Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius, the production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I guess, well, well, what's that mango? So I was
Speaker 1: reading the story about the chess player Bobby Fisher this week.
Speaker 1: This is when he was young, and I guess he'd
Speaker 1: won a US championship at the time, so he was famous,
Speaker 1: but he was also just a kid, and he didn't
Speaker 1: have that much money, and you know, he's kind of
Speaker 1: a recluse, right. Actually, I had read that he used
Speaker 1: to play secretly online like later in his life, and
Speaker 1: there was always so much buzz when somebody thought they
Speaker 1: noticed his style of play and and and thought they
Speaker 1: were onto and that they discovered that it was him. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if I feel like you'd see that pop up from
Speaker 1: like Japan or Malaysia or wherever. There's these people who
Speaker 1: were just like so excited to have played Bobby Fisher.
Speaker 1: I think they've played Bobby Fisher. But so, anyway, he's
Speaker 1: young at this time. He wants to go see a
Speaker 1: movie and he doesn't have money for it, so he
Speaker 1: walks into the Chess and Checker Club of New York
Speaker 1: just to pick up a few extra bucks. I guess
Speaker 1: to hustle it, right, And I guess at the time
Speaker 1: it was this, uh, this large, smoke filled, crowded pool
Speaker 1: hall type place but for chess, and Bobby's totally in disguise.
Speaker 1: He's got a rainco, he's got his collar off, sunglasses
Speaker 1: and a hat. He looks ridiculous, but he does not
Speaker 1: want to be noticed. So he asked a friend, like,
Speaker 1: do you think he can just get me into a game?
Speaker 1: And a friend asked the owner across the bar. And
Speaker 1: remember it's smoke filled and like, Bobby's in disguise, so
Speaker 1: the owner goes tell him, no, he's just a kid.
Speaker 1: The hustlers will eat him alive. And so like, Bobby
Speaker 1: Fisher is furious and he just stomps out. And this
Speaker 1: is all reported. This is a real story. But when
Speaker 1: his friend tells the owner who it was, that it
Speaker 1: was Bobby Fisher who wanted a game, like, apparently the
Speaker 1: whole crowd at the place has this audible grown and
Speaker 1: this one guy goes, oh, man, I would have paid
Speaker 1: hundreds of dollars just to sit across from Bobby Fisher
Speaker 1: on a chess board. Anyway, So I don't know much
Speaker 1: about chess, but I do love stories about it. And
Speaker 1: we're gonna get into the most dangerous styles of chess,
Speaker 1: how the game moved from the battlefield to the royal court,
Speaker 1: and even why getting a billion people to play chess
Speaker 1: might be our best hope to keep away aliens. Let's
Speaker 1: dig in the their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius.
Speaker 1: I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my
Speaker 1: good friend man Guess Ticketer and on the other side
Speaker 1: of the soundproof class writing down a list of chess
Speaker 1: openings he's trying to master. Actually, can you read what
Speaker 1: he's got on the white board over there, Mango, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's got the hillbilly attack, the monkeys burn, Hippopotamus defense,
Speaker 1: does something called the toilet variation He's written definitely, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it definitely says toilet variation. Well, those are all real
Speaker 1: chess opening moves. But that's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil,
Speaker 1: who also happens to be a future chess master, not
Speaker 1: a current chess master, but I'm confident of future chester. Yeah.
Speaker 1: He can do anything he puts his mind too. But
Speaker 1: you know, chess is one of those things I used
Speaker 1: to love as a kid, Like I played it on
Speaker 1: my computer. We used to play it with relatives, but
Speaker 1: I never got good at it, Like I'm probably as
Speaker 1: good as I was in second grade. But I do
Speaker 1: love like movies and books that involved it. I I
Speaker 1: read this great book last year. It's really slim. It's
Speaker 1: called The Chess Game and it's by the same author
Speaker 1: that wrote The Hotel Budapest. And you know, I don't
Speaker 1: understand any of the chess strategy, but I was totally
Speaker 1: enamored with how the main character plays these games of
Speaker 1: chess in his head. Yeah, I mean, like that's a
Speaker 1: real skill. I had heard about these two Silicon Vallet
Speaker 1: guys who met for the first time. I want to
Speaker 1: say it was Peter thiel And and somebody equally famous.
Speaker 1: And any way, the first time they met, they sat
Speaker 1: down at a restaurant and one of them said, I
Speaker 1: heard you like chess, and then all about an opening
Speaker 1: play and they actually played a full game on an
Speaker 1: imaginary board in their heads. Like just these two chess savants.
Speaker 1: That would be the weirdest conversation to like, wait a
Speaker 1: table on just hearing people call out letters and numbers.
Speaker 1: But you know what's crazy to me is, you know,
Speaker 1: one of our friends dads was a chess champ in Ecuador,
Speaker 1: and they're these photos of him playing like twelve matches
Speaker 1: at a time, just moving from board to board to
Speaker 1: board and making moves super quick. And and then there's
Speaker 1: like blindfold chest, which is kind of like what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. But you know what's weird is that a
Speaker 1: lot of people used to think that playing chess while
Speaker 1: blindfolded can actually lead to brain damage, brain dam So
Speaker 1: so why do they think that. Apparently it's just so
Speaker 1: exhausting to keep track of all those pieces while also
Speaker 1: planning out your next moves. And in fact, the Soviet
Speaker 1: Union completely banned blindfold chess in because of that perceived danger.
