Talk:Reuben Fine

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Some wag noted that this was "a loss for chess, and at best a draw for psychology"

I've seen this quote (with small variations) several times, but I've never seen a source for it - does anybody know where it comes from? --Camembert

[edit] AVRO

Quote:

The winner of AVRO, a double round-robin tournament, was to be challenger to the world champion then held by Alexander Alekhine.

This was perhaps the hope of many in the chess world at that time. However this hope could reasonably be said to have been dashed when Alekhine spoke at the opening session denying that the winner would have any automatic claim to a challenge.

AVRO featured the best players of the era but the conditions were effectively weighed in favor of the youngsters in that the venue changed frequently. IIRC the players would more than once finish a game in the evening then travel overnight and have to play their next game the very next afternoon. (It was a traveling show to publicize the Dutch radio network AVRO.) Not very good for the chess and really, not very fair. -Wfaxon 03:41, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Fine has written that the criticism doesn't carry much weight because the travelling distances in Holland were short. (I don't necessarily agree, I'm just passing it on). Rocksong 07:58, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Binet

Quote:

(Fine is not the first person to examine the mind as it relates to chess—Alfred Binet, the inventor of the IQ test, had studied the mental functionality of good chess players, and found that they often had enhanced mental traits, such as a good memory).

Binet found that a chessplayer tends to have a good memory for chess positions and the like, things he or she has studied, not an overall superior memory. -Wfaxon 03:55, 11 August 2006 (UTC)