The board should be available to both players to examine, no matter whose turn it is. If a player has their hand on one of the pieces, that is distracting. Even worse is a player who will pick up a piece, put it down on another square and keep a finger on it while they decide if they want to move there.
Also, visualizing the chess board after the pieces have been moved is part of the skill of making a chess move, so the touch move rule just nips in the bud any playing around with the board.
That would fall under distracting the opponent, which makes it against the rules.
Yeah I think it should be enforced if someone is trying to be distracting, but if it's just a quick error - a brush of a piece - that's b.s. (and no I don't mean bachelors of science). It's irritating when someone will try to get whatever advantage they can. apart from playing solid chess.
In any over the board game that an opponent has accidentally left their clock running after they moved I pointed it out to them...not because I'm some the patron saint of chess but because I wouldn't want to win that way.
I will touch you
It's the only thing in the FIDE laws that limits you to moving only your own pieces. If you 'have the move' and you touch an opponent's piece you must capture it, which can be done only with one of your own pieces.
(Actually they also say you 'have the move' when your opponents move has been 'made', which is obviously not true at the start, so feel free to play 1.g7-g5.)
It tells you what happens here https://handbook.fide.com/chapter/E012023 (Art.4).
If it's an opponent's piece that cannot be moved you must capture it if you can and you 'have the move' (see previous post).
What's the reasoning behind the touch move rule ? Is it to stop players from figdetting ? Is putting a finger on a piece really that distracting ? Why should the other player care until the move is made ? Is it to train players to analyse in the head rather than seeing the position on the board ? Or is it to prevent the player from messing up the board ?
A lot of "silly" questions here - I'm just curious of its origins