PALAY - Grain of Life

Rice (genus Oryza) is a plant in the family of herbs which is a major source of food for more than half the population of people in the world. It is the third largest grain crop, after corn and wheat .

In the past months rice is very expensive here in the Philippines. Government was under fire for its failure to regulate the supply and price of rice. If news is to be believed, government agencies in charge claimed that there is more than enough supply of rice in our warehouses. The country even exported tons of rice overseas!

But why is Rice or Palay Price continue to be high notwithstanding the claim of the government that it is otherwise?

I made my own research and what is more patriotic way but to engage in palay/rice trading myself to determine once and for all which is which.

I am a banker not a farmer so imagine how difficult it is for me to engage in the business.

In my interview with the farmers, a capitalization of $600 or P30,000 is needed for every hectare of land for farming inclusive of the seeds and the fertilizers. Normally, the farmers for some reasons do not have that amount of capital. What will they do is they will borrow fertilizers from the store or borrow capital from a financer normally at 3% per month for a palay period of 120 days at most. The Palay will then be sold to the financer at a much lower price than the market. Income from palay farming is good but it is seasonal. Depending on the demand for palay, the income can really be good if not better.

There are two seasons worth remembering in planting palay:
a. ending normally in September
b. ending normally in March

Understandably, these seasons will mark the beginning of buying palay.

PLANTING SEASON:

1. Land preparation
2. Application of organic fertilizer
3. Application of Molouscide (pangkahol)
4. Application of Herbicide (pangdamo)
5. Application of Insecticide
6. Application of Fertilizer
7. Application of Insecticide
8. Application of Fungicide
9. Application of Fertilizer

These cycle must carefully and heartfully be applied so palay will be ready for human consumption. Cycle normally lasts to 98 days to 120 days at most.

BUYING SEASON:

As in regular business the we have to know the expenses to be incurred to know if we are really earning.

Cost
1. Milling - P85 per sack
2. Sack - 11 per sack
3. Measurement of Darak - .10 per kilo
4. Drying (Diesel) - 65 per sack (P40 per sack if ordinary Dryer)
5. Arrangement - 2 per sack
Total P163.10
=====

SELLING TIME:

It is now time for selling but first we should determine the "Recovery" meaning how many kg of palay is needed to fill up a 50kg of rice or 1 cavan of rice.

The formula will be:

let x be the recovery.
x = no. of kg of palay bought/no. of cavans of palay milled
x = 2042/18 cavans and 44 kilos
x = 2042/18.88
x = 108.15 kg needed to complete a cavan of rice
====

To determine the Selling Price (SP ) of a cavan the formula will be:
SP = (Recovery x Cost of Palay bought per Kg) + Total Costs - Other Income (By-products)
= (108.15 x 19.50) + 163.10
= 2,108.93 + 163.10
SP = P 2,272.03
=======
This means that the SP should not be lower than P2,300 per cavan (with consideration of course on the amount earned from by-products).

This also means that the cost of palay bought which was P19.50 was very expensive unless there is a predetermined computation that the seller was willing to shoulder due to previous commitments.

Further, the buyer of palay grains should monitor the prices of the Ricemill which ideally should be less than P1.00.

The question of why the prices of rice is high is still due to the rule of "Supply and Demand". Wether the supply is controlled by some sectors to appear that there is artificial shortage is another question (Which I would like to believe). This is aside from the fact that this is the time of the year where harvesting is affected by continous rains brought about by typhoons.

Chess Killer Tip

http://youtu.be/qgTiCf2X5NQ

‘A GM is a GM’? – FIDE title devaluation

26.6.2013 - Although much has been made of the rising Elos, little has been said of the FIDE titles that rely on them, and their increasing devaluation. It is not just the grandmaster title, but all titles that are losing their value, and even those dropping standards are being tossed aside as FIDE hands out titles to players who are underrated by hundreds of Elo. Here is a look at this worrisome trend.

 

‘A GM is a GM?’ – FIDE title devaluation

By Albert Silver

While voicing serious concerns with a grandmaster about the inflation of international chess titles and their dwindling value, the grandmaster agreed there was reason to worry, but then added “still, a GM is a GM to be fair.” Is it? Many players view the issue as a relatively recent phenomenon, as if it were just a minor issue of Elo adjustment over the last decade, but the issue goes much deeper and further. Since its adoption and creation by FIDE in 1950, the title has not only changed in its requirements, but its very definition.

History of the grandmaster title

When FIDE first awarded the grandmaster title in 1950, it was bestowed upon 27 players of the day, which included world champion Mikhail Botvinnik and all those who had qualified or been seeded in the inaugural Candidates Tournament: Isaac Boleslavsky, Igor Bondarevsky, David Bronstein, Max Euwe, Reuben Fine, Salo Flohr, Paul Keres, Alexander Kotov, Andor Lilienthal, Miguel Najdorf, Samuel Reshevsky, Vasily Smyslov, Gideon Ståhlberg, and László Szabó.

It was also given to players still living who, though past their prime in 1950, were recognized as having been world class at their peak: Ossip Bernstein, Oldrich Duras, Ernst Grünfeld, Borislav Kostic, Grigory Levenfish, Géza Maróczy, Jacques Mieses, Viacheslav Ragozin, Akiba Rubinstein, Friedrich Sämisch, Savielly Tartakower, and Milan Vidmar.

Jacques Mieses playing Akiba Rubinstein in 1909. 41 years later FIDE could not
fail to recognize their stature.

The standard used for the title was clear: a grandmaster was someone who was recognized as a world-class player at some point in their career. As the process advanced, clear criteria needed to be established for future title contenders.

