Thursday, December 17, 2009

Other News





We now interrupt your regularly scheduled post about stuff I am interested in and nobody else is to bring you news of other stuff I am interested in that (probably) nobody else is:

Magnus Carlsen will be the number 1 rated chess player in the world when FIDE publishes their next Elo ratings list. Full report here.

A few questions you might ask:

Q: Why is this significant?
A: Magnus is only 19, by far the youngest to be ranked #1. He is also not Russian, another oddity in the world of chess. He's from Norway.

Q: If he is the number 1 player, why are Veselin Topalov (Boo! Hiss!) and Vishy Anand (Yay! Go Vishy!) playing for the World Championship next year?
A: Because Topalov earned the right to play for the world championship last year prior to Magnus becoming the best player. In chess, the only way to become "world champion" is to defeat the current world champion.

Q: I thought Garry Kasparov was the world champ.
A: You probably also think that Jack Nicklaus is the world's best golfer. Anand beat Vladimir Kramnik in 2007, Kramnik beat Kasparov in 2000. FYI, Kasparov beat Karpov in 1985, Karpov won by default in 1975 when Bobby Fischer went nuts, and Fisher beat Boris Spassky in 1972.

Q: Wait a minute, how do we know Magnus is the best player?
A: Chess uses an Elo rating system to rank the relative strength of players. I am interested in this because the underlying statistical model is very similar to the models that I use to model peoples' preferences in my academic work. Basically, the model uses your performance against other players to calculate how good you are. If you beat another player rated higher (lower) than you, your rating goes up (down) a lot. Beating an inferior opponent won't raise your rating much, if any. The nice thing about the model is that it is completely objective and updated monthly. Magnus' Elo will be 2810. You need to be about 2500 to be a grandmaster. My rating is about 1680. A complete novice is 1200.

Q: Is there anything else you'd like to tell us?
A: Yes. Aside from the Elo ratings, the chess world is completely dysfunctional. Because the only way to become world champion is to beat the world champion, the only way to lose the world championship is to get beaten. Thus, champions have the incentive to avoid playing except under favorable circumstances. There are no universally recognized organizing authorities, so players tend to break away and form new organizations continually. Sometimes years go by without world championship matches.

Imagine if the only way for the Lakers to lose their crown as world champions was to have a team beat them in a 7 game series. Then imagine that the Lakers did not recognize the NBA's authority to organize a playoff to determine a team to play them. Further imagine that the Lakers decide that they will only play on their home court, etc. etc. You get the idea.

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