Bobby Fischer is widely considered the best player in history. He was just that much better than his competition. But if he were to play against Magnus, he would surely lose. Computers have not only evolved our knowledge of the game, but drastically change the way it is played at all levels. Bobby claims computers have ruined chess, but in my opinion it has only advanced our technical knowledge, but does not destroy the integrity of the game. Chess has always been technical and requiring thinking many turns ahead. I figure we have chess players here and I am curious what your thoughts might be

My opinion is that more than anything else, computers contributed to the popularity of chess. It's just so much more fun to look at the evaluation bar swinging up and down for the normal pleb like myself.
My opinion is also that Fischer was an idiot and you shouldn't take him too seriously. Decent chess player though

Kasparov was one of the greatest players, same for Carlsen now. Fischer did not win as much world titles as Kasparov. Just like football, it's difficult to compare different era's like the times of Pelé, Maradona, Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo and Mbappé. In chess there is more opportunity to have a match between older players and younger players, although the older players need to prepare their absolute best play. But it would be awesome if older and younger top players would play against eachother.

This is a strange comment to me, there’s no shortage of chess players historically and currently who have remained active for multiple decades.

Averbakh and Korchnoi come immediately to mind; and Anand and Kramnik are contemporary examples. The latter two are *easily* at a Maradona/Mbappe level so I’m not really sure what you’re looking for here.

I don’t know how different chess is with computers. Obviously opening theory is different (some lines that were “bad” are now okay and some lines that were “okay” are now bad) but opening theory has always been trendy with or without engines. That said, tablebase endings don’t change OTB chess for 99.9% of players (hell, there’s GMs who still don’t understand a ‘simple’ QvR ending) and Alpha Zero-esque outside pawn pushes remain a dice roll for 99.9% of players OTB.

I think the main evolutions are faster post-mortems (thank you engines!) and, as mentioned, the live eval bars for spectators who are interested in this. I might be in the minority here but I’m not interested in watching live games whatsoever and prefer to play through at my own pace, without an engine.

Just like football, it's difficult to compare different era's like the times of Pelé, Maradona, Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo and Mbappé.

In some sense, the comparison is between chess players over the ages is very easy. All you have to do is ask an engine for it's opinion ;)

Edited 5/22/2023 00:51:44

all LICHESS players shall be ashamed of themselves

Lichess is one of the best chess sites. Many good chess puzzles and variants too at the site.

Ding Liren <3

Chess is definitely way more popular, and even a career choice for a small # of people

Fischer had a lot of mental illness that progressed worse as he got older, definitely a broken man even when he was very young

Good to know others dont see computers ruining chess :)

I've always thought that the closer your brain is to a computer the better you are at chess

Ding Chilling!