Speaker 1: And and actually one Russian player died during his attempt
Speaker 1: to break the world record for a number of opponents
Speaker 1: played wild blindfolded. What you're saying, people combine those things
Speaker 1: like they blindfold themselves then play multiple games simultaneously. Do
Speaker 1: people still do this? Yeah? And actually a new world
Speaker 1: record was set less than two years ago. So this
Speaker 1: chess grandmaster, his name's Timore Garyev, and he played forty
Speaker 1: eight games of blindfold chess simultaneously over the course of
Speaker 1: the three hours. Yeah, he actually won eight percent of
Speaker 1: those games, and it's ridiculous. Along the way, he was
Speaker 1: actually riding an exercise bike the whole time, and in
Speaker 1: the end he peddled apparently about fifty miles. Good lord,
Speaker 1: I mean, I love that they just added the exercise
Speaker 1: bike because they're playing forty eight simultaneous blindfold games. Wasn't enough.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking though, maybe after Tristan masters the Hippopotamus defense,
Speaker 1: that he's going to get on this blindfold chess train.
Speaker 1: We'll see. Well, anyway, for today's show, we're going to
Speaker 1: cover chess, so we'll we'll take a deep die into
Speaker 1: the history of the game, how the rules developed, and
Speaker 1: why the iconic pieces look the way they do. I
Speaker 1: think I've always been curious about this. And then a
Speaker 1: little later we'll try to figure out why Russians are
Speaker 1: so good at chess, as well as why computers might
Speaker 1: be the best players of all. Now, of course, we'll
Speaker 1: take a look at how playing chess can affect your
Speaker 1: brain and just what kind of smart it actually makes you. Anyway,
Speaker 1: that's right, So let's jump right in and talk about
Speaker 1: the history of chess, because it actually goes quite a
Speaker 1: ways back. So most historians believe in early version of
Speaker 1: the game was invented in India about fift undred years ago,
Speaker 1: and the first known mention of anything involving chess appears
Speaker 1: in a text from five and then about a century later,
Speaker 1: the game made its way to Persia, where a few
Speaker 1: different variations evolved. So the exact rules of the game
Speaker 1: and the appearances of the pieces hadn't been formalized at
Speaker 1: that time, but the pieces did have these established identities
Speaker 1: that aren't that dissimilar from what we're used today. So
Speaker 1: one of the main differences was that the game didn't
Speaker 1: lay out a royal court like it does. It was
Speaker 1: more of a battlefield back then, with the king being
Speaker 1: the only piece shared between the ancient version and the
Speaker 1: modern version. I'm curiously, do you know what the other
Speaker 1: pieces were in the old battlefield version? Yeah, so instead
Speaker 1: of ponds, you had these infantry pieces. Nights were cavalry,
Speaker 1: and and bishops were elephants. I think our rooks were
Speaker 1: actually chariots as well. And what about the what about
Speaker 1: the queen? Was the queen part of the game at
Speaker 1: that point. That's a different story. I mean, well, we'll
Speaker 1: get to that in a minute. But the short answer
Speaker 1: is that the piece would later become the Queen. It
Speaker 1: was actually called the vizier or or the advisor. So
Speaker 1: if you think about Jaffar, the villain from Aladdin, like,
Speaker 1: that's basically what the piece was, and he was the
Speaker 1: top counselor to the ruler. But you've got to remember
Speaker 1: the rules of the game hadn't solidified, so most of
Speaker 1: the pieces didn't move exactly like they do now. So
Speaker 1: the Advisor, for instance, could only move one square diagonally,
Speaker 1: which made it this much weaker piece than today's Queen,
Speaker 1: which can obviously, you know, move any number of squares
Speaker 1: in any direction she wants. Yeah, that's interesting. So how
Speaker 1: did the weakest piece in the game pretty much to
Speaker 1: become the strongest because the queen has you know, better
Speaker 1: moves than the king, right, I mean, I know the
Speaker 1: King can move in any direction just like the Queen can,
Speaker 1: but he only moves one square at a time, which
Speaker 1: is just I don't know that must that would piss
Speaker 1: me off if I Yeah, but he's probably got gout
Speaker 1: overrese you know. So the upset and power didn't actually
Speaker 1: happen until after the game had spread west to Europe
Speaker 1: in the early eleventh century, and once the game hit Europe,
Speaker 1: that's when it shifted from that army on the battlefield
Speaker 1: to members of the royal court. And for a while
Speaker 1: most of the pieces still moved more or less according
Speaker 1: to the original rules, but that changed sometime in the
Speaker 1: fourteen hundreds or so when this unknown inventor, I think
Speaker 1: it was either in Italy or Spain, introduced the rules
Speaker 1: we know today, and the most important revisions he made
Speaker 1: were to the Bishop and the Queen, which until then
Speaker 1: had been sort of the weakest pieces on the board
Speaker 1: except for the ponds and something. These pieces were less
Speaker 1: restricted in their movement and a whole lot stronger, and
Speaker 1: it was one of those changes that just made the
Speaker 1: game so much faster and more interesting to play. And
Speaker 1: that makes sense, and I could see how those would
Speaker 1: go over well in terms of the actual game play.
