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Online Chess
The Net's
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The Mall
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(C)heatingSome people feel no shame about “(c)heating;” that is,
using a computer program to cheat when playing online. They often
rationalize it by claiming that everyone else is doing it anyway, and that
it helped them avoid tactical blunders which allowed them to play a
strategically sophisticated game which is what chess is all about anyway,
etc., etc., etc. Here are my (rather strong) opinions on this subject. "Consider the example of a highly intelligent seven-year-old child whom I wish to teach to play chess, although the child has no particular desire to learn the game. The child does however have a very strong desire for candy and little chance of obtaining it. I therefore tell the child that if the child will play chess with me once a week I will give the child 50 cents worth of candy; moreover I tell the child that I will always play in such a way that it will be difficult, but not impossible, for the child to win and that, if the child wins, the child will receive an extra 50 cents worth of candy. Thus motivated, the child plays and plays to win. Notice however that, so long as it is the candy alone which provides the child with a good reason for playing chess, the child has no reason not to cheat and every reason to cheat, provided he or she can do so successfully. But, so we may hope, there will come a time when the child will find in those goods specific to chess, in the achievement of a certain highly particular kind of analytical skill, strategic imagination and competitive intensity, a new set of reasons, reasons now not just for winning on a particular occasion, but for trying to excel in whatever way the game of chess demands. Now if the child cheats, he or she will be defeating not me, but himself or herself." I think this passage reveals a lot about the mind-set of someone who cheats at online or correspondence chess in order to achieve a certain rating or title. The rating or title has become like the candy to the child: it is some external object which the player believes has independent value; and if that were true, it would be rational in some sense for the player to cheat in order to achieve that object. But this sort of thinking is simply confused. Ratings and titles have no independent value. They are only useful insofar as they are a reflection of our chess playing abilities. They should be used as a way of evaluating one’s level of chess skill, and tracking one’s progress (or lack thereof . . .) over time. So it is not really the rating or title itself that we are aiming at; but rather the improvement of our chess abilities, of which the rating or title is a mere measurement. So if you cheat in order to secure a higher rating, then you’ll get that higher rating, but you won’t really be playing chess, and you won’t improve, and you won’t achieve what it is that the rating is supposed to reflect. And so in a very real way, you are only cheating yourself, as cliché as that sounds. [Interested in discussing this issue? Come to Chessville's Discussion Forum!] Copyright 2002 S. Evan Kreider. Used with permission.
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The Chessville
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