carlsen should apologize.
Have you ever heard of "innocent until proven guilty"? The burden of proof is on the accuser. We should be shown evidence, or Carlsen should apologize.
What can he do if he is completely convinced of the other player cheating. He can only let the other player win and at the same time make clear that he is not going to play against him.
That is the only legal and honest way to deal with what you perceive is a cheating opponent.
What else can you do? Get a libel trial?
He has not said that the other player does not cheat. But he is not going to play against him.
It is not so easy as to say: "hey, this player cheats".
OK: he has no proof. Perfect, he is willing to lose and keep his mouth shut. But he has said something: "I cannot say anything without getting into an unsolvable trouble".
And Carlsen didn't technically accuse him and Niemann is not technically on trial, so "innocent until proven guilty" is irrelevant. Magnus's goal seems to be to get Niemann disinvited from tournaments. He's taking such drastic measures for a reason at the expense of his own hard earned rep, and given his benevolence as world champion you have to trust his judgement.
Magnus should explain his actions to the organisers and the public, or just not enter tournaments.
He almost certainly explained himself to the organizers of the Sinquefield Cup, given how they instituted more anti-cheating measures as soon as he withdrew. They knew what was up, they just didn't come to a good resolution with Magnus and he withdrew instead.
> and the public
No good can come from that, any resolution will be either Hans being caught red handed, tournaments employing anti-cheating measures that put Magnus at ease, or tournaments having to choose between inviting Hans or Magnus. None of those involve the public in any way.
> or just not enter tournaments
I'm pretty sure he told the organizers of this tournament "I'm not coming if Hans is coming", and they told him "you signed the contract months ago, you have to come". So instead Magnus did the closest equivalent to not playing Hans: play one move and forfeit.
Carlsen himself said something akin to "Watzkin didn't have thick enough skin to become chess world champion", if you knew a bit about chess you wouldn't suggest this silly explanation
Suggesting that pro chess players don't tilt is absurd given that we've seen it happen plenty of times, often after losses.
Hans has cheated before and that affects credibility. Magnus has been around for awhile and gathered a reputation regarding professional style. That affects credibility. Having high or low credibility is not a crime and everyone is free to create their own personal theories on credibility.
Magnus has decided that he does not want to play Hans. As the world chess champion people will want to know why. Magnus has pre-emptively tweeted a meme which basically says that he refuses to say anything. I don't see what's wrong with Magnus avoiding Hans while basically saying nothing.
Losing games on purpose is unsportsmanlike. Now, if Magnus has good reason to believe that he's just countering bad sportmanship with his own brand of it, that could perhaps be justified in some circumstances. But to the general audience, it makes chess look really bad.
That's what Magnus is to the "general audience" with regards to chess, and it's going to take a lot for Magnus to be a net negative to chess. We are only making drama because Magnus is so good. Nobody would be blinking an eye if I failed to show up to a tournament, and my opponent would be glad to reap the points.
Not really, at all. That TV series and the COVID pandemic have way more to do with current chess popularity than Magnus & Nakamura. The playing public doesn't really care who the champion is, they play with themselves and only very few follow every game on major tournaments. As a spectator sport, chess is beyond boring, even worse than baseball (seriously, how come people in the US are so into watching baseball??!)
So is cheating. At least this is blindingly obvious.
In the few high level tournaments that are knock out or Swiss system it would be less unsportsmanlike because in those most other players won't have to play Magnus.
In other words, he is bullying Niemann using his status and renown as a world champion. Nice.
Nothing dictates that burden of proof is always on the accuser, especially in the internet where there isn't really any authority or agreements on subjects like this. It's just a statement/opinion by grandparent and it baffles me why presumption of innocence is even brought up like it's something to be held everywhere.
"Innocent until proven guilty" is not just a legal concept but a social norm. I'm a big Carlsen fan, but that same logic, applied to other domains, has led to witch-hunts throughout history, or character assassination/reputational damage when someone is accused of something but those accusations are never tested in court.
Coming back to chess, this isn't a casual situation with your friends, but a professional environment with norms and with money on the line. Imagine the same thing at your workplace.
