Should Presidents Be able To Spot Three Move Forced Checkmates?

[Splendour]

Could Bill Clinton make this chess moved David Sklansky is talking about?..Though, I never started out a big Clinton fan I was simply amazed at the amount of mental toughness/resilence he displayed when the media pelted him for over a year on the Lewinsky scandal even after he was caught lying...Now that is tough!!

[David Sklansky]

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I think presidents should be idea men. Men with vision. Men with people skills and the ability to be a diplomat and to coordinate and bring things, people, and ideas together (notice that it would be almost impossible, or very rare indeed, for a genuis mathematician to be any kind of a successful diplomat). They should have the ability to lead and inspire patriotism and trust. (I should include women too now).

The genuis of the details, what's practical, what's not, can be worked out by others. What I object to is your insinuation that intelligence is always better. It can never hurt, I agree. It can never hurt to be good looking either. But it's not always necessary. Even a mediocre smart person knows how to surround himself with those who clearly ARE intelligent enough to bring about those things he wants to get done.

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You keep bringing up geniuses. People who find partial differential equations relatively easy. I'm talking about people who find ninth grade algebra difficult. Your repeated attempts to discredit my point with your point is exactly the type of bad thinking that you don't want a president doing. There are lots of idea men who know how to coordinate things and have people skills who can also do elemetary algebra or easy logic problems in their head. There is precious little chance that someone without those abilities, is so much better at other things, than the best of those who do have those abilities, to make him the preferred choice to carry out the myriad duties of the president.

[pokervintage]

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Is there a website or something that employs a similar test? I have never really played chess and I want to determine how difficult this is.

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Keep in mind, if you find such a test, that Sklansky is referring to 3 move endings that in fact have a solution. So if the ending has a solution then the solution is methodized and consequently only requires memorizing and implementing the method to find the solution. It does not require any reasoning ability at all.

pokervintage

[Utah]

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I treat you with kid gloves.

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No need. My post generally sucked. However, I agree mostly with your idea that I think was better articulated in a later post by you:

"There are lots of idea men who know how to coordinate things and have people skills who can also do elementary algebra or easy logic problems in their head. There is precious little chance that someone without those abilities, is so much better at other things, than the best of those who do have those abilities, to make him the preferred choice to carry out the myriad duties of the president."

That is more or less correct. I would maybe only argue with degree.

[Lestat]

<font color="blue"> Your repeated attempts to discredit my point with your point is exactly the type of bad thinking that you don't want a president doing. </font>

Does this mean I wouldn't get your vote?

Let me ask you this... Would you rather see a candidate who had difficulty solving for mate in 3? Or a candidate who easily finds mate, but is too stubborn/irrational to accept evolution as a scientific theory?

I just meant to point out that there are different types of aptitudes when it comes to logic and numbers. I'm sure you understand this better than I.

[chezlaw]

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<font color="blue"> Your repeated attempts to discredit my point with your point is exactly the type of bad thinking that you don't want a president doing. </font>

Does this mean I wouldn't get your vote?

Let me ask you this... Would you rather see a candidate who had difficulty solving for mate in 3? Or a candidate who easily finds mate, but is too stubborn/irrational to accept evolution as a scientific theory?

I just meant to point out that there are different types of aptitudes when it comes to logic and numbers. I'm sure you understand this better than I.

[/ QUOTE ]
Its whether its necesary not whether its sufficient. Obviously no-one who wont accept evolution should be allowed near any power but given the group of people who are otherwise acceptable should we eliminate those who cannot solve the chess problems.

I'm not sure but I certainly would never vote for anyone who agreed it was required and that all candidates should take the test.

chez

[yukoncpa]

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You and Lestat keep getting my point confused. I don't claim that mega intelligence would significantly increase someone's competance to be president. It is in fact probably correlated with less competance. But so is being unable to do only moderately difficult thinking problems. Maybe the most difficult three move problems are harder than I thought, but that is off the subject. The point is that the ability to look ahead and visualize the possible consequences of various actions is an important attrribute for a president to have. He can't just turn to an expert for something so basic.


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I don’t know any fancy rules of chess. I probably have 200 hours of chess in as a kid. Recently I asked a friend of mine, who is an international master, what book I should get, explaining that something like chess for dummy’s is what I was thinking of. Instead he bought me, “200 Perplexing Chess Puzzles”, by Martin Greif and told me this was the best book for me. Most of these puzzles are forced mate in 4 or 5 moves with some of them mate in 3 and some, mate in 6. So far I’ve been able to work out about half of these problems in less than an hour. Admittedly, some of these problems were so tough, I skipped over them.

My point is if I can do this any one can, and I would never vote for President anyone who couldn’t do what I just did. I would personally feel he was too idiotic even to hire competent advisors.

[Lestat]

Uh, here in the states, we have 3 republican nominees who openly admit to not accepting evolution. Our current president thinks God gives him advice.

My point is, I don't care how quickly any of these guys can solve for mate. I'd rather have someone in office who couldn't pass a high school algebra test (but who knows how to delegate), than any of them.

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
Uh, here in the states, we have 3 republican nominees who openly admit to not accepting evolution. Our current president thinks God gives him advice.

My point is, I don't care how quickly any of these guys can solve for mate. I'd rather have someone in office who couldn't pass a high school algebra test (but who knows how to delegate), than any of them.

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I said 'should be allowed' not 'are allowed' [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

chez

[RJT]

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Could Bill Clinton make this chess moved David Sklansky is talking about?..Though, I never started out a big Clinton fan I was simply amazed at the amount of mental toughness/resilence he displayed when the media pelted him for over a year on the Lewinsky scandal even after he was caught lying...Now that is tough!!

[/ QUOTE ]

Read his autobiography if you want to really get a handle on how smart he is. The guy’s got game.