Speaker 1: But it's a little bit surprising because if you think
Speaker 1: about it making the queen the most powerful piece on
Speaker 1: the board, it it feels pretty progressive for you know,
Speaker 1: think about this was medieval times you're talking about. That's true,
Speaker 1: and there were tons of sexist players that did kind
Speaker 1: of excuse the change there and said that the strength
Speaker 1: was only in her defense of the King. That's when
Speaker 1: her power came up. But but the reality is that
Speaker 1: queens were getting more powerful on the chessboard at the
Speaker 1: same time they were getting more powerful in real life.
Speaker 1: So so you think back to the fourteenth and fifteen centuries,
Speaker 1: the ladies that were coming to power all over Europe,
Speaker 1: where people like Elizabeth the First and Mary Tudor and
Speaker 1: Queen Isabella. That's pretty cool to see that that would
Speaker 1: you know, be mirrored on the chessboard. But so I
Speaker 1: actually want to stick with the chess pieces for just
Speaker 1: a minute and talk about how they got these iconic
Speaker 1: designs that we're all used to seeing at this point.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, you think about the horsehead knights
Speaker 1: and the castle shaped brooks, because obviously, during those sin
Speaker 1: trees of innovation and development that you were talking about,
Speaker 1: the game was really spreading through all different regions and cultures,
Speaker 1: and there was actually no standard chess set to play with.
Speaker 1: I mean, the basic setup was there. You had a
Speaker 1: board with sixty four squares and thirty two pieces, and
Speaker 1: you know, I guess they made pretty similar moves, but
Speaker 1: what those pieces actually looked like, or how they felt,
Speaker 1: or even what they were made of. I mean all
Speaker 1: of that very dramatically depending on where you were playing
Speaker 1: the game. And so all of these countless varieties of
Speaker 1: styles worked well enough for a while. But you come
Speaker 1: upon the nineteenth century and the game has become so
Speaker 1: popular that chess clubs and competitions began cropping up all
Speaker 1: over the world. So you can imagine it actually got
Speaker 1: pretty confusing when players from different cultures would sit down
Speaker 1: for a match and then realized that none of the
Speaker 1: opponent's pieces looked familiar to them. Would be so weird
Speaker 1: and very strange. But and it's still just so strange
Speaker 1: that the game evolved somewhat similarly in so many places,
Speaker 1: and that this was really the big difference. But you
Speaker 1: asked forward a bit to eighteen forty nine, and there
Speaker 1: was a British architect named Nathan Cook who built this
Speaker 1: standardized set that was called the Staunton Chess set, and
Speaker 1: its pieces are actually the ones that we still know today.
Speaker 1: So I'm curious, like, if Nathan Cook made the set,
Speaker 1: why is it called the Staunton set? Like who is Stunton? Yeah,
Speaker 1: what you'd think it might be called the Cook Chess set,
Speaker 1: But he actually decided to forego that fame and in
Speaker 1: favor of practicality. So there was a guy named Howard
Speaker 1: Staunton who was a major player in the London chess
Speaker 1: scene at the time, and he'd organized these tournaments and
Speaker 1: clubs and was really considered one of the best players
Speaker 1: in the world. And so Cook knew how respected Staunton
Speaker 1: was in this chess community, and so he approached him
Speaker 1: and asked if Staunton's name could be used to market
Speaker 1: his new designs, And of course Staunton was flattered and
Speaker 1: agreed as soon as he saw the pieces, and so
Speaker 1: the set was a huge hit with the public, and
Speaker 1: really since the nineteen twenties it's actually been the required
Speaker 1: set for all world chess organizations. I didn't realize that.
Speaker 1: So what was the revolutionary about the Stunt set? Like
Speaker 1: I I get that it became the standard, but why
Speaker 1: is that exactly? Well, the set had a few things
Speaker 1: going for it, so for starters it it wasn't wholly
Speaker 1: unfamiliar because Cook had studied a bunch of different popular
Speaker 1: chess sets that were in use at the time and
Speaker 1: use those common traits really as starting points for his
Speaker 1: own set, and then from there he would look to
Speaker 1: inspiration in the architecture of Victorian London, which was the
Speaker 1: city around him at the time, and also for some reason,
Speaker 1: from the ruins of ancient Greece and Rome. And so
Speaker 1: take the Night for example, The Night and the Staunton
Speaker 1: set is a great example of that influence. Like it's
Speaker 1: the only piece in the set that isn't an abstract
Speaker 1: representation of something, and instead it looks like a pretty
Speaker 1: realistic horse head. And that's because it's pretty clearly inspired
Speaker 1: by a sculpture on the east pediment of the Parthenon.
Speaker 1: So that carving depicts horses pulling the chariot of the moon,
Speaker 1: goddess of Greek mythology, and so that supposedly what the
Speaker 1: Staunton Night is based on, like this horse that drew
Speaker 1: the moon across the sky each night, which is such
Speaker 1: a weird mishmash of things, right, like Victorian London, you've
Speaker 1: got like Greece and Rome because the culture is like,
Speaker 1: so what else was Cook doing? All right? Well? I
Speaker 1: actually found this breakdown in the Smithsonian of the Staunton set,
Speaker 1: and here are a few of the key features. According
Speaker 1: to the article, it says, um, while some variation is tolerated,
Speaker 1: there are several key distinguishing characteristics that define a set
Speaker 1: as a stunt. The King is topped with a cross,
Speaker 1: and as the tallest piece, it serves as a metric
Speaker 1: for the height of the other ones. The Queen is
Speaker 1: topped by a crown and a ball, the Bishop has
Speaker 1: a split top, and the rook is a squat castle turret.
