Chess-specific intelligence VS General intelligence

Kasparov has suggested that it is wrong to consider a priori someone intelligent because of his chess skills!

He has also said that quite a lot of grandmasters have rather narrow interests!!

Should we distinguish then between the "chess machine" and the "chessplaying philosopher"?!

I don't think there are different kinds of intelligence, there's just intelligence. Maybe there are alfa beta and omega circuited brains and beta brains are more suitable for chess.

My perception of chess intellegence is this: spacial mapping skills ourput data to a persons executive center where they can organize the data in ways that are relevent to accomplishing their goal (the goal usually being to gain position or pieces.)  Then they used this organized data to make a decision by comparing their options.  This is not the same as linguistic intellence, philisophical intellegence, emotional intellegence, scientific intellegence, etc.

As far as the chess intelligence compared with the phiosohpical intelligence, both require deep and abstract logic.  However, chess requires spacial mapping skills, and philosophy requires the analysis of linguistic concepts.  They are very differnt.

So Kasporov was right.

Also, the chessplayers that become successful are likely to be very fast learners and to therefore also have a high IQ (a good predictor of learning speed.)  But this does not mean that they are philosopers or even people who make wise life decisions.  Also one can be good at chess without having a high IQ.

I think the chessplaying philosopher image was created because a person thinking deeply on the chess board looks very similar to a person thinking deeply about philosophy. Both require a calm and centered mind and body and both require deep concentration.  Both are also abract intellegences involving logic, so someone who enjoys abstracgt logic might enjoy both chess and philosophy. 

@Vivinski:

Alpha circuited brains?  Beta circuited brains?  There is no such thing.  There is also no such thing as Omega brainwaves.  All brains have some of alpha, some beta, some delta, etc.  By saying "alpha circuited brain," are you describing a brain that has a higher amplitude of alpha than of beta throughout the brain?  Or perhaps too little beta?

In the pre-frontal lobe (just above the eyebrows,) a brain that is chronically shown to have too much alpha and not enough beta typiclly has ADHD.  This person might have difficulty playing chess because they have trouble supervising where to place their attention.  They have trouble analyizing all options -- they may get stuck on one line of play and ignore others.  Then they often make mistakes that cost them the game.

Also, different areas of the brain display increased alpha when that person is calm and centered.  This state of mind is required for good chess playing.

If a person had a beta oriented brain, or beta increased everywhere throughout the brain, they would likely not be very good at chess either because they would have a physically and emotionally overly aroused brain (flight or fight.) They would not be able to concentrate on a game which requires a calm and centered mind.

The highest functioning brain would optimally have increased beta only in of areas in the brain used to play chess (such as the pre-frontal cortex.)  The increase in beta would be caused by increased activity only in the circuits of that area that aid in chess playing.

But activity level only correlates with a person's intellegence.  In other words, the quality of the connections as well as activity level is vital to a person's intellegence.

I agree with Johnmillerr, I think a successful chess player would be a good prediction for someone who is a good learner, and also I think these people organize and gather information well.

I disagree with ciljettu mostly because the statement isn't specific enough.  I think very good players are able to study/research/concentrate and have a good memory, but I tend to think of intelligence as more on a creative side... how many TNs did they come up with for example.

Which is another problem, intelligence isn't specific enough, the word means different things to different people.

Psychologists have identified several different types of intelligence and several different models explaining each one.

For example, the most well known model I think is the Triactic Model of intelligence, which categorizes intelligence into three very broad categories: analytical intelligence, practical intelligence, and creative intelligence.

Analytical intelligence measures a persons ability to annalyze ideas and to break them down into their components.  Creative intelligence is the ability to create novel and innovative ideas.  Practical intelligence is the ability to utilize the ideas in order to adjust to an enviornment or to adjust an enviornment to one's self.  When a person is described as intelligent, it is unknown which or what combination of these three intelligences they possess.

It is also difficult to place the chess intelligence into one of these categories.  The model was constructed in order to help explain the cognitive components of a successful person who lives a successful life.  However, it was not constructed to explain success in chess.

The analytical component of the triactic model mirrors what an IQ test would.  I recently read an article on chess.com explaining the cognitive components of chess (http://www.chess.com/article/view/the-cognitive-psychology-of-chess), and it states, "After a century of investigation, not a single study with adult chess players has managed to establish a link between chess skill and intelligence.  Intellect had little predictive power among strong chess players."  

However, they also found a correlation between academic success and children who play chess.  There is a strong correlation between a person's IQ and academic success.  Therefore, they may be a correlation between children who play chess and a higher IQ.  This is in contradiction to the study on adults who play chess which states that there is no correlation between the IQ or adult chess players and adult non-chess players.

Still, the correlation between academic success and chess skills may not necisarrily be contributed to an IQ.  Children chess players may come from better, more stable famlies who prioritize education, for example.

They also found a correlation between open-mindedness and chess in children.  Open-mindedness is associated with philosophical intelligence.  So, it's possible that chess skill in children may be a sign of higher abstract thinking abilities later in life.  Since both chess and philosophy require logic, this would not surprise me.

Anyways, there may be a correlation between chess and IQ and chess and philosophical thinking.  There also may not be.  That's all I can conclude, though my intuition tells me there might be.

