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Comment by MichaelCollins | Hacker News Reader

If you previously still had respect for Hans, does that mean you considered it possible he is innocent of these specific cheating accusations? Supposing for the sake of argument that he really didn't cheat, isn't he well within his right to sue those defaming him?

Personally I don't know; I see smoke but no fire and I'm not qualified to judge the meaning of that smoke. Hans' admitted history of cheating before online makes me inclined to believe he's cheated again, but it doesn't prove anything. In the future going forward, I think the chess community should adopt a zero tolerance policy towards cheating; one strike and you're out even if you were a teenager when you did it. This would be the most fair to the players who never cheat even once. But this isn't the sort of standard that should be applied retroactively.

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He has the option to sue, but the way to gain respect is to demonstrate his ability in an environment that controls for any means of cheating posited by those who suspect him of doing so.

He already did so, in the match that he won against Carlsen. The measures in all those tournaments are extremely stringent.

Clearly some people whose opinions matter do not regard those measures as stringent enough to settle the issue.

Do you have any idea of what is in place to prevent cheating in those competitions? The only possible improvement would be for the players to be naked.

This is just an easy excuse.

"He cheated!" "There are anticheat measures" "They're not good enough"

It's a cycle that can never be solved. The loser can always claim the anticheat measures were "not enough".

You know what. I think Carlsen has cheated in every single one of his games. Prove the contrary.

> The only possible improvement would be for the players to be naked.

Something might be placed inside the organism.

> I think Carlsen has cheated in every single one of his games. Prove the contrary.

That's easy. He streamed a lot of games with the tightest time requirements happening in the discipline, kind of 3 minutes per player plus extra 1 second per move. The speed of that game is so high that there is simply no time for having a conversations with cheating device. Also he always notice some suspicious moves (in not that fast games) which becomes correlating with chess engine.

> Something might be placed inside the organism

https://www.chessdom.com/hans-niemann-was-thoroughly-checked...

Seems unlikely ...

It is, however, testable, and Niemann is the person with greatest interest in publicly falsifying this or similar hypotheses.

> That's easy. He streamed a lot of games with the tightest time requirements happening in the discipline, kind of 3 minutes per player plus extra 1 second per move. The speed of that game is so high that there is simply no time for having a conversations with cheating device.

Conversations? A cheating software can read the board and even move the pieces for him, this is ridiculous. 100% a cheater.

What can be proved about past games performed in less-than-fully-stringent conditions is beside the point.

As far as I am concerned, once Niemann has passed all the tests his accusers can come up with, he would be vindicated, and they would be subject to opprobrium - it would be a vindication unavailable even through a successful libel suit. There's no infinite regress of suspicion in this view.

This is a video of Hans being checked before round 4 of the Sinquefield cup.

https://www.chessdom.com/hans-niemann-was-thoroughly-checked...

I don't know what else they could have done other than full body x-ray him. Make your own mind up whether these checks are stringent.

In addition, there was a 15 minute broadcast delay.

His record in that tournament for rounds 4 though 9 was loss, draw, draw, win, draw. Hans was the lowest rated player in the tournament by 57 points.

That video itself immediately suggests some ways Niemann could offer to demonstrate he is not cheating, beginning with changing (under supervision) into clothing provided for him, and minimizing the number of people present at all stages.

In any such proposal, he could reasonably require the same of his opponents and any monitors present.

He tried, he even suggested to do a match naked...

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