Speaker 1: And so with all of this, Cook really established this
Speaker 1: clear and simple language with the forms that he was choosing,
Speaker 1: which not only made them easy to recognize, but pretty
Speaker 1: cheap to produce as well. And so I'm betting that
Speaker 1: all of that together is probably why the Staunton said,
Speaker 1: is still, you know, really the global standard today. All right, well,
Speaker 1: I know we want to jump ahead in the timeline
Speaker 1: and talk a little bit about the rise of chess
Speaker 1: in Russia, but before we do that, I do want
Speaker 1: to run quickly through a little of its history in
Speaker 1: the US. And as you might imagine, the game made
Speaker 1: its way stateside thanks to European columnists, but despite the
Speaker 1: fact that Ben Franklin was a huge chess fan, the
Speaker 1: game really didn't catch on until the mid nineteenth century.
Speaker 1: And what turned the tide was that this American chess
Speaker 1: player his name was Paul Morphy. He managed to beat
Speaker 1: all of Europe's chess champions in this international tournament. It
Speaker 1: was the first time this had ever happened. So people's
Speaker 1: patriotism just kind of kicked in at that point and
Speaker 1: it did its thing, and from then on chess became
Speaker 1: super popular in the US. Of course, not everyone was
Speaker 1: happy to see the game takeoff. And why is that?
Speaker 1: I mean, I read this hilarious old article from this
Speaker 1: eighteen fifty nine edition of Scientific American, and the author
Speaker 1: basically treats chess like the sinis de corrupting influence, almost
Speaker 1: like it's the fortnight of its time. And so this
Speaker 1: is how the author describes this very real danger of chess.
Speaker 1: A pernicious excitement to learn and play chess has spread
Speaker 1: all over the country, and numerous clubs for practicing this
Speaker 1: game have been formed in cities and villages. Why should
Speaker 1: we regret this, it may be asked. We answer, Chess
Speaker 1: is a mirror amusement of a very inferior character, which
Speaker 1: robs the mind a valuable time and might be devoted
Speaker 1: to nobler requirements, while it affords no benefits whatever to
Speaker 1: the body. A game of chess does not add a
Speaker 1: single new fact to the mind. It does not excite
Speaker 1: a single beautiful thought, nor does it serve a single
Speaker 1: purpose for polishing and improving the nobler faculties. You know,
Speaker 1: those were really the good old days when the greatest
Speaker 1: threat facing the youth of America with the pressure to
Speaker 1: join a chess club when you talk about it. Alright, well,
Speaker 1: now that we've heard from the critics, let's talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about some of the game's biggest proponents, which
Speaker 1: of course are the Russians. So but before we get
Speaker 1: to them, let's take a quick break. You're listening to
Speaker 1: part time Genius and we're talking about the enduring appeal
Speaker 1: of one of the world's oldest games, chess. So well,
Speaker 1: one thing I noticed this week is that it's suspiciously
Speaker 1: large number of top ranking chess players all hail from
Speaker 1: Russia or some other Soviet republic, and that includes chess
Speaker 1: grandmasters like Anthelie Karpov Gary Kasparov, And it really made
Speaker 1: me wonder, like, why do the Russians have such a
Speaker 1: dominance for chess. Well, it's interesting, and so of course
Speaker 1: was digging into this in our research for this week.
Speaker 1: But chess first spread the Russia along the Persian and
Speaker 1: Indian trade routes. And that was way back in the
Speaker 1: seventh century or so, and it was popular from the start,
Speaker 1: but it didn't really become a national pastime until much later.
Speaker 1: More we're talking like the nineteenth century or so. Now,
Speaker 1: this was during the Russian Revolution when Lenin and the
Speaker 1: Bolsheviks took power, and Lennon was a big player. I mean,
Speaker 1: he really loved the game, and Stalin would be after him.
Speaker 1: But the real mastermind behind the country's chess movement was
Speaker 1: Lennon's commander of the Soviet Army, this guy named Nikola Krelenko. Now,
Speaker 1: he opened these dedicated chess schools, he organized competitions and
Speaker 1: really paved the way for these first state sponsored chess tournaments.
Speaker 1: And this was back in So you fast forward a
Speaker 1: decade and you've got roughly half a million amateur players
Speaker 1: that have signed up for these state chess programs. It's
Speaker 1: pretty remarkable how quickly it grew. Yeah, so it sounds
Speaker 1: like there's this big push from the state and that's
Speaker 1: what sort of kick started Russia's love affair with chess.
