This article has a lot of factual errors but it also offers some interesting views. Read and judge for yourself.
Bobby Fischer: The greatest chessplayer of all time?
By Errol Tiwari
Sunday, February 4th 2007
Fischer’s IQ was in the range of 180 – genius level. But this is not exceptional to Fischer alone. Brilliant chess players have been known to have high IQs. However, there is probably no topic that intrigues chess players as much as the inner workings of the mind of Bobby Fischer. Chess players universally feel they can improve their own game by understanding how Fischer’s mind worked.
But Fischer’s incredible retention was not restricted to chess alone. One day when he was in Iceland, Fischer called Frederick Olaffson, Iceland’s only Grandmaster. Olaffson’s Icelandic-speaking daughter answered the phone and explained her parents were out and would return at suppertime. Fischer understood nothing that was said because he did not know the language. But he listened, apologized and hung up.
Later that day Fischer met with another Icelandic player who spoke English. He explained what had happened and repeated every Icelandic word he had heard on the phone, imitating the sounds with perfect inflection. The Icelandic player translated the message word for word for Fischer.
Following his match with Spassky, Fischer had achieved the highest rating of any player in history. Professor Arpad Elo’s International Rating System, a thoroughly reliable system that is used to this day, rated Fischer at 2805. He was the only player in the history of the game to have reached the magic 2800 mark. Rating points are given for wins against strong Grandmasters and are taken away for draws and losses.
Fischer’s record remained unbroken for twenty years. And to this day only two players have succeeded in reaching 2800–Garry Kasparov and Veselin Topalov. Although he is the current world champion, Vladimir Kramnik is rated at 2750 and Viswanathan Anand the number two in the world, is rated at 2779. Kasparov has retired from chess and is not active, so he is not rated. And by the way, Professor Elo had correctly predicted that Fischer would beat Spassky by a 12½ to 8½ margin, and that the contest would end on the twenty-first game.
Here is the full article.
“Fischer’s record remained unbroken for twenty years. And to this day only two players have succeeded in reaching 2800–Garry Kasparov and Veselin Topalov.”
Susan,
Read what you post before publishing and giving references. Kramnik has succeeded reaching 2800.
I don’t know about that. I think when an article is posted here the source of the article is quite clear. Nothing is being quoted this is an extract from the original article plus a link to the whole of it, therefore providing a service – some of the most interesting articles on chess picked out, presented and made easily accessible. I think it’s then our responsibility to discover what is factual, and I doubt anyone has time to write a comentary on every article pointed to here – we know they present a cross section of opinion too. I’m sorry, but something about the way you said that made me want to respond.
its now how fischers mind worked that is essential its how hard he worked. his hard work combined with his natural abilities made him the best. most of his moves came from practicing so when he played the game he knew what to do. he had no fear in trying new ideas during a game because he had worked out there solutions on his own. look at kasaprov he works harder than anyone and the results show because he combines natural ability with hard work. both of these guys used ideas from previous chess greats and expanded upon them. to say you have to understand how fischers mind work seems like the ideas he had were completly his own. fischer read countless chess books by russians and expanded up there ideas. the thing i think fischer had was a memory that could absorb everything.
wolverine
I agree with the first anonymous about the ratings. The article writer doesn’t seem to have a clue about the historical ELO ratings.
Fischer’s highest ever rating was 2785, reached after the 1971 Petrosian match. He lost 5 points in the 1972 Spassky match to end up on 2780.
Elo is inflated as far as I know ,
So more ppl will get over 2800, if you wait long enough.
Which makes the achievement of Fischer even greater. I never forget how he won with big numbers in all his matches (ie. Fischer-Taimanov 6-0).
I see no current player capable of winning with such margins in a match.
This article contain several mistakes and I consider it rubbish. Its “Fischer myths”, stories. The writer hasnt bothered to check his facts. The simplest is when its said that Fischer had 2805 in rating. He newer had an offical FIDE rating more than 2785, and he lost 5 points winning the WC against Boris Spassky.