Under the 1957 regulations, the title of International Grandmaster was automatically awarded to the world champion and to any player qualifying from the Interzonal tournament to play in the Candidates Tournament. It is worth noting that it was under these conditions that Bobby Fischer became the world’s youngest grandmaster at age 15, when he qualified for the Candidates tournament. Looking at it in today’s eyes, one might conclude these draconian conditions were ridiculously tough, but when FIDE convened in 1965 with the purpose of revising the rules, the prevailing opinion was that the 1957 rules were… too easy!

When Bobby Fischer was awarded the grandmaster title at age 15, it was because
he had qualified as a world championship contender.

At the FIDE Congress in 1961, GM Milan Vidmar said that the regulations "made it possible to award international titles to players without sufficient merit", and when FIDE convened in 1965 to revise them, GM Miguel Najdorf echoed Vidmar’s concerns, and stated that the existing regulations were leading to an inflation of international titles. As a result, the rules were tightened up, and now the grandmaster candidate had to score 40% in the Candidates Tournament, or reach the quarter finals of the Candidates Matches. This is what was expected of a player holding the grandmaster title.

Although this undoubtedly kept the prestige of the grandmaster title immaculate, it was probably a little overprotective. The consequence of the new regulations was that in 1966 only one title was conferred and the same was true again in 1968.

In 1970, the modern system for awarding titles was presented at the FIDE Assembly at the Siegen Chess Olympiad with proposals by Dr. Wilfried Dorazil, then FIDE Vice-President, and fellow Committee members Svetozar Gligoric and Professor Arpad Elo. These changes were based on the widespread adoption of the Elo system by FIDE and its role in awarding the grandmaster title. At the time, a rating performance equivalent to 2551 was enough for a norm, and the rating required was 2450. Just as today, the player needed three norms, but at the time the three norms had to be scored within a three year period. Eventually the rating requirement was raised to 2500 as the ratings rose and the preservation of the title’s value became a concern.

Lowering the standards

To put this into perspective, in 1973, 40 years ago, a Grandmaster norm performance was the equivalent of a player ranked in the top 20-40 players in the world. This was still true ten years later in 1983, and it is worth noting that the 2450 rating required to become a grandmaster was still quite close to the world top 100, where the 91st to 100th players were rated 2485, and included Boris Gulko, Joel Benjamin, and others.

In 1987, Boris Gulko was barely 25 Elo above the minimum to be
recognized as a grandmaster, yet that ranked him 80th in the world.

By 1993, 20 years ago, things had changed significantly after several inflationary rules did their damage, such as a rule in which a tournament winner could not lose Elo, and the GM norm was now the equivalent of a player ranked in the top 60. Today, in 2013, a GM performance equates to a player ranked in the top 250, and the minimum rating to earn the title, which 30 years ago would have almost had you in the top 100 players, would now rank you around 930 in the world.

A GM is a GM? The title may be the same, but the definition and expectation of the title have clearly changed. Assuredly there are more strong players than ever before, but the grandmaster title was not an exam one passed with a diploma at the end, it was a stamp of prestige that implied world-class ability. Still, the trend of the devaluation of titles does not stop there.

The trickle-down effect

A few special cases were also introduced over time, such as winning the World Junior Under-20 Championship. At first, this prestigious championship, won by players such as Kasparov, Karpov, Spassky, and even top players of today such as Anand, Aronian, and Mamedyarov, earned the player the International Master title. As time passed this was upgraded to earn the winner a grandmaster norm, until finally in 2004 it was deemed worth the title outright. From a purely Elo perspective this would seem to make sense. After all, by 2004 there were no sub-2600 winners, so the promise of the title was never actually put into practice. Unfortunately this has also led to an alarming trickle-down effect to other titles. 

Garry Kasparov, winner of the World Junior Championship in Dortmund in 1980.
Second was Nigel Short (right) and third Chilean IM Ivan Eduardo Morovic (left).

Until now, the discussion has been the nonstop devaluation of what it means to be a grandmaster and the devaluation of the title itself, but this affects all other titles as a result. The reason is that all titles are actually proportionate to the grandmaster title. The requirements to become an International Master (IM) are the same as those of a Grandmaster except the rating required is 100 below. This is how it was even in 1970.

In 1978 the FIDE Master (FM) title was introduced and today the requirement is that a player be rated 2300 FIDE, which is 100 below that of the IM, or 200 Elo below that of the Grandmaster. There is also a Candidate Master (CM) title for players who reach 2200. No norms are required for these last two titles, and they are strictly dependent on one’s rating. Although there has never been any question about these titles suggesting world class ability, the problem comes with the alternate ways one can achieve these lifetime titles.

Gata Kamsky is the highest ranked player ever to not be a grandmaster,
when at age 16, and still untitled, he was 8th in the world with 2650 Elo.

One example is that one can become a FIDE Master for life by winning an event such as the Pan-American under eight championship. One might think this means that these chess-playing seven-year-olds are in fact playing at 2300 strength, but the fact is you will not find a single one of these players rated even 2000 FIDE much less 2300. So why are they receiving titles that suggest a 2300 playing strength? Good question.

As of July 1st, FIDE will expand on this title generosity, by providing a free-for-all for the Candidate Master title, which is a lifetime title conferred to players who are rated 2200 FIDE. The idea of a title to allow players, unable to achieve grandmaster status, to show they reached a dignified level of skill is commendable, but what is one to think of FIDE regulations that then guarantee the title to a six-year-old player for coming third in the Continental School under-seven championship despite being rated hundredsof Elo below the requirements? What value does the title have then?

It is obvious that the strict definition of a grandmaster as a world-class player no longer holds true, but there is a vast difference between a world-class player and one ranked no.930 in the world. It would be a tragedy for FIDE to let its most prestigious title, and aspired goal, dwindle down to mediocrity.

