"Christopher Dearlove" <chris@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:K4ZJNXG5QZ4HFw04@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> In message <7tOdnan7yPuKA0PanZ2dnUVZ_h-vnZ2d@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, David Kane
> <davidekane@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> writes
>>Changing the scoring in chess
>>would not significantly increase the cheating possibilities
>
> Factually inaccurate. It's been pointed out that changing the scoring
> system as you suggest increases the advantage of cheating.
>
> Now to throw something concrete into this. Freakonomics (Levitt and
> Dubner) quote numerous examples of cheating (teachers to name one
> less obvious example). But in particular they quote good statistical
> evidence that sumo wrestlers throw matches. This is precisely what
> you are arguing wouldn't happen in chess.
While I didn't look at the original, there are some discussions
I found publicly available.
http://faroutliers.blogspot.com/2005/05/freakonomics-of-sumo.html
which might give me some idea of what you are talking about.
The argument in favor of corruption is not iron-clad, though definitely
plausible. In any case, this has nothing to do with draw avoidance.
There are vast differences between this situation and chess:
1. The discussion appears to concern a simple special case of results when
rewards are
uneven for a single match - not a systematic, long-term cheating scheme.
2. The rewards are far greater in sumo than in chess.
3. Sumo has always been connected with unsavory elements - the closest
thing in chess would have been Soviet government involvement,
i.e. ancient history.
Just about every s****t, game, contest, etc. will produce isolated
situations with unequal stakes. That those can be manipulated,
and probably have been manipulated to some degree, to my
way of thinking is scarcely relevant to the contention that
converting chess to a rational scoring system will produce a
wave of cheating.
A while ago, Anand with White clinched first place at Linares
by playing a quick draw with a lower rated opponent who was out of
the running. That was run of the mill chess. Everybody likes
Anand, and he was doing what everybody does. The lower rated
player gained a few points, and exceeded his expectation. Anand
clinched an im****tant tournament victory. It was a sensible deal.
But I hope I'm not alone in thinking that it would have been
more interesting to see a *real* chess game, whatever
scoring/anti-cheating measures are needed to produce it.
Counting draws as half wins produces *pseudo* chess.
Given we already have
> evidence (agreed draws) that chess players aren't moral paragons
> (and I think Bobby Fischer blew that one too) there's a near certainty
> they'd be doing something similar. (Maybe the coin toss, or they
> could auction the game throw between them in advance, with an
> agreed signal when it's invoked by mutual agreement. That solves
> most of the problems you raise, even though a simple coin toss is
> mostly good enough.)
>
> And to return to Fischer. When he was on top, most of his
> opponents were Soviet grandmasters. It's well recorded that the
> USSR authorities would instruct players what to do. With a net
> gain from throwing games, they would have been laughing all the
> way.
>
> And finally, what's the problem with draws? Apart from that draws
> can be instructive and interesting, let's just suppose they aren't,
> and that 80% of games are draws (I think it's slightly less than
> that). So only 20% of games are interesting. Who has time to
> watch even that 20%? The only people who'd have to watch draws
> are people watching a single game, live. And we can pretty much
> assume those people are chess enthusiasts, and they clearly
> don't mind draws.
>
> --
> Christopher Dearlove
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