That should be some good info for ciljettu, who apparently thought this was a political issue.

Heh, but seriously, interesting, thx.

haha thanks.

Psychology is an amazing area of science.  I like to do it justice (:

I've known people who were extremely talented in some areas, but sucked in others. There's no reason why chess talent should be any different. There are very few people who are extremely gifted in all areas.

@hamworld05:

It is a fact that they correlate one's IQ with academic success.  It is false to say that all people with high IQs' will have academic success.  It is a fact that they correlate children who are strong chess players with accademic success.  It is not a fact that this is due to these chess players having a higher IQ.  (As I have said, younger chess players may be more likely be in a family that prioritizes education.)  However, it is still possible that the children who are stronger at chess have a slightly higher IQ (All that I am saying is that it is possible.)

A person who has an IQ of 120 is statistically more likely to  have accademic success than a person who has an IQ of 80.  This is a fact.  

I read once in my old highschool psychology textbook that the chances of a student having accademic success does not increase significantly beyond the IQ of 120.  This means that a person with the IQ of 120 is nearly just as likely to succeed as the person with the IQ of 150.  In fact, if the person with the IQ of 120 has more creative intelligence than the person whose IQ is 150, then the person with the IQ of 120 is more likely to succeed.

Open-mindedness, creativity, and skill in the area of question are better predictors of a persons radicality than IQ.  This is assuming that the radicality is rationally justified.  IQ affects at least creativity slightly up until the IQ of 120 or so (learned this from the same source as above.)

@hamworld

I suppose I meant to say that creativity is a predictor is carreer success (depending on the carreer, of course,) not academic success.

I don't think that famous academic essays would receive an F if that same essay was handed to a professor as college work.

In my freshman year in college I wrote a six page essay on gender dysphoria.  For a six page essay I spent far more time than I should have, far more time than I usually spend, and far more time than my peers did.  This was because I became so overfocused on the topic that I didn't want to finish the essay until I had the most complex arguments and the most indisputable claims that I could possibly create.  After the essay met my extremely high standord I finally turned it in (a little late.)

When I discovered that I received an F on the essay I was heartbroken.  I wanted to know why, so I made an appointment with the person who graded it.  Appently it wasn't my logic, knowledge, or argumentitive skills that gave me a bad grade.  It was because my sentances were not understandable and because I ended up writing about a different topic than the assigned topic.

I am diagnosed with ADHD.  I did some very ADHD things when I wrote that essay, such as becoming overfocused and being unable to follow a specific instruction.  I was also completely unaware that I was using a style of language that nobody could understand except for me.  After my mistakes were pointed out to me, and after I became aware of them, I was able to redo the essay and get a good grade.

So when you describe an intellegent person who is unable to write a "good essay," and who's writing is "different from academic conventions in universities," do you think that you may be describing the intelligent person who is underattentive while being overfocused?  (Meaning that the person is focused intently on one thing and nothing else.  Also, although it is counterintuitive, being both underattentive and overfocused are seem together with some frequency.)

Football great, Leroy, had an I.Q. of -19 (negative 19). Yet, achieved great success.

why "chess specific"? why not just call it what it is? it's spatial reasoning intelligence. I would venture to assert that this is the type of intelligence (there are many types, albeit some more recognized/valued than others) involved with chess.

and a caveat, this type of intelligence isn't all that is involved in internet blitz and bullet video game chess. there you have a myriad of other factors at play. but in real chess played in real life in real tournaments, that is where the full force of someone's spatial reasoning intelligence would be brought to bear in pure form.

@johnmiller

yeah, if someone's having a nervous breakdown, it would probably affect their ability to anything, especially anything having to do with using their heads. this would also probably affect the speed at which they learn. you know, if some real effed up bullshit was constantly going on around a given person, that person would probably be going along at slower pace than someone else who is living in happy chocolate land of goodness, love and happiness. this, I would think, has to be taken into account. what the stressors are in respective environments, context, circumstances, conditions. things are never as simple as some people would like for others to believe. in my experience, when someone is trying to force a simplistic argument/view on everyone, ram it down their throats as absolute truth, not considering, listening for a second, to any dissent, it's because they are full of shit and probably did something criminal they don't anyone to know about.

@hamworld 

yeah, right. a masters degree gives you that much respect, power and freedom to do what you wish. maybe 50 years ago. you could have several phds from ivy league schools, but the minute you assert something that the powers that be don't like very much, to put it lightly, you will be mercilessly crushed, silenced and discredited (probably misdiagnosed with a bogus mental illness or something). that is the world and society in which we live. 

psychology vs psychiatry

and then there's neuroscience, as well as emerging hybrid fields such as biopsychology etc

it's true that all grandmasters, international masters possess extremely high spatial reasoning intelligence. 

what's not true, or right, is to use chess as the equivalent (especially not internet blitz or bullet chess, which are essentially video games for everyone who doesn't have 2300 fide or about next to their name) of an iq test or something along these lines and/or slander, defame, insult someone based on their chess (especially if it's internet blitz, bullet video game chess)

actually I think neuroscience is rather far along now. firmly established branch of science.

I swear I've seen this before...

Yeah, they saw how great Fischer turned out and they all jumped right on that bandwagon.