Solution

So what is the solution? If FIDE acknowledges the problem and wishes to revert this worrisome direction, then strong measures need to be taken. When the Elo system was implemented by FIDE in 1970, no provisions were made for possible ratings inflation and subsequently the titles, as a result, only one 50 Elo adjustment has been made in the last 40 years. Since then the rating of the 100th player has risen approximately 150 Elo.

To those who would argue that it is due to an increase in stronger players, realize that the difference between the 10th and 100th player has not changed in over 40 years. For example, in 1983, the world no.10 was 115 Elo stronger than the world no.100, and today in June 2013 the difference is 109 Elo.  

In theory this would seem to indicate a need to recalibrate the title requirements, rating and norms, by 150 Elo, but a compromise would be a 100 Elo raise so that new grandmasters entering the list would still be in the top 240 players, instead of the 930th as is the case now. To prevent the problem from getting out of hand again, FIDE would implement a practice of regularly re-examining the requirements every five years and recalibrating them, if necessary, according to the lowest rating of the top 200-250 players.

As to the distribution of Elo-based titles such as FIDE Master and Candidate Master to players who have not proven their worthiness in any way or form, cease the practice immediately, as this not only besmirches the value of the title, but is an insult to players who earn them through dedication and skill. Otherwise, why stop there? Just declare them all grandmasters.

Sex for Flight Scheme - 1987

               I was a Yakuza victim!

               This was revealed by a Pinay who went to Japan to be a waitress but ended up an unpaid prostitute           
                She went there because she wanted to earn some money to be able to sell meat in the market. However, she found herself turned into a piece of meat sold into japanese market for sex with  these japanese customers. Every night she other women were brought  to a hotel and sold to at least two Japanese.  The most courageous among them hatched for an escape plan and thru the help of a symphatetic Japanese who happened to be a girlfriend of one of the Pinay's there, they manage to escape to Tokyo. They sought refuge in the Philippine Embassy, however, some embassy officials before helping these women forced them to have sex with them in return for their passports and visas back to the Philippines.

                  Last year our government was very proud, very fortunate indeed! Imagine the Philippines has just generated $xxx from its local export , however, the Filipina has lost her face, her dignity, her womanhood.  She has become  a some kind of commodity - an export product. She has become a some kind of a meat - a very very cheap meat!

Issac Asimov and Chess

Issac Asimov and Chess

Isaac Asimov was born on January 2, 1920. In his lifetime, he wrote 470 books and is one of the greatest science fiction writers. Some of his science fiction stories mentioned chess.

One of his first science fiction stories, Nightfall, written in 1941, contains a reference to chess. A multi-chess board was set up and a six-member game was started. “The men about the table had brought out a multi-chess board and started a six member game. Moves were made rapidly and in silence. All eyes bent in furious concentration on the board.” In 1968, the Science Fiction Writers of America voted Nightfall the best science fiction short story ever written. When the book was expanded into a novel, multi-chess had been changed to stochastic chess.

His first published novel, Pebble in the Sky, published in 1950, propelled a man thousands of years into the future. The only thing that did not change, after thousands of years, was the game of chess. The novel also mentioned variants of chess such as 3-D chess, and chess played with dice.

“Chess, somehow, hadn’t changed, except for the names of the pieces. It was as he remembered it, and therefore it was always a comfort to him. At least, in this one respect, his poor memory did not play him false. Grew told him of variations of chess. There was fourhanded chess, in which each player had a board, touching each other at the corners, with a fifth board filling the hollow in the center as a common No Man’s Land. There were three-dimensional chess games in which eight transparent boards were placed one over the other and in which each piece moved in three dimensions as they formerly moved in two, and in which the number of pieces and pawns were doubled, the win coming only when a simultaneous check of both enemy kings occurred. There were even the popular varieties, in which the original position of the chessmen were decided by throws of the dice, or where certain squares conferred advantages or disadvantages to the pieces upon them, or where new pieces with strange properties were introduced. But chess itself, the original and unchangeable, was the same–and the tournament between Schwartz and Grew had completed its first fifty games. They used a “night-board,” one that glowed in the darkness in a checkered blue-and-orange glimmer. The pieces, ordinary lumpish figures of a reddish clay in the sunlight, were metamorphosed at night. Half were bathed in a creamy whiteness that lent them the look of cold and shining porcelain, and the others sparked in tiny glitters of red.”

Asimov mentioned chess in his 1950 short story, Legal Rites. “Every night we sat up together. When we didn’t play pinochle or chess or cribbage, we just sat and talked over the news of the day. I still have the book we used to keep records of the chess and pinochle games. Zeb made the entries himself, in his own handwriting.”

In 1953, in Asimov’s short story, Monkey’s Finger, he wrote, ““Yes. Yes.” Torgesson paced faster. “Then you must know that chess-playing computers have been constructed on cybernetic principles. The rules of chess moves and the object of the game are built into its circuits. Given any position on the chess board, the machine can then compute all possible moves together with their consequence and choose that one which offers the highest probability of winning the game. It can even be made to take the temperament of its opponent into account. Torgesson said, “Now imagine a similar situation in which a computing machine can be given a fragment of a literary work to which the computer can then add words from its stock of the entire vocabulary such that the greatest literary values are served. Naturally, the machine would have to be taught the significance of the various keys of a typewriter. Of course, such a computer would have to be much, much more complex than any chess player.”

In his 1953 book, Second Foundation, he wrote, “But she had died. Less than five years, all told, it had been; and after that he knew that he could live only by fighting that vague and fearful enemy that deprived him of the dignity of manhood by controlling his destiny; that made life a miserable struggle against a foreordained end; that made all the universe a hateful and deadly chess game. But there was no way of making the people suddenly disbelieve what they had believed all their lives, so that the myth eventually served a very useful purpose in Seldon’s cosmic chess game.”