Random non-experts taking sides here is inappropriate. Even many other Grandmasters have opinions on these accusations (true or false), but are refusing to state them publicly, preferring to let it play itself out, due to their respect for norms. Magnus is entitled to his opinion and to expressing them, but treating them as facts rather than accusations is just strange.
Chess cheating expert Ken Regan thinks Niemann didn't cheat. "Innocent until proven guilty" obviously applies.
I think the question is whether it ought to be a social norm.
What do you think of Prince Andrew? Hasn't been proven guilty. Should we just go about our business with him as usual? What about everyone else who settles a case?
I think of "Innocent until proven guilty" as a sort of viral trope. People think it's the norm, so when the question comes up, this phrase appears in their minds and is the first thought on justice. But I'm not sure it's a good norm, at least I have yet to hear arguments about why we should follow it, especially outside of the legal realm.
But just because the bar is set so high for criminal guilt doesn’t mean we can or should use it elsewhere.
And much of personal interactions are basically “guilty until proven innocent” because the risk (even if minor) isn’t worth it. Most people have no problem being told they can’t share a bathroom stall with you even if you’d share one with a spouse.
Even civil cases have a lower bar, and many personal interactions are way lower.
And while I do have a problem with “do one crime and never be hirable again for anything” I do not have a problem with certain crime blocking certain types of work, and/or subjecting you to additional scrutiny.
> What do you think of Prince Andrew? Hasn't been proven guilty. Should we just go about our business with him as usual? What about everyone else who settles a case?
We have circumstantial evidence that he did it; testimonies from victims, who have made credible claims, etc. There's also a difference between making sure you're not victimized (e.g. being careful around alleged abusers, or Carlsen being suspicious about a suspected cheater), but that doesn't apply to internet gossipers.
And the public's reaction to Prince Andrew would be different if he was a nobody, who was publicly vilified by the most influential people, with zero evidence available to the public; compared to him being a powerful person, who is publicly protected by the most influential people, with plenty of circumstantial public evidence. I think he's guilty, but there's context to my belief.
What irks me is when people take sides in "he said she said" conflicts (i.e. with zero public evidence) between two people they've never met. "Innocent until proven guilty only applies to courts!" is reasoning I've seen far too often regarding accusations published in some random tweet, and it's really quite ugly.
Is this a troll or some kind of rhetorical question? OP explained exactly his reasoning and clearly they said it was because of reputation.
> Have you ever heard of "innocent until proven guilty"?
It is not a court and Hans is not being tried on criminal charges, so what does that have to do with anything? Legal systems also have other standards for evidence such as balance of probability.
> The burden of proof is on the accuser. We should be shown evidence, or Carlsen should apologize.
What exact accusation did Carlsen make? A verbatim quote with complete context will be sufficient.
In the criminal court of law, that's the burden of proof. This is not it.
why would you need proof when Niemann already admitted to cheating in the past?
It is simply immoral to deny any kind of redemption to any person who has ever made a mistake. For a person so ready to cast stones, are you yourself without any sin? Should the errors you once made follow you for the rest of your life?
I'd say people should put up some evidence of Niemann's cheating, how exactly he was receiving information on best possible moves, or just shut up about it. Or dial the anti-cheating measures to eleven, strip the players naked, put them in a Faraday-cage without spectators and cameras, and see how they do.
Do you see how absolutely impossible to do this, don't you?
And honestly, even if it was proposed as a joke, a bluetooth buttplug actually sounds like a good secret channel for small amounts of information if you don't mind it sitting there. You're probably can feel the vibration very well and add some bits with different vibration speeds and patterns. I feel like the shoe method would require you to have your feet still and it's easier to enforce a shoe check than an anal probing...
I don't think we should live in a society where people can be imprisoned by relying on accusations alone, of course hard evidence should be required, but I don't mind living in a society where people are free to use the shared knowledge of their own community to reach epistemological conclusions. If the chess community decides to trust Magnus and his credentials without any proof, that's their prerogative, the concept of criminal innocence doesn't come into play at all here.