Therefore I find it unlikely that professor Elo would have predicted 12,5-8,5 – and 21 games duration – none of my books on the match says anything such, and it would of course have been a very interesting prediction come true -if it really was so.
Again, this article contains a lot of the “Fischer myth” – unfounded stories of his unprecedented greatness.
Yes, Fischer was a great player, one of the very very best of all times. But such “stories” is this one, is of no value when it comes to understand his greatness and his failures.
According to the Sigma Society, Kasparov IQ is between 180 and 215.
They also propose the use of Bill McGaugh’s formula, which asign the estimated ELO level (of course it depends on study and other parameters) that normally could be reached with a specific IQ:
ELO = 1282 + 17,3*(QI-100)
Kramnik has reached 2800. Get it right, you no talent. You were raised to play chess and you still cant beat the 100th ranked player in the world.
Paul Morphy…the greatest.
Also, though not world champion…Pillsbury had a phenomenal memory…as do many of the great GM’s, and as Fischer surely does.
Hi,
RJF has been the greatest player of the history. It is true in my opinion. The opinion is based on his results in pretender matches. 6:0 against Taimanow and Larsen, 6.5 : 2.5 against iron draw wall Petrosian.
Beating Petrosian with such a result could be compared with winning versus Kramnik with similair score +5, -1,=3.
Playing against SU players Fischer was playing not only with the players but against all soviet laboratory preparations. There were special team in SU created to prepare against Fischer. It was including top soviet players and trainers. Fischer has to solved by himself all chess i psychological novelties prepared against him. He also has given the new forces setting in chess e6,d6 or b3,e3.
According to chessmetrics.com. He has had the highest rating.
Referring to rating inflation, 2785 on 1972 is more then 2850 now.
Regards
P.
This article contains too many mistakes: utter crap – like Miles would put it. What happened to editorial responsibility?
Ms. Polgar:
1) I am a true fan of yours, thanks for the great blog!
2) Vladimir Kramnik reached 2800+
Tom Hendrich
Fischer’s IQ was in the range of 180 – genius level. But this is not exceptional to Fischer alone. Brilliant chess players have been known to have high IQs.
Susan (if you area reading this), doesn’t that contradict your father’s claim, according which he simply decided to raise his three daughters as brilliant chess players? Which he did, no question, but wasn’t that just fluke, that he happened to have three brilliant daughters to begin with?
Because the true role of IQ has not been settled in the world of science, but few would debate that it is genetically bound.
Also, many people with very high IQ are not at all outstanding chess players, even if they do play chess. So, isn’t it possible that for great chess playing ability one must need some other type of “something”? Such as great memory, which is not directly related to high IQ. Some people have photographic memory, yet their IQ can be quite average. The other way around too (high IQ, average memory). Or perhaps something else, like some mental visualization ability which we don’t even specifically defined yet (which enables chess players to play blind chess, often simultaniously)?
So, could high IQ be just one of the traits required for playing great chess?
Gabor
Certain of the posts leave a very sour taste, but I guess we’ll always get this while there are open forums of communication on the net, and these are a good thing.
Topalov is the best player ever.
That’s why he raises so much jealousy
among some other chess players.
Anand hit 2803 last year on the April 2006 list according to Fide.
http://www.fide.com/ratings/id.phtml?event=5000017
Kramnik top was 2811 and he was over 2800 for more than a year, 7 quarters. see fide.
http://www.fide.com/ratings/id.phtml?event=4101588
and here you can see the rating spike for Topalov at fide. He went straight up from 2730 to 2813. Very unusual and suspicious in my opinion.
http://www.fide.com/ratings/id.phtml?event=2900084
I have always believed that Bobby is the greatest player. He did it all on his own. NO computer and NO grandmaster help. All his games were coming from him personally. Every move. No one is going to accuse Bobby of using Fritz10 to cheat. LOL.
Hey moron, do you know how to read? The article was not written by Susan. Grow up.
“Later that day Fischer met with another Icelandic player who spoke English. He explained what had happened and repeated every Icelandic word he had heard on the phone, imitating the sounds with perfect inflection.”