In his 1955 short story, Franchise, he wrote, “We can’t let you read a newspaper, but if you’d care for a murder mystery, or if you’d like to play chess, or if there’s anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you’d mention it. Reason alone wouldn’t do. What was needed was a rare type of intuition; the same faculty of mind (only much more intensified) that made a grand master at chess. A mind was needed of the sort that could see through the quadrillions of chess patterns to find the one best move, and do it in a matter of minutes.”

In his 1956 short story, The Dead Past, he wrote, “Your scientists can’t write. Why should they be expected to? They aren’t expected to be grand masters at chess or virtuosos at the violin, so why expect them to know how to put words together? Why not leave that for specialists, too?”

In his 1968 short story, Exile to Hell, he wrote, “He considered the chessboard carefully and his hand hesitated briefly over the bishop. Parkinson, at the other side of the chess board, watched the pattern of the pieces absently. Chess was, of course, the professional game of computer programmers, but, under the circumstances, he lacked enthusiasm. By rights, he felt with some annoyance, Dowling should have been even worse off; he was programming the prosecution’s case. He tapped his finger on the chessboard for emphasis, and Dowling caught the queen before it went over. “Adjusting, not moving,” he mumbled. Dowling’s eyes went from piece to piece and he continued to hesitate.”

In his 1970 short story, Waterclap, he wrote, “No mystery,” said Bergen genially. “At any given time, some fifteen of our men are asleep and perhaps fifteen more are watching films or playing chess or, if their wives are with them-”

From 1971 to 1974, Asimov wrote Tales of the Black Widowers. It had several chess references. He wrote, “He was a master at Chinese checkers, Parcheesi, backgammon, Monopoly,checkers, chess, go, three-dimensional ticktacktoe.” Do you have a chess set, Mr. Atwood?”

“Certainly!”

“Yours? Or was it a present from Mr. Sanders?”

“Oh, no, mine. A rather beautiful set that belonged to my father. Sanders and I played many a game on it.”

In 1972, in his short story, Take a Match, he wrote, “He said there was a low hum that you could hear in one of the men’s rooms that you couldn’t hear anymore. And he said there was a place in the closet of the game room where the chess sets were kept where the wall felt warm because of the fusion tube and that place was not warm now.”

In his 1976 short story, The Winnowing, he wrote, “Peter Affarre, chairman of the World Food Organization, came frequently to Rodman’s laboratories for chess and conversation.”

In 1978, Asimov wrote a story for the September 4, 1978 issue of New York Magazine, entitled, “Gosh, Kreskin, That’s Amazing!” He wrote, “The amazing Kreskin, who bills himself as the “world’s foremost mentalist,” played chess with Cleveland Amory and Jacques d’Ambroise at the Raga restaurant last Tuesday. Kreskin was blindfolded, and he announced he would call out his opponent’s moves after thay made them, presumably by reading their minds. He called out the first two moves of each opponent, then caled a halt to that part of the demonstration. Both Amory and d’Abroise made the common Pawn-to-King’s-Four opening move, and Kreskin guessed the move – after much patter and visible suffering. Kreskin moved his Queen’s Pawn up to Amory’s piece, and Amory promptly too it with his King’s Pawn. In being taken from the board, the two chess pieces made a pronounced click – a dead giveaway. Kreskin guessed the move again with suffering and delay.

For the second part of the demonstration, Kreskin had Cleveland Amory place a Knight on another chessboard with the 64 squares numbered sequentially. Although blindfolded and with his back to the chessboard, Kreskin guessed that the Knight was on No. 35. I don’t know how he did it, but I presume any good mentalist can do it. He then called off the number of 63 other squares in order, squares to which the Knight could move by legitimate Knight’s moves.

The various “Knight’s tours,” which is what these are called, are well known to chess players, and I suspect it is quite possible to memorize a Knight’s tour and then, having established the starting number, rattle off the other 63 numbers in the correct order.

Kreskin suffered through every number, though, asking for quiet, then pattering and squirming endlessly. He got the numbers right, of course.

He expressed surprise at one point that one position was followed by another square bearing a number higher than the previous one. There are 42 different positions on the squares that allow a move to another position ten higher in number by a Knight’s move, so his surprise was itself surprising.

Kreskin is offering to meet Bobby Fischer, together with the winner of the Korchnoi-Karpov match, and play them both simultaneously, himself blindfolded. If that should happen and Kreskin proceeds with constant chatter as last Tuesday, I wonder which of his two opponents will kill him first. Probably Fischer.”

In 1979, Asimov wrote Isaac Asimov’s Book of Facts. On page 68, he says, “The number of possible ways of playing just the first four moves on each side in a game of chess is 318,979,564,000.” This may be wrong. The number of possible ways for White to play the first move is 20 (16 pawn moves and 4 knight moves). For the first move with Black, the number is 400. For the 2nd move for white, the number of possible moves is 8,902 (5,362 distinct). For the 2nd move for Black, the number of possible moves is 197,281 (71,852 distinct). For the 3rd move for White, the number of possible moves is 4,865,617. For the 3rd move for Black, the number of possible moves is 119,060,679. For the 4th move for White, the number of possible moves is 3,195,913,043. For the 4th move for Black, the number of possible moves is 84,999,425,906. This is smaller than what Asimov says.

In 1981, Asimov wrote a science fiction short story called The Perfect Fit. He referred to a 3-dimensional chess game which was a game with 8 chessboards stacked upon each other, making the playing area cubic rather than square.

In 1984, in his book Bouquets of the Black Widowers, he wrote, “’Please! It will do you good to listen. You may be a distraction. If you play chess, you will know what I mean when I say you may be a sacrifice. You are sent in to confuse and distract us, occupying our time and efforts, while the real work is done elsewhere.”

