I'd rather spend all that time reading up on game theory and play some fun video games, like Red Dead Redemption.
Other aspects of strategy, like shortening decision loops[1], forming alliances, or the exploration/exploitation tradeoff[3], are simply not represented by chess because it is a turn-based, zero-sum game with perfect information. That makes chess a poor model of real-world strategy.
Still, the things it does teach are real and useful, so as long as you don't think its the end-all, be-all of strategic thinking you can get something out of it.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_game_theory
[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploration%E2%80%93exploitati...
It also teaches you to forget about the past and focus on the present. It teaches you long term plans usually don't work and relying on them is a bad idea and it's better to focus on execution here and now (this is what Soviet school got wrong although probably only officially, the players knew it all along - analogies to 5 years plans were just too tempting for book authors).
At human level it also teaches you to design strategy to exploit your opponents - play openings they hate, simplify vs players who like complicated positions, complicate vs players who like simple ones.
There is a lot of interesting things you learn about thought process and decision making as your level improve. It might not be the best game for that but it's pretty good considered how simple it is.
Chess is a great game for removing all those external factors. It's just thinking
Not everything has to be an absolute competition-or-not. For the same reason you can enjoy a casual game of chess with a friend, you can enjoy a casual game of some RTS. Helps that there are a lot of open source RTS communities that each have their own skills-emphasis.
That is true for an engine.
Meta-games around studying your opponent, specific match preparation and all those game theoretic stuff are so pervasive people claim they are 'killing' chess at top levels. Anyway, for humans, chess at high levels of mastery is a striking display of bootstrapping some insane cognitive machinery around memory, processing speed, 'expanding' working memory via understanding:
[0] Alekhine blindfold simultaneous vs 32 opponents: https://www.blindfoldchess.net/assets/images/alekhine-excerp...
[1] Reingold, Charness, Pomplun & Stampe (2001), "Visual Span in Expert Chess Players": https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11294228/
[2] Connors, Burns & Campitelli (2011), "Expertise in Complex Decision Making: The Role of Search in Chess 70 Years After de Groot": https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1551-6709...
Off the top of my head I can think of a number - the value of diversity and the contextual power of capabilities such as the power of weaker pieces used diligently, and the power of counterintuitive sacrifices.
Chess also makes no accommodation for your fantasies and ego. There is no luck, only skill.
There is also much to be garnered from the layered complexity of strategy, where some strategies will take you to a certain level of play that need to be completely replaced or expanded with nuance to reach a higher level.
There are many lessons to be learned from chess.
That said, I would not recommend anyone become good at chess to get good at life.
There is a very tangible benefit to people playing in chess that has nothing to do with the game itself. One example is for kids - I think kids playing chess (particularly over the board) learn quite a lot from the game. For example, etiquette (being respectful to your opponent), patience, logic, etc… but one of the best things they learn is how to lose. In chess you lose a lot. Asymptotically vast majority of players will lose approximately 50% of their games. Learning how to lose (respectfully), learn from your mistakes, then overcome them is really great process to learn. Doing this in real life rather than over the screen is also completely different.
Combine that with the game being fun and the social aspects (meeting new people, making friends)… chess very much transfers to real life in my view
That's valid for pretty much every kids sports/games though
Chess is the first board game you can introduce to your kid that has no element of luck whatsoever. It could be brutal. I have seen 7-9 year olds coming out crying after a game in a tournament. But it also may be requires very good parenting to handle all the emotional distress. Chess also is obviously accessible.
It is an emotional rollercoaster to engage kids in Chess tbh. We are ready to sometimes throw the towel every other week. :-)
You're so evil lol.
I figured it would just be a temporary name until I came up with something better.
Then it stuck. I will say it has been easy for my customers to remember the name!
And that's when I realized nah, it's not worth it.
That's a great quote, thanks for sharing.
(Eg limit yourself to commands you can send to vim as you write your Lean proof or whatever.)
It can be a bit fun, sometime, to play someone that has studied an opening at my level, but since they aren't that deep into it, they only know the moves for some variations. So me, not knowing the opening, do something from the left-field, and they don't really know how to punish it anyway. Remember one time someone got a bit grumpy, heh.
That's perhaps true for full information, two player games.
Try Diplomacy for a change. (Even if you play without explicit negotiations and only have the moves speak for themselves.)
Some folks find chess fun and interesting enough to play it and study it all their lives. Other games can also be fun, though it's rare for a game to hold someone's attention throughout their whole life.
So, while I did play chess for fun, after a while it became boring--but I also impute this to my ADHD, perhaps for others it might not stale.
I would not mind a game or two with an interesting opponent, but playing daily is out of the question for me anymore. Time has opportunity cost, right?
- dealing with imperfect information
- bluffing
- thinking ahead with an enormous number of possible moves (especially when you consider deck construction)
- tracking board state
- mentally implementing "triggers"
I hit about 2k Elo on lichess playing the 3+0/5+0 and I have no regrets!
To each their own.
If you like the competitive aspect of chess, you may enjoy physical sports too. I started to find video games pretty boring compared to pushing myself physically.
Nassim Taleb say a lot on this in his Anti-fragile.
It's just a board game
- it teaches resiliency in bad situations.
- it teaches you to not be too harsh on yourself as a person. If you watch GMs playing online, they make bad mistakes all the time too - they're not godlike creatures who make no mistakes, far from it.
The flipside is that if you approach it the wrong way (I know I have at many points), it can have the opposite effects too.
To approach chess in a mentally healthy way was a long process for me. You need to get rid of your ego and be objective as much as possible when playing, or it will just make you sour - this in itself is a valuable lesson.
Yes, I agree.