According to this Fischer should be able to speak Icelandic like a native since he has been there for a while, has such a good sound and verbal memory.
I doubt it very much.
Article is complete BS.
Yeah, you would like very much to see that Kramnik is the greatest in chess, wouldn’t you… But we all know that Kramnik got his WC after a dirty toilet war, and nothing can change that!
“Yeah, you would like very much to see that Kramnik is the greatest in chess, wouldn’t you… But we all know that Kramnik got his WC after a dirty toilet war, and nothing can change that!”
Yet another Bulgarian loser is crying. They have always been big time losers. Their best women and strongest sons had been utilized by the Ottoman empire, they used to cry like babies then. Nothing changed. A loser remains a loser.
Stabroek News is a privately owned newspaper in Guyana. The writer of the article should learn how to do basic fact checking.
the ottoman empire conducted an unprecedented genocide against the Armenian people, killing 3 million innocent women and children. You must be very proud of that, fellow.
The idea that Fischer had an IQ in the range of 180 to 187 has been widely reported, but there is no good evidence for it. The main source claims that this was Fischer’s score in a high school IQ test at age 15, just before he dropped out. But the source is based on memory only, and other people who also had access to Fischer’s score at that time claim that it was much lower. The story about Fischer repeating Icelandic speech verbatim is not reliable evidence, because (1) it is not said how long the Icelandic speech was, or whether Fischer had time to write it down or rehearse it, and anyway (2) good memory is not reliable evidence for high IQ. Fischer was certainly a genius at playing chess, and at subject-specific tasks such as memory for chess games. There is no reliable evidence of his being a genius in any more general sense. In fact, I believe his writings and speeches provide strong counter-evidence.
Hi Susan,
Was Fischer able to learn any Hungarian when he lived in Budapest?
bullcrap..they dont even set their facts straight before publishing an article.. susan can you contact the newspaper ..?
;Elo is inflated as far as I know ;
this is an argument valid in every field.. an old mathematician usuaully says mathematics is so easy these days in their time it was so difficult and that standards are falling.. inflation or not i dont know at the top level players toady are no less than fischer or anybody for that matter..
TO ALL THOSE who support the first comment on this page…Only Kasparov maintained his over 2800 rating. Neither Kramnik, Topalov or Anand HAVE been able to keep themselves over 2800 So, Fischer stands over all of them because with out all the current technology he was able to maintain an unbreakable record for a number of years. Now, lets see if even one of our new “STARS” can reach Kasparov’s peak of 2851. So PLEASE stop taking it against Susan and be more polite towards her and her efforts to stand for what the most of us wouldn’t dare.
Cont from the last post….
The Elo system of rate games is outdated . Check http://www.chessmetrics.com and it will give you a better perspective on ratings
Pah!
I watched an interview with Fischer last week on YouTube — he couldn’t even remember what his current win/draw/loss versus Spassky was!
It’s so funny how these “genius myths” propagate, like urban legends.
Facts, people, facts. Don’t believe urban legends just because they sound cool.
Also, you do realise that serious IQ tests are only meaningful up to about 145? Claiming an IQ well above that is a complete absurdity.
you forgot kramnik
If Fischer is such a genius. how come he was so dumb as to get sucked in by Herbert Armstrong’s ‘Worldwide Church of God’?
And it seems the writer did not only not check his facts. Like, where did he get this 2805 figure from? It doesn’t exist, so how did he get it? He must have made it up. This is not excusable.
Can we just ditch this entire post and save bandwidth?
The bad news is that this article contains an avalanche of errors, qualifiying it as historical fiction. At some point the legend will eclipse the man, if it has not already done so. The good news is that Bobby is not a convicted felon, even though he has spent over a year in a Japanese prison. More good news for prison chess. He will continue to have a clean slate as long as he remains a fugitive from justice.