In 1986, in his short story Robot Dreams, he wrote, “Paulson said, “We can’t let you read a newspaper, but if you’d care for a murder mystery, or if you’d like to play chess, or if there’s anything we can do for you to help pass the time, I wish you’d mention it.” “Reason alone wouldn’t do. What was needed was a rare type of intuition; the same faculty of mind (only

much more intensified) that made a grand master at chess. A mind was needed of the sort that could see through the quadrillions of chess patterns to find the one best move, and do it in a matter of minutes.”

In 1987, in his book Fantastic Voyage II – Destination Brain, he wrote, “In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.” There were other references to chess in the novel. He wrote, “What’s more, Aleksandr was a dreadful chess player, much to his father’s disappointment, but he showed signs of promise on the violin.” “A pawn is the most important piece on the chessboard — to a pawn.”

In 1988, in his short story The Smile of the Chipper, he wrote, “Of course, we couldn’t hire them both. Getting two chippers to work together is impossible. They’re like chess grandmasters, I suppose. Put them in the same room and they would automatically challenge each other. They would compete continually, each trying to influence and confute the other. They wouldn’t stop couldn’t actually — and they would burn each other out in six months.”

In 1990, he wrote an essay for the Los Angeles Times, entitled “Checkmate?”, about computer chess vs. human intelligence.

In his book, Isaac Asimov’s Treasury of Humor, he wrote, “Once while I was in the army, I read “The Royal Game”, surely the best chess story ever written. It filled me with a wild desire to play chess and I began to approach various soldiers who appeared the chess type. No Luck! To each one I came with a wistful “Would you like to play a game of chess?” and from each one came a cold “No.” Finally I had the idea that I should have had to start with. I came to a soldier and said, “Would you like to read a terrific story?” and handed him “The Royal Game”. I waited. An hour passed. And then he came to me and said “Would you like to play a game of chess?”

In 1994, Isaac Asimov’s last autobiography, I. Asimov: A Memoir, was published after his death. In his chapter titled Games, this is what he said about chess.

“Failure at physical sports has never bothered me…What bothered me, though, was my failure at chess. When I was quite young and had a checkerboard, but no chess pieces, I read books on the game and learned the various moves. I then cut out cardboard squares on which I drew the symbols for the various pieces, and tried to play games with myself. Eventually I managed to persuade my father to get me real chessmen. Then I taught my sister the moves and played the game with her. Both of us played very clumsily indeed.

My brother, Stanley, who watched us play, learned the moves and, eventually, asked if he might play. Ever the indulgent older brother, I said, “Sure,” and prepared to beat the pants off him. The trouble was that in the first game he ever played he beat me.

In the years that followed, I discovered that everyone beat me, regardless of race, color, or religion. I was simply the most appallingly bad chess player who ever lived, and, as time went on, I just stopped playing chess.

My failure at chess was really distressing. It seemed completely at odds with my “smartness,” but I now know (or at least have been told) that great chess players achieve their results by years and years of studying chess games, by the memorization of large numbers of complex “combinations.” They don’t see chess as a succession of moves but as a pattern. I know what that means, for I see an essay or a story as a pattern.

But these talents are different. Kasparov sees a chess game as a pattern but an essay as a mere collection of words. I see an essay as a pattern and a chess game as a mere collection of moves. So he can play chess and I can write essays and not vice versa.

That’s not enough, however. I never thought of comparing myself to grand masters of chess. What bothered me was my inability to beat anyone! The conclusion that I finally came to (right or wrong) was that I was unwilling to study the chessboard and weigh the consequences of each possible move I might make. Even people who couldn’t see complex patterns might at least penetrate two or three moves ahead, but not I. I moved entirely on impulse, if not at random, and could not make myself do anything else. That meant I would almost certainly lose.

And again – why? To me, it seems obvious. I was spoiled by my ability to understand instantly, my ability to recall instantly. I expected to see things at once and I refused to accept a situation in which that was not possible.”

Asimov died on April 6, 1992 of AIDS after a blood transfusion during heart surgery.

In 1996, in Robert MacBride’s trilogy book Caliban – Utopia, set in Isaac Asimov’s Robot/Empire/Foundation universe, the author wrote, “A whole series of questions she dared not ask flickered through her mind, along with the answers she dared not hear from Kaelor. Like a chess player who could see checkmate eight moves ahead, she knew how the questions and answers would go, almost word for word.”

In 1997, Gregory Benford wrote Foundation’s Fear as part of the Second Foundation Trilogy. It was written after Asimov’s death, authorized by the Asimov estate. There were several chess references in the book.

Occupations of Chess Players

Occupations of Chess Players

Here are some occupations of some chess masters and well-known chess players.

Accountants and chess masters include Johann Allgaier (1763-1823), Henry Bird (1830-1908), Samuel Reshevsky (1911-1992), and Frederick Yates (1834-1932). Bird also wrote a book entitled An Analysis of Railways in the United Kingdom. Reshevsky graduated from the University of Chicago in 1934 with a degree in accounting and was an accountant for a Manhattan engineering and construction firm.

Nana Alexandria (1949- ) is a Woman Grandmaster who is now an administrator for FIDE, the World Chess Federation.

Anjelina Belakovskaia is a 3-time US women’s champion who is playing in this year’s US women’s championship. She is now a professor of advanced risk management at the University of Arizona.

Chess players who knew how to fly airplanes include Ed Edmundson (1920-1982), Max Euwe (1901-1981), Harry Golombek (1911-1995), Carol Jarecki (1935- ), and Woman GM Natalia Pogonina (1985- ). Edmondson was an air Force Lieutenant Colonel and a navigator on tanker aircraft.

Pascal Charbonneau won the Canadian championship twice. He is an analyst at Alpine Associates working on Wall Street.

Samuel Boden (1826-1882) was an art critic and amateur landscape painter. He was also the chess editor of the Field from 1858 until 1873. He started as a railway clerk.

Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) was a renowned artist and one of the founders of Dadaism, surrealism, and cubism.

