Genetic Limits in Chess

Almost everything in life is determined by genetics and experience.  People often disagree on which factor is more important but will accept the fact that both are significant.  I will argue that chess is also determined by genetics and experience and propose an idea for the relative importance of each factor.    

First off, I would like to point out that almost everything measurable about a human being is normally distributed throughout the human population.  Height, speed, weight, etc. are all examples.  Although human intellect is not easily measured, it makes sense that different intellectual skills would also be normally distributed.  

Given that intellectual abilities will fall on a spectrum and that chess is an intellectual game, it is clear that every person will have some natural genetic ability for chess.  Now for genetic limits.  At what point will your genetic ability prevent you from improving?

Initially genetic ability will not limit your chess performance.  When you first learn how the pieces move and start playing games, experience is essentially the only thing that matters.  You just need to play more games so you can start to remember patterns and strategical ideas.  As you improve your game and gain rating,  what will distinguish you from lower rated players will not be your genetic ability but simply the fact that you have probably put more time into the game. This is because at very low ratings, essentially no one is at their genetic capacity to play chess because the play is so bad.  

At the very top level of chess, genetic ability is the factor that matters.  This is because almost all the players have dedicated their lives to playing chess and so all their experience is about the same.  This means that the distinguishing factor will be their genetic ability to play chess.  

It would be very interesting to see maximum possible chess elo as a function of genetic ability (ex assuming you put in maximum experience).  I would expect that a person with average genetic chess ability would actually be able to get a pretty high rating just off of experience.  However, for those of you dreaming about being the best in the world, it is almost certainly hopeless even if you played chess all day, every day starting as an infant.  That said we should all feel confident that we can achieve a very good chess rating if we just put in the time.  

After going from a 600 blitz rating to a 2000 rating in about 1.5 years, I have not gained a point in the last 6 months.  It seems the difference between 2000 rated players and 2100 players is enormous.  I am starting to come to terms with the fact that I have probably found my genetic limit and playing chess will just have diminishing returns for me.  

I have noticed that most IMs and GMs can play completely blindfolded.  Imagine how easy calculation would be if you had the whole board with all the pieces in your head.  It seems that to become truly exceptional at chess you need a photographic memory.  

From my observations here are some genetic abilities that an individual must have to become an IM or GM at chess. 

-photographic memory

-excellent at logic (understanding of cause and effect)

-Exceptional Pattern recognition and pattern memory

Here are some important attributes of an exceptionally strong player's personality 

-competitive

-focused

-objective 

I am always in awe watching GMs and IMs play chess.  They take so much into consideration and seem to have such a great understanding of chess positions.  It is hard to believe that anyone could beat them.  The fact that these players are so strong is a testament to how much genetic ability plays a role at the top of any human endeavor.  

Meh, even kids can be GMs, so logic is not so important.

You also don't need a photographic memory to play blindfold chess. My memory is average to low-average and I can play blindfold and remember at least some games I've played in the past. Just depends whether the moves make sense.

Also it's hard to believe you've hit a permanent wall after only 1.5 years. You want to talk about normal distributions, almost no one hits their ceiling so soon. (Also your account is over 2 years old so...)

I do agree that genetics matter though.

Chesss Strategy for Club Players by Grooten has a good study(back up by scientific experiments) on how GMs differs from mere mortals.

If I may ask,when did you start playing chess?