Speaker 1: But why were all those Soviet leaders and think are
Speaker 1: so into chess in the first place, Like, was it
Speaker 1: just because it's a strategic game, and and they were
Speaker 1: kind of seen as great schemers. You know, I'm guessing
Speaker 1: the strategy involved was a big part of the appeal
Speaker 1: for them, so that that's probably true. But I also
Speaker 1: read this article in Slate that suggested there might have
Speaker 1: been a little bit more to it, so I just
Speaker 1: will read a little bit of this. The author of
Speaker 1: the piece was Chris Beam, and he was describing the
Speaker 1: appeal of chess. So he writes, the Soviets saw chess
Speaker 1: as embodying their revolutionary ideals. It was a game of skill,
Speaker 1: and the USSR prided itself on intellectual talents. It was
Speaker 1: also cheap, which meant anyone could play it, and it's
Speaker 1: back and forth dynamic reflected that dialectical concept of history
Speaker 1: espouse by Marxism. You know, never mind the irony of
Speaker 1: playing with imperialist symbols like kings and queens. That is funny,
Speaker 1: you know. I I and thought about that. But I
Speaker 1: know chess is hugely popular in Russia, even if it
Speaker 1: no longer has state money behind it. And there's actually
Speaker 1: this one famous chess supporter in particularly who I want
Speaker 1: to talk about not only because he's done a lot
Speaker 1: to keep the game relevant for Russian citizens, but also
Speaker 1: because he's just a super weird guy. His name is
Speaker 1: kirsn uh illiams in Off, which I know I mispronouncing.
Speaker 1: He was president of the World Chess Federation from all
Speaker 1: the way up until just last year, and that's when
Speaker 1: he was finally ousted in favor of a new president.
Speaker 1: It's a pretty impressive run those of what makes him
Speaker 1: such a weird guy. So there are actually a bunch
Speaker 1: of things, but honestly, they all kind of hinge on
Speaker 1: one in particular, which is that Kirsen claims that he
Speaker 1: was abducted by aliens, and I'm just gonna let him
Speaker 1: explain what happened. And this is what he said an
Speaker 1: interview about a decade after the abduction. It happened on
Speaker 1: September sevent I was taken from my apartment in Moscow
Speaker 1: and taken to the spaceship and we went to some
Speaker 1: star and after that I asked, please bring me back
Speaker 1: because the next day I should be back and go
Speaker 1: to the Ukraine. They said, no problem, Kirson, you have time.
Speaker 1: Oh no, no problems, I guess he got napped by
Speaker 1: some considerate aliens. I mean, not every abductee is so lucky,
Speaker 1: is that? Yeah? Usually there's more provings. These weren't just
Speaker 1: any aliens. They were the sophisticates that invented che us.
Speaker 1: Apparently that's true. You know, I didn't realize that this
Speaker 1: was even a theory. So do people really think chess
Speaker 1: was created by aliens? Well, at least one guy does,
Speaker 1: because in that same interview, Kerson went on to say,
Speaker 1: I am not a crazy man. My theory is that
Speaker 1: chess comes from space. Why because the same rules sixty
Speaker 1: four squares black and white, and the same rules in
Speaker 1: Japan and China and Qatar and Mongolia and Africa. The
Speaker 1: rules are the same. Why I think maybe it is
Speaker 1: from space. I mean, I don't want to challenge somebody
Speaker 1: that was in power for that long, but I have
Speaker 1: to say his evidence feels a little bit thin to me.
Speaker 1: I mean, we just tracked the spread of chess across
Speaker 1: different continents, so I feel like jumping straight to the
Speaker 1: aliens theory it feels a little off to me for
Speaker 1: some reason. So Kirson did leave the door open for
Speaker 1: at least one other possibility, and in this interview with
Speaker 1: The Observer, he admitted that there were actually two options,
Speaker 1: and this is how he put it. Each year archaeologists
Speaker 1: find evidence of chess in America, India, Japan, or China
Speaker 1: played under the same rules from a time without playing
Speaker 1: or the internet. Look, the chess board has sixty four squares,
Speaker 1: and ourselves are made of sixty four pieces. All the
Speaker 1: shows that chess comes either from God or from UFOs.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's basically a toss off. Like, the only
Speaker 1: thing we know for certain is that chess wasn't invented
Speaker 1: by humans. Is such a strange story. I mean, why
Speaker 1: even tell people about this? I mean, the aliens just
Speaker 1: kind of took him on this joy ride through the
Speaker 1: Solar System and then dropped him off in time for
Speaker 1: a meeting. It seems pretty uneventful for what it could
Speaker 1: have been. Yeah, but you've got to remember he remained
Speaker 1: president of the Chess Federation for another twenty years after
Speaker 1: the incident, So I guess the story really didn't bother people.