Dr. Nathan Divinksy (1925- 2012) served as assistant dean of science at the University of British Columbia. His wife was the 19th Prime Minister of Canada, Kim Campbell. Divinksy received a Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of Chicago and became a mathematics teacher. He is now an alderman on the Vancouver, BC city council.

Gosta Stoltz (1904-1963) was an automobile mechanic as well as Swedish chess grandmaster.

Elliot Winslow (1952) gave up serious chess (he was an International Master) to become a professional backgammon player and poker player. Bill Robertie is another chess player who became a professional backgammon player. Robertie graduated from Harvard and is a systems analyst. He won the 1970 US Speed Chess championship. He has won the Monte Carlo World Backgammon Championship twice. He has written books on backgammon, chess, and poker.

Sir George Thomas (1881-1972) was a professional badminton and tennis player (he once played at Wimbledon). He won the British chess championship twice and the All-England Badminton championship 7 times. In 1911, he played in the semi-finals of the men’s tennis double at Wimbledon.

Max Harmonist (1864-1907) was a ballet dancer for the Royal Ballet in Berlin, performing at the Imperial Opera House.

Bankers and chess masters include Bill Addison (1933-2008), Ossip Bernstein (1882-1962), Ignatz Kolisch (1837-1889), Ken Rogoff (1953- ), and Max Weiss (1857-1927). Addison gave up chess (he was an International Master) to work at the Bank of America in San Francisco. Addison was also considered one of the best Go players in the U.S. Bernstein was a financial lawyer and earned a doctorate in Law at Heidelberg in 1906. Kolisch started out as a private secretary of the Russian Prince Urusov, then moved to Vienna and met Albert Rothschild, who got him involved in banking. Kolisch became a millionaire from banking and later became a chess patron. Rogoff served as an economist at the International Monetary Fund and was on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. He is currently a Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Weiss was a banker for the Rothschild bank in Vienna. He also studied mathematics and physics in Vienna and later taught those subjects.

International Master Norman Weinstein became a successful trader at a bank.

Esther Epstein (1954- ) is a Systems Manager for the Bio-Molecular Engineering Research Center (BMERC) at Boston University. She is a Woman International Master (WIM). She is married to GM Alex Ivanov.

Luke McShane is a GM and bond trader in London’s financial sector.

Larry Evans (1932-2010) was considered the best blackjack player of any Grandmaster. He was also a journalist. He wrote over 50 chess books.

Lothar Schmid (1928- ) is a book publisher. He is the owner of the largest known private chess library and a chess collector.

Boxers include Arnold Denker (1914-2005) and Max Euwe (1901-1981). Denker was a Golden Gloves boxing quarterfinalist in New York and won three Golden Gloves bouts by knockouts in the welterweight division. He was also a promising young baseball player who later got a job at a meat-packing company. Euwe was an amateur boxer and won the amateur heavyweight boxing championship of Europe.

Irina Levitina (1954- ) gave up serious chess and became a professional bridge player. In chess, she was a world championship Candidate and was a Woman Grandmaster. In contract bridge, she has been World champion four times. She ranks 2nd among World Bridge Federation Women Grand Masters in terms of master points. Alekhine was a bridge player, but not a very good one. Emanuel Lasker was also a bridge player and wrote a book on bridge.

Arthur Dake (1910-2000) was director of the Oregon Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). He started out as a merchant seaman. He then sold insurance and telephone directories.

Amos Burn (1848-1925) was a cotton broker and sugar broker from Liverpool. He was a chess journalist and from 1913 until his death, Burn edited the chess column of The Field.

Viacheslav Ragozin (1908-1962) was a civil engineer and had a career in the construction industry.

Arnold Denker (1914-2005) was a businessman in the meat packing industry and became a millionaire.

Theo Van Scheltinga (1914-1994) worked as a carpenter at the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.

Jonathan Tisdall (1958- ) is a chef and works as a freelance journalist.

Edmar Mednis (1937-2002) was a chemical engineer, then a stock broker.

Weaver Adams (1901-1963) was a chicken farmer.

British civil servants and chess masters include Oldrich Duras (1882-1957), Wilhelm Hanstein (1811-1850), Stuart Milner-Barry (1906-1995), and Edward Sergeant (1881-1961).

Members of the clergy include Bill Lombardy (1937- ), George MacDonnell (1830-1899), Ruy Lopez (1540-1580), John Owen (1827-1901), Domenico Ponziani (1719-1796), Charles Ranken (1828-1905), Arthur Skipworth (1830-1898), and William Wayte (1829-1898).

Lombardy is a former Roman Catholic priest. Ruy Lopez was a Spanish priest and later bishop in Segura. Owen was an English vicar. Ponziani was a law professor and priest who became a canon in the Modena Cathedral, then Vicar General. Ranken was a Church of England clergyman. He and Lord Randolph Churchill (Winston Churchill’s father) founded the Oxford University Chess Club. Wayte was a Church of England clergyman.

In his earlier years, Arthur Bisguier (1929- ) was a computer programmer at IBM and gave that up to become a professional chess player.

Klaus Darga (1934- ) works as a computer programmer.

Diane Savereide (1954- ) retired from chess to become a computer programmer for NASA. She is now a software developer in Los Angeles.

Cryptographers included C.H.O’D Alexander (1909-1974), Reuben Fine (1914-1993), Harry Golombek (1911-1995), James Aitken (1908-1983), and Stuart Milner-Barry (1906-1995).

Vincenzo Castaldi (1916-1970) was a dentist in Florence, Italy. He was an Italian International Master.

George Koltanowski (1903-2000) was a diamond cutter.

Diplomats include Jose Capablanca (Cuba), Max Judd (consul-general in Vienna), James Mortimer, and Tassilo von Lasa (Prussia).