You ungrateful vicious wolves! Susan does this blog out of the kindness of her heart and love for chess and chess fans! You attack her for putting interesting articles on her FREE site!!!!! You attack like a lynch mob because you dislike the article or Fischer or both. You attack Susans chess ability and her journalistic accountability. Ms Polgar has stated at the beginning of this article if you had the dam IQ to interpret the information, that “THIS ARTICLE HAS ALOT OF FACTUAL ERRORS BUT IT ALSO OFFERS SOME INTERESTING VIEWS. READ AND JUDGE FOR YOURSELVES”! Its a wonder Susan continues this blog with such ungrateful ignorant readers. Susan I want to take the time and personally thank you for all your hard work for giving us this great chessic blog with playable games and great chess articles! The best on the net!
Thanks Susie
P.S. Get over it everybody Fischer was the greatest chess player of all time! he lived slept and ate chess. Thats all he cared about. he was fearless, relentless, creative, inntuitive and genuis!
How do you thank someone impersonally? No doubt Bobbby has more intellectual firepower than tfk, but that’s not saying much.
You can thank who you want, anytime, anyplace, anyway. Your attack on the previous poster is really, really odd.
—
Anonymous said:
and here you can see the rating spike for Topalov at fide. He went straight up from 2730 to 2813. Very unusual and suspicious in my opinion.
—
Mr. Anonymous, get your facts straight please. Kramnik had exactly the same “spike” between Jan 2000 and Jan 2002 (two years), i.e. about +60 ELO points.
http://www.fide.com/ratings/id.phtml?event=4101588
Topalov’s spike is +70 ELO points and it also covers two years (Jul 2004 to Jul 2006).
Hmmm…very suspicious indeed. 😛
“the ottoman empire conducted an unprecedented genocide against the Armenian people, killing 3 million innocent women and children. You must be very proud of that, fellow.”
Armenians stabbed the Ottoman empire at the back. They started revolting at the end of the first world war by the help of Russians and Armenians living in Russia. It’s not genocide, it is consequences of war. The number you give is highly exaggerated by the way. Anyways, bygones are bygones.
A war against women and children is genocide, you dumbass!
“A war against women and children is genocide, you dumbass!”
Show me one war in which women and children are not killed, you Einstein.
This article is full rubbish and inventions. I feel very sad, for the quality of Susan’s blog, to link to such a text.
Example : “I.Q. of “x”, said alone, has no meaning, because, even for deviation i.q. (for adults), there are three different scales (standard deviation 15, 16 or 24).
Please Susan, before linking to an article, have a look at it.
“Brilliant chess players have been known to have high IQs.”
Brilliant chess players have also been known to have low IQs. I had more to say, but lambent already said it better than I could.
To the fan of the ottoman empire above:
Are you the same genius that made the hideously gleeful statement about the suffering of Bulgarian men and women under the savage ottoman oppression? I would presume so. I would also presume that you are a Kramnik’s fan and supporter. As to your nationality – I pity your compatriots. You are disgrace to them.
gnom
I agree.
He is also another that cannot get his facts straight.
This massacre occured early in 1915, not ‘at the end of the war’. The Ottoman Turks had long wanted to do this, but had been constrained by the European Powers. But with them fighting each other in World War One, this gave the Turks their chance. The massacres were so bad that even the Turks’ German allies were embarrassed.
I think the historical event of my home country Bulgaria, being 500 years under turkish violence, should be well studied in order for there to be no doubt about reality! The truth is well documented not only by bulgarians, but also by english and american journalists, who witnessed enough slaughteries to make conclusions of their own.
And of course, the genocide over the armenians during 1915 – 1918. These are events so absolutely sure to have happened such as the fact that the earth is round. Turkey is a shame for this world for denying that 2 + 2 = 4, total unhumanity…
“The Ottoman Turks had long wanted to do this, but had been constrained by the European Powers. But with them fighting each other in World War One, this gave the Turks their chance. The massacres were so bad that even the Turks’ German allies were embarrassed”
Complete bullshit. Ottomans ruled half of Europe by 1700. If they wanted to do this so called “genocide” who would stop them at that time ?
Ottoman lands have been a safe haven for Jews when they were expelled from Portugal, Spain and Italy back in 1490s. There were two options for those jews :
– genocide under Spanish, Portugese and Italian governments
– living a free and prosperous life under Ottomans.