Speaker 1: And as for the trip being uneventful, there was at
Speaker 1: least one part that had some real and lasting consequences.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, what what what's that? At some point during
Speaker 1: the journey, the alien suggested to Carson that it would
Speaker 1: be a really good idea for him to build this
Speaker 1: extravagant city dedicated to all things chess. And so he
Speaker 1: went home and did that. But he built an actual
Speaker 1: chess city. Yeah. So at the time Kierson had the
Speaker 1: second job, he was president of the Republic of Calmakia,
Speaker 1: which I guess it is a subject of the Russian Federation,
Speaker 1: and using his cloud as leader, Kierson was able to
Speaker 1: build his chess city on the east side of this
Speaker 1: Buddhist town called Alista, and he went all out right, like,
Speaker 1: the city has a chess museum, this huge open air
Speaker 1: chess board, it's got a swimming pool, enough chess sets
Speaker 1: to host year round tournaments. It's actually hosted several championships
Speaker 1: in the year was built, I guess in But Kirson's
Speaker 1: real goal was to use Chess City to boost the
Speaker 1: popularity of the game so that the total number of
Speaker 1: chess players in the world would rise from six hundred million,
Speaker 1: which I guess is where it is approximately now, to
Speaker 1: a full billion. Wow, I mean, that seems like a
Speaker 1: big goal. So what was so important about hitting a
Speaker 1: billion players? Apparently that's the number of players needed to
Speaker 1: stop aliens from destroying the planet. I mean, it just
Speaker 1: gets weirder and weird. So how did this guy stay
Speaker 1: in office for multiple decades? I know, oh, I I
Speaker 1: guess he was just really serious about it, And like,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I found this interview that he did
Speaker 1: with Independent This is back in two thousand and ten,
Speaker 1: and he kind of just flat out says that playing
Speaker 1: chess is the key to preventing this alien attack. And
Speaker 1: he writes, above us, they're all looking at us, and
Speaker 1: maybe they will get tired of us. And suddenly he
Speaker 1: tails off, making dramatic gesture of destruction. How can we
Speaker 1: save ourselves from them only through intellect, concentration, and spiritual energy.
Speaker 1: If a billion people are in these chess centers playing chess,
Speaker 1: the world will still have positive energy. All right, Well
Speaker 1: I meant it. I mean, I'm invested in this now
Speaker 1: if the fate of the world is at stake on
Speaker 1: all this. But I have to know, did Krison get
Speaker 1: to a billion players? Like, did the Chess city work?
Speaker 1: It did not, so, and the whole thing is mostly
Speaker 1: vacant today and it barely gets any use. And what's
Speaker 1: particularly sad about it is that Kirrison actually cut the
Speaker 1: town's food subsidies to help pay for this fifty million
Speaker 1: dollar complex. So now Chess City is is really just
Speaker 1: a monument to the local government's disregard for its citizens. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's kind of a bummer, But you know, I don't
Speaker 1: want to dwell on all these neglectful politicians or even
Speaker 1: the alien invasions. As weird as that story was, and
Speaker 1: I feel like we should talk about a few chess
Speaker 1: stories that are a little more upbeat. What do you
Speaker 1: think I'm for it? First? A quick break? Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: so chess may not be your best hope for a
Speaker 1: stemming off this alien invasion, but the game still has
Speaker 1: a whole lot going for it. Like plenty of studies
Speaker 1: have shown that playing chess can improve your focus, it
Speaker 1: can help you hone your decision making skills, and of
Speaker 1: course it's a great way to strengthen your memory, especially
Speaker 1: if you play it blindfolded. But before we get to
Speaker 1: the mental benefits, let's talk about some of the more
Speaker 1: surprising things we found out about the game, and and
Speaker 1: maybe we've never noticed before. You know, one thing that's
Speaker 1: stood out to me is how resilient the game is.
Speaker 1: Like it stands up to scrutiny more than just about
Speaker 1: any other game out there. You know, people over the
Speaker 1: years have tried to, I guess like solve chess for
Speaker 1: for decades and decades, but the game always seems to
Speaker 1: elude them. I mean, there's always another move you never
Speaker 1: considered a new way to win or even lose at chess.
Speaker 1: And remember that's true even after we built computers specifically
Speaker 1: designed to decode the game and really select the best
Speaker 1: possible move for millions and millions of different scenarios. Isn't
Speaker 1: that exactly what it means to solve chess? Like, if
Speaker 1: we're able to compute every possible sequence of moves and
Speaker 1: counter moves and all these different forms of match can take,
Speaker 1: then isn't the game effectively solved? Well, I mean that's
Speaker 1: actually the thing, because even if you had the most
Speaker 1: powerful computer in the world, it still wouldn't be able
Speaker 1: to calculate all the unique games that could be played.
Speaker 1: And this just seems unimaginable, but the possibilities just scale
Speaker 1: up way too quickly. So for example, after both players
Speaker 1: have moved one time in a game of chess, there
Speaker 1: are four hundred possible boards setups, but after the second
Speaker 1: of the turns, the number of possible games shoots up
Speaker 1: to just under two hundred thousand. Now after three moves
Speaker 1: there are one hundred and twenty one million possible outcomes,
Speaker 1: and so on and so on until you get to
Speaker 1: the current best estimate for the total possible number of
Speaker 1: chess games, which is a staggering ten to the one
Speaker 1: hundred and twentieth power. So to put that number in
Speaker 1: perspective just a little bit, there was a great breakdown
Speaker 1: that I found from Popular Science, and here's what it says.
Speaker 1: There are only ten to the fifteen total hairs on
Speaker 1: all the human heads in the world, ten to the
Speaker 1: twenty third grains of sand on Earth, and about ten
Speaker 1: to the eighty one atoms in the universe. The number
Speaker 1: of typical chess games is many times as great as
Speaker 1: all those numbers multiplied together. An impressive feat for thirty
Speaker 1: two wooden pieces lined up on a board. That is unbelievable.
Speaker 1: You know, uh, when you look back at the kind
Speaker 1: of like endless complexity of the game, you know, it's
Speaker 1: really no wonder that it gives our brains such a workout.
Speaker 1: And I actually read the study from a while back
Speaker 1: that found the experts who played chess actually used both
Speaker 1: sides of the brain while solving chess problems, and not
Speaker 1: just the analytical right side. Oh wow, but this only
Speaker 1: happens and I'm guessing like really experienced players, that's right.