Jaroslav Sajtor worked for the diplomatic service in Czechoslovakia.

Nikola Karaklajic (1926-2008) was a disc jockey for Belgrade radio.

Louis Paulsen (1833-1891) established a distillery and was a tobacco farmer.

Elijah Williams (1809-1854) worked as a druggist.

Economists and chess masters include Igor Bondarevsky (1913-1979), Ivan Farago, Gyozo Forintos, Aivars Gipslis, Yair Kraidman, and Ken Rogoff (chief economist at the World Bank).

Electrical engineers and masters include Mikhail Botvinnik and Vladimir Liberzon. John Watson has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering. I have degrees in physics and electrical engineering and am a systems engineer.

GM Eero Book (1910-1990) of Finland was an engineer.

Former world women’s chess champion Elisaveta Bykova (1913-1989) was an engineer in a large Moscow printing house.

Donald Byrne (1930-1976) was an associate professor of English at Penn State.

Grigory Levenfish (1889-1961) was an engineer in the glass industry. He had a degree in chemical engineering.

Julio Granda-Zuniga (1967- ) is a farmer in Peru. He is a Peruvian GM.

Vivek Rao was America’s highest-rated junior player when he was 16. He is a former quantitative financial analyst on Wall Street.

Alexey Troitsky (1866-1942) was a forester in Siberia.

IM Alfred Brinckmann (1891-1967) of Germany was a functionary.

Bukhuti Gurgenidze (1933-2008) was a geologist. He was a GM from Soviet Georgia.

Victor Palciuskas (1941- ) is a former world correspondence chess champion. He was a professor of geophysics.

GM Milko Bobotsov (1931-2000) of Bulgaria was a gymnastics instructor.

Peter Thiel is a chess master and now the billionaire co-founder of PayPal who runs the hedge fund Clarium Capital.

GM Patrick Wolff, a two-time US chess champion, was an analyst at Clarium, then started his own fund, Grandmaster Capital, with $50 million under management.

Anna Hahn, the 2003 US women’s champion, became a hedge fund manager at D.E. Shaw Group.

GM Max Dlugy started his own hedge fund. He worked at Banker’s Trust on their foreign exchange spot desk. He is now manager of Diversified Property Fund.

Johann Berger (1845-1933) was an Austrian high school administrator.

Henry Buckle (1821-1862) was a British historian and writer. He wrote History of Civilization in England.

Vladimir Alatortsev (1909-1987) was a Soviet GM and hydraulics engineer.

Insurance salesmen include Al Horowitz, Issac Kashdan, Miguel Najdorf, and William Napier (vice-president of Scranton Life Insurance).

Journalists and chess masters include Manuel Aaron, Lajos Asztalos, Robert Byrne (1928-2013), Emil Diemer, Isaac Kashdan, Lubomir Kavalek, George Koltanowski, Mario Monticelli, Andy Soltis, and Boris Spassky.

Louis-Charles Mahe de La Bourdonnais (1795-1840) was a land speculator (and not a very good one at that).

Richard Teichmann (1868-1925) was a language teacher.

Lajos Asztalos (1889-1956) was a languages teacher.

Lawyers and chess masters include Gerald Abrahams, Alexander Alekhine, Rosendo Balinas (1941-1998), Curt von Bardeleben, Ossip Bernstein, Miroslav Filip, Johann Hjartarson, Paul Lipke, Paul Morphy (never practiced), Bill Martz (never practiced and became a car salesman instead), Meindert Niemeijer, Fredrik Olafsson, Julius Perlis, Harold Phillips, Domenico Ponziani, Folke Rogard, Alexander Rueb, James Sherwin (Executive VP of GAF Corporation and director at Hunter Douglas), Saviely Tartakower, Karel Treybal (judge), Mijo Udovcic, Michale Wilder (partner at McDermott Will & Emery), and Daniel Yanofsky (mayor of a suburb of Winnipeg).

James Tarjan (1952- ) gave up chess to become a librarian.

Carl Ahlhausen (1835-1892) was a librarian for the Berlin Chess Association.

Semyon Alapin (1856-1923) was a linguist, railway engineer, and grain commodities merchant.

Tim Redman is a former president of the USCF. He is a professor of literary studies at the University of Texas at Dallas.

I.S. Turover (1892-1978) founded a lumber and millwork company and became a millionaire.

Paul Keres (1916-1975) was once a professor of mathematics in Tallinn, Estonia.

Mathematicians and chess players include C.H.O’D Alexander, Adolf Anderssen, Magdy Assem, George Atwood, Christoph Bandelow, John Beasley, Otto Blathy, Hans Boumeester, Nathan Divinsky, Noam Elkies, Arpad Elo, Max Euwe, Ed Formanek, William Hartston, Paul Keres, Martin Kreuzer, Emanuel Lasker, Anatoly Lein, Lev Loshinksi, Vladimir Makogonov, Geza Maroczy, Vania Mascioni, J. Mauldon, Jonathan Mestel, Walter Morris, John Nunn, Nick Patterson, Miodrag Petkovic, Ken Regan, Hans-Peter Rehm, Ken Rogoff, and Duncan Suttles.

Mechanical engineers and chess masters include Alexander Kotov and Edward Lasker.

Medical doctors and chess masters include Jana Bellin, Fedor Bogatirchuk (also professor of radiological anatomy), Karl Burger, Ricardo Calvo, Yona Kosashvili, Ariel Mengarini (psychiatrist), Joseph Platz, Helmut Pfleger, Christine Rosenfeld, Anthony Saidy (specializing in tuberculosis), Siegbert Tarrasch, and Johannes Zukertort.

Milan Vukcevich (1937-2003) was a professor of metallurgy and Chief Engineer at General Electric. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in chemistry.

Lev Aronin (1920-1983) was a Soviet IM and a meteorologist.