Ask any jew about this. They will tell the truth.
Why did not Ottomans kill jews then ? Simply because they did not revolt against Ottomans.
If you revolt against the country you live and if you loose, you DIE.
Chess is not linked to IQ. Einsten was no GM but an average patzer. On the other hand no top GM in recent history is known to have done something of significance outside the board.
Just bacause computers can play great chess they are geniuses?
For history of Turkish tribesmen attacking Delhi, see http://www.geocities.com/ajayvasani/historyofmedievalindia-turks.htm
Thankfully, they didn’t occupy India.
For “recent” history of US tribesman attacking Baghdad see :
http://voanews.com/english/2007-02-05-voa56.cfm
Thankfully, they didn’t occupy Turkey.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_genocide#The_position_of_the_Republic_of_Turkey
In March 2005, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan invited Turkish, Armenian and international historians to form a Commission to establish the events of 1915. In April 2005 Armenian president Robert Kocharyan responded to Turkish Prime Minister’s offer by sending a letter to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and in the letter telling “suggestion to address the past cannot be effective if it deflects from addressing the present and the future. In order to engage in a useful dialog, we need to create the appropriate and conducive political environment. It is the responsibility of governments to develop bilateral relations and we do not have the right to delegate that responsibility to historians.
Paul Morphy was the BEST chess player EVER…considering those he played against!
That’s all there is to it.
PAUL MORPHY…ALL TIME GREATEST CHESS GENIUS AND CHESS PLAYER.
Errol should have been name Error.
Hehe!
Lots of factual errors there.
But 2805 wasn’t Fisher’s highest ever.
Prior to that,I think he had beaten ~20 Grandmasters in a row not loosing a single game!
That’s record of all Time!
Especially having in mind what the title “GM” meaned then.
Assuming Fisher’s rating ~2750 prior to that series victories,his carrear rating would be ~2840-2850.
forget about all the errors in elo rating whether he was 2785 0r 2850 the facts is bobby fischer is the greatest chess player the world has ever known. there will never be another bobby fischer. he was completly fearless and was always searching for truth. he wasnt just a genious on the board he was a genious period. he could have been the best at whatever he put his mind to. he just happened to choose chess. he speaks his mind whether you agree or disagree with him. we need more people like bobby fischer forever searching for the truth. forever challenging supposed accepted doctrine. he wasnt just satisified with being the best he wanted to understand the true meaning behind the mysterious game of chess. he was searching for perfection. nobody compares to bobby fischer. fischers one of those people that the more you get to know him the more you realize you dont know him. just like chess every stone you turn over there ten more stones that you never realized existed. bobby your the only true champion. your the best!
wolverine
Hi, I was wondering if any of you heard of instrumentation IQ ciphers? The system works were you create a grid in the real world ,could be three dimension,and like chess you would pay attention of the position of an object like a car on an imaginary square with a person who raises their hand giving visual cue, giving you a sound on a radio to look at a bus in another grid square, this type of grid can be used anywhere. The thing is if you can remember positions and use it in the chess game you will win, as long as you don’t go crasy thinking your psychic, that is the big difference from having an IQ of 150 to 179 and 180 and up having guts. I hope you understand. Thanks Bye.
All these people are over 800:
Garry Kasparov
José Capablanca Emanuel Lasker
Mikhail Botvinnik
Alexander Alekhine
Anatoly Karpov
Viswanathan Anand
Vladimir Kramnik
All these people are over 800:
Garry Kasparov
José Capablanca Emanuel Lasker
Mikhail Botvinnik
Alexander Alekhine
Anatoly Karpov
Viswanathan Anand
Vladimir Kramnik
IQs above 140 cannot be reliably measured.
Alfred Binet began the first studies of chess player intellect back in 1893. Since then dozens of studies have shown that:
a) chess is non-intellectual (computers – which have zero intelligence – can easily beat any chess player),
b)there is no real link between intelligence and chess ability
c) that chess Grand Masters do not have any special intellectual capabilities outside chess.