Speaker 1: So the researchers gathered eight international chess players and then
Speaker 1: eight novice players, and then they took fm r I
Speaker 1: brain scans while the subjects worked their way through two
Speaker 1: different tests. And first they had to identify geometrical shapes
Speaker 1: and then they had to determine whether or not the
Speaker 1: pieces on the chessboard were in a check situation. And
Speaker 1: the result from these tests were really unexpected because they
Speaker 1: showed that while the novice players had only used the
Speaker 1: left side of the brain to process this task, the
Speaker 1: expert players had used both sides of the brain. So
Speaker 1: this is what the lead researcher explained. Quote. Once the
Speaker 1: usual brain structures were engaged, the experts utilized additional complementary
Speaker 1: structures and the other have to execute processes in parallel. Wow.
Speaker 1: So did this dual processing improve the expert's performance at all? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it actually made them much quicker at solving the chess
Speaker 1: problems than novices were, But it is worth noting that
Speaker 1: the parallel processing only occurred during the chess problems and
Speaker 1: not during that geometry test. So it really seems like
Speaker 1: all the extra practice that the experts had given their
Speaker 1: brains was this nice boost, but only when it came
Speaker 1: to chess. You know, it's interesting to hear that, because
Speaker 1: I was actually reading about how playing a lot of
Speaker 1: chess can actually be a detriment to players sometimes, like
Speaker 1: rather than being beneficial to them. And how's that. Well,
Speaker 1: it's because of something called the einste Long effect, which
Speaker 1: Scientific American describes as the brain's tendency to stick with
Speaker 1: solutions it already knows, rather than look for potentially superior ones.
Speaker 1: So scientists researching this effect really love using chess players
Speaker 1: as subjects, and that's because they provide a really clear
Speaker 1: way to see the effect in action. So as an
Speaker 1: example of this, some studies present master chess players with
Speaker 1: a chessboard that has two possible solutions. You've got this
Speaker 1: well known maneuver that can win the game in five
Speaker 1: moves and a less common but actually much faster, three
Speaker 1: step solution. So the players were told to win the
Speaker 1: match in as few moves as possible, but once they
Speaker 1: had spotted this familiar five steps strategy, they actually seemed
Speaker 1: unable to recognize the much quicker solution. And it wasn't
Speaker 1: that the three step move was really obscure or anything
Speaker 1: like that, but because those same players were actually presented
Speaker 1: with a similar setup where the three step move was
Speaker 1: the only way to win, and then in that scenario,
Speaker 1: the players recognized the strategy right away. So in that
Speaker 1: first experiment, it really was the Einstellung effect at work.
Speaker 1: And you know, the players weren't able to see any
Speaker 1: of the other options because they had this cognitive bias
Speaker 1: for the move they knew best. That's really fascinating. But
Speaker 1: also like that even chess masters can learn something to
Speaker 1: do better the next time around, because like, there are
Speaker 1: that many possibilities, Like I actually think that's why so
Speaker 1: many schools invest in their own chess pro ramsay it's
Speaker 1: one of those rare hobbies that can boost your cognitive
Speaker 1: ability well also teaching you these coping skills like how
Speaker 1: to win or lose gracefully. Although I do have to
Speaker 1: say the one time my son got hit at school,
Speaker 1: it was in his first grade chess club. He came
Speaker 1: home with dirt on his face, and I was like, Henry,
Speaker 1: how that happened? And he kind of gleefully said, oh,
Speaker 1: I took the second grader as queen, so he kicked
Speaker 1: me in the face. For Henry, it seems like he
Speaker 1: was okay with that. He'd rather win and take the face. Oh.
Speaker 1: You know, And there are so many places where they're
Speaker 1: teaching it really young to kids, like in Armenia, for instance,
Speaker 1: Chess is actually a required subject for every kid who's
Speaker 1: six years and older. And that's kind of awesome, even
Speaker 1: though it probably means the poor matth teachers wind up
Speaker 1: pulling double duty and teaching chess as well. Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: but I have a feeling it's worth it to them anyway, because,
Speaker 1: you know, as one Armenian teacher explained, chess trains logical thinking.
Speaker 1: It teaches how to make decisions, trains memories, strengthens willpower,
Speaker 1: motivates children to win, and teaches them how to deal
Speaker 1: with defeat. It's the only school subject that can do
Speaker 1: all of this. Oh, I really love that idea. Well,
Speaker 1: how about we knock out this fact off and then
Speaker 1: get Tristan the show. As some of his opening moves
Speaker 1: he's been perfecting. Yeah, so for a while now, we've
Speaker 1: known that elite athletes tend to live longer than the
Speaker 1: rest of us, and that's really not the big of
Speaker 1: a surprise. But research now shows that elite chess players
Speaker 1: also have a survival advantage over the general population. A
Speaker 1: team of Australian researchers looked at players from twenty eight
Speaker 1: countries and specifically over a thousand players who reached international
Speaker 1: chess grandmaster status over a period of nearly seven years,
Speaker 1: and then they compared the survival data of those people
Speaker 1: to fifteen thousand Olympic medalists, and not only did they
Speaker 1: find that both groups had significant survival advantages over the
Speaker 1: general population, but that the difference between the two was
Speaker 1: not even statistically significant. Oh wow, that's pretty interesting. All
Speaker 1: well years ago, iron remember reading about how, you know,
Speaker 1: before the age of the Internet, people used to play
Speaker 1: chess by mail or what's called correspondence chess. So you'd
Speaker 1: make a move, put that move in the mail, and
Speaker 1: then your opponent would do the same, and you'd go
Speaker 1: back and forth and games could take years to play.