Some served in the military. C.H. O’D Alexander was a British Colonel and code breaker. Tartakower was a Lieutenant in the French Underground during World War II. Johann Allgaier was a quartermaster in the Austrian army. Jose Araiza was the Mexican Champion from 1924 to 1949 and was a Lt. Colonel in the Mexican army. Paul Rudolf von Bilguer was an Army Lieutenant. John Cochrane was a lieutenant in the British navy. Alexander Deschapelles lost his right arm fighting the Prussians. Oldrich Duras served in the Austrio-Hungarian army during World War I. Svetozar Gligoric was considered one of Yugoslavia’s best war heroes during World War II. Klaus Junge was a German Lieutenant and was shot and killed during World War II. Grigory Koshnitsky was an anti-tank gunner during World War II. George Mackenzie served as Captain in the Northern Army in the American Civil War. Gavriil Veresov was a Captain in the Russian Army. Eugene Znosko-Borovsky was wounded in the Russo-Japanese war and World War I.

Musicians and chess masters include Armand Blackmar (music professor and music publisher), Hans Johner (director of the Zurich Philharmonic Orchestra), Philidor, Mark Taimanov (concert pianist), Eileen Tranmer, and Eugene Znosko-Borovsky (music critic).

Jean Dufresne (1829-1893) was a newspaper editor in Berlin.

GM Jon Arnason (1960- ) of Iceland is Secretary and Treasurer of Oz Communications and is a successful businessman.

Painters include Samuel Boden, Marcel Duchamp, Henry Grob, Bernhard Horwitz.

Irving Chernev (1900-1981) was employed in the paper industry.

Robert Huebner (1948- ) worked as a papyrologist (an expert on Egyptian hieroglyphics)

Marmaduke Wyvill (1815-1896) was a member of parliament in England.

Alan Trefler won the World Open in 1975. He is CEO of Pegasystems.

Alexander Kevitz (1902-1981) was a pharmacist. He earned degrees in law and pharmacy. He was an American chess master.

IM George Botterill is a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Sheffield.

Nick de Firmian (1957- ) has a degree in physics from the University of California, Berkeley.

Vladimir Malakhov (1980- ) is a Russian GM. He used to work as a nuclear physicist.

Albert Sandrin (1923-2004) was one of the world’s best blind chess players. He was also a piano tuner.

Miguel Najdorf (1910-1997) was a porcelain importer.

Josef Klinger (1946- ) gave up chess to become a professional poker player. Ken Smith (1930-1999) was a professional poker player. Walter Browne (1949- ) is a professional poker player and has won over $300,000 in poker (see picture).

GM Utut Adianto of Indonesia is a politician. In 2009, he was elected to the Indonesian Senate.

Martin From (1828-1895) was a prisoner inspector.

Reuben Fine (1914-1993), during World War II, was a translator. He gave up chess to become a psychoanalyst.

Nikolai Krogius (1930- ) was a sports psychologist. He is a Russian GM.

IM Johan Barendregt (1924-1982) of the Netherlands was a Dutch psychology professor.

GM Jacob Aagaard is an author and co-owner of Quality Chess, a chess publishing house.

Adolf Albin (1848-1920) was a publisher (he ran the Frothier Printing House in Bucharest) and translator.

Kim Commons (1951- ) was a real estate agent.

Anna Gulko is an IM and former US women’s champion. She is a research analyst at Invesco and worked at Banker’s Trust.

Henry Atkins (1872-1955), who won the British championship 9 times, was a British schoolmaster. He was a math teacher, and was then appointed principal at Huddersfield College.

Howard Staunton (1810-1874) was a Shakespeare scholar.

Seaman included Arthur Dake and William Evans (ship captain).

For a time, Grandmaster Simen Agdestein (1967- ) was also a professional soccer player. He now teaches soccer and chess at a sports gymnasium in Norway. He won seven Norwegian chess championships.

GM Duncan Suttles of Canada is a software developer and president of Magnetar Games.

IM Mario Bertok (1929-2008) of Croatia was a sports journalist.

Emil Schallopp (1843-1919) was a stenographer. He was a German player and author.

Ilya Gurevich (1972- ) became a stock exchange options trader.

Ron Henley (1956- ) became a member of the American stock exchange.

Larry Kaufman (1947- ) became a successful stock broker and trader.

GM David Norwood became a trader at Bankers Trust, but quit after a few months. He then found a job at Duncan Lawrie, a British private bank. In 2008, at the age of 40, he retired as a multi-millionaire.

John Roycroft (1929- ) was a systems engineer for IBM for 26 years.

Taxi drivers include Victor Frias, Nicolas Rossolimo, and Tim Taylor.

International Master Frank Anderson (1928-1980) graduated with a physics and mathematics degree from the University of Toronto and ran a tax consulting business.

Teachers and chess masters include Adolf Anderssen (math), Gedeon Barcza (math), Ludwig Bledow (math), Donald Byrne (English), Robert Byrne (philosophy), Arpad Elo (physics and astronomy), Max Euwe (math), Paul Keres (math), Lionel Kieseritzky (math), Danny Kopec (computer science), Geza Maroczy (math), Stuart Rachels (philosophy), Ken Regan (computer science), Ken Rogoff (economics), and Anthony Santasiere.

Vladimir Antoshin (1929-1994) was a technical designer and may have worked for the KGB.

Vlastimil Hort (1944- ) worked for a general-interest magazine as a translator.

Walter Korn (1908-1997) directed the U.N. Relief and Rehabilitation Administration after World War II, helping relocate concentration camp survivors.

Sir Philip Milner-Barry became Under-Secretary of the Treasury in England.

Geza Maroczy (1870-1951) was a waterworks engineer.

Fred Reinfeld (1910-1964) was a prolific writer. He wrote over 100 books.

– Bill Wall

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