Speaker 1: And actually this kind of sounds fun to be able
Speaker 1: to do this with a friend who lives, you know,
Speaker 1: across the country or whatever. But what surprising is that
Speaker 1: even today, the US Chess Federation estimates they have about
Speaker 1: three thousand members still playing correspondence chess. Don't now for
Speaker 1: some play by email, and there are even tournaments for
Speaker 1: correspondence chess with rules like each player is given thirty
Speaker 1: days of reflection time over ten moves, you know, to
Speaker 1: really speed things up. I guess. So I was reading
Speaker 1: recently about how chess became popular among captured or wounded
Speaker 1: soldiers during World War Two, and you know, the rules
Speaker 1: of war is so interesting to me sometimes you remember
Speaker 1: learning about the Geneva Conventions, which are often thought of
Speaker 1: today is sort of the way war crimes are defined.
Speaker 1: But the Third Convention set out how prisoners of war
Speaker 1: would be treated, so in addition to how prisoners would
Speaker 1: be treated physically, it also had sections on recreation and
Speaker 1: stated that the captors should encourage the intellectual diversions and
Speaker 1: sports organized by prisoners of war, which makes it not
Speaker 1: that surprising that a quiet game that could take hours
Speaker 1: of days to play and was understood around the world
Speaker 1: could take off at a time like this. So organizations
Speaker 1: like the Red Cross would even send chess sets around
Speaker 1: the world to prisoners where there were even organized chess
Speaker 1: tournaments and were so weird. But I do think that
Speaker 1: one aspect is pretty cool. Yeah, all right, we mentioned
Speaker 1: earlier the similarities between elite athletes and chess players. Well,
Speaker 1: did you know that the World Chess Federation actually conducts
Speaker 1: drug tests and they do this pretty routinely, and this
Speaker 1: is because there's a push for it to be part
Speaker 1: of the Olympics and so this is actually required by
Speaker 1: the IOC. But there's some interesting studies around the effects
Speaker 1: of you know, so called smart drugs on the ability
Speaker 1: to play chess. Now specifically drugs like modafinil and riddling.
Speaker 1: So Madefanil is a drug we've talked about actually in
Speaker 1: an episode. I guess it's been quite a while, but
Speaker 1: it's commonly used to help with sleep disorders, and riddling
Speaker 1: is commonly used to treat things like a d h D.
Speaker 1: And the findings from some of the studies on these
Speaker 1: players was really interesting because weirdly, players on these smart
Speaker 1: drugs were often losing more games than those who were
Speaker 1: not taking these but this was actually because the players
Speaker 1: on them, We're taking more time per move and just
Speaker 1: running out of time. So once they took the time
Speaker 1: out as a factor, they found that these players were
Speaker 1: actually playing better. So it's one of the researchers put it,
Speaker 1: these substances may be able to convert fast and shallow
Speaker 1: thinkers into deeper, but somewhat slower thinkers. Huh, that's really interesting. Well,
Speaker 1: we talked about how long chess has been around, and
Speaker 1: I was reading about some of the oldest strategy books
Speaker 1: on chess, and this one from way back in one
Speaker 1: had some pretty awesome advice. The book suggests strategies such
Speaker 1: as playing with your back to the sun. Why because
Speaker 1: that could blind your opponent. It also suggests that if
Speaker 1: you're playing by a fire at night, you should use
Speaker 1: your hand to create a shadow over the board so
Speaker 1: that your opponent won't be able to see his pieces clearly. Wow.
Speaker 1: You know, I had a couple of facts about weird
Speaker 1: chess tournaments and a couple of other things. But looking
Speaker 1: over there at Tristan and seeing the size of the
Speaker 1: smirk on his face, I've never seen him smirk that
Speaker 1: big because I know he loves this fact, because he
Speaker 1: loves to play dirty. Whenever he competes, he plays so dirty,
Speaker 1: such a dirty guy. But anyway, I'm gonna have to
Speaker 1: stop us there and give you today's trophy, Mango, thank
Speaker 1: you so much. Well all right, well, if you've got
Speaker 1: any great stories about chess or any facts about chess
Speaker 1: that we may have left out today, we always love
Speaker 1: to hear those from you. If you can email us
Speaker 1: part Time Genius and How Stuff Works dot com, or
Speaker 1: you can always hit us up on Facebook or Twitter.
Speaker 1: But from Gabe, Tristan, Mango and me, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius is
Speaker 1: a production of How Stuff Works and wouldn't be possible
Speaker 1: without several brilliant people who do the important things we
Speaker 1: couldn't even begin to understand. Tristan McNeil does the editing thing.
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Speaker 1: Gave Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support from the
Speaker 1: research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams
Speaker 1: and Eve. Jeff Cook gets the show to your ears.
Speaker 1: Good job, Eves. If you like what you heard, we
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Speaker 1: We did. We forget Jason, Jason who