6655321
On Wednesday the 19th of July I played a tournament chess game at the San Diego Chess Club against Fawsi Murra. Sr. This is a game I was (numerically) meant to lose; Murra is rated almost 250 points higher than me on the ratings scale. After move four I spent a moment trying to remember the name of the opening position we had reached. Was it the Taimanov or the Kan? The two are similar, but there is a difference. I also didn’t really know how to play against either system. I remembered that you could set up what is known as the Maroczy (mah-rock-see) Bind against the two systems, but wasn’t sure (couldn’t remember) how to handle the bind against these two systems. The only time I normally use the Maroczy Bind is against Accelerated Dragons (don’t they sound intimidating? Not just Dragons, but accelerated ones at that!). I made a decision and using the advise from a book by Grandmaster Andrew Soltis to think analogously when you don’t know an exact position, and played it as if it was against an Accelerated Dragon. I played my best and after making okay moves for two and one half hours I finally made a “weak” move on move number 22 which handed the initiative to my opponent. How did he follow up? He blundered and hung a piece. I immediately saw his error, but spent two minutes verifying it before I set in to begin the kill! On move 28, in a hopeless position, Mr. Murra resigned. Victory was mine!
How did I as a chess player who’s been playing avidly for three years not know the name of the opening position reached on move four? Strangely enough, this is not uncommon. Case in point, at Wijk aan Zee in 1990, Viswanathan Ananad who is one of the strongest grandmasters in the world had to spend several moments after move number three to remember the name of the opening position reached. So at least I’m in good company when it comes to forgetting the names of openings. But how is it that I can remember the first fourteen moves of the 1959 game Bernstein – Fischer or fourteen or so moves into the Chigorin variation of the Main Line Ruy Lopez, but not even know the name of an opening on move four? You’d think it was because I reached the other positions more often, so well duh!, but that is not the case. Another odd example is when I play my friend Rob in blitz games at the coffee shop. He almost always plays the Sveshnikov Sicilian against me. No problem, since he always plays it I should be well armed. Sort of… On move sixteen he never plays the “book” move which is strongest in the variation, but I never remember how to punish him for his “mistake.” It could be easy to rationalize this with the dismissive, “Gee, that Sam sure has a poor memory.” But that would not be quite right.
My friend Dan e-mailed me the other day telling me about his summer reading and the books he plans to teach (again) this fall at College. For most of he books he mentioned the character’s names only, knowing that was enough for me to know what books he was speaking abouthe wrote “...then back to Beowulf, Arthur, Hamlet, Bernard Mark, poor Winston Smith, and little Alex. I bet you remember his convict number -- I never can.” “Of course I can,” I thought, “It’s 6655321.” Now I haven’t read that book in at least 10 years, but Dan knows that I still remember the convict number for a character?! So much for my poor memory.
Now how the heck can I remember the convict number for a fictional character from a book I haven’t read in a decade, but when I’m driving to work I often wonder silently, “Did I turn the coffee maker off?” Is it distance in time (along the lines of us remembering the past more easily than the near present)? No. I can remember all the different verb conjugations from this last year of studying Japanese (recent), but cannot even remember a single Russian verb (from 16 years ago), so that can’t be it. Is it repetition? No; I turn the coffee maker off everyday, and I don’t read A Clockwork Orange everyday (it’s been ten years). Also with repetition, Dan reads the book once or twice a year, so it should be him that remembers the convict number and not me, right? How about importance or significance? Well, I think it is much more important that the coffee maker is off keeping my home from burning to the ground rather than some dastardly Storm Trooper who may one day have me cornered and in the absence of fanatics dressed as superheroes to protect me, he offers up as my only hope of survival, if I can tell him Alex’s convict number from A Clockwork Orange he will spare my life. I don’t think that will ever happen, but on the off chance it does… Woo-hoo! I am saved!
It’s a strange thing then this abstract called memory. Think about all the things you do recall and the myriad of information which often escapes you which you wish to retain. “What’s it going to be then, eh?” As you ponder this over the next minute or two, or preferably over the next few days, also remember and ponder Keats’ final line to “Ode on a Grecian Urn” which I remember after not having read it in about five years, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
How did I as a chess player who’s been playing avidly for three years not know the name of the opening position reached on move four? Strangely enough, this is not uncommon. Case in point, at Wijk aan Zee in 1990, Viswanathan Ananad who is one of the strongest grandmasters in the world had to spend several moments after move number three to remember the name of the opening position reached. So at least I’m in good company when it comes to forgetting the names of openings. But how is it that I can remember the first fourteen moves of the 1959 game Bernstein – Fischer or fourteen or so moves into the Chigorin variation of the Main Line Ruy Lopez, but not even know the name of an opening on move four? You’d think it was because I reached the other positions more often, so well duh!, but that is not the case. Another odd example is when I play my friend Rob in blitz games at the coffee shop. He almost always plays the Sveshnikov Sicilian against me. No problem, since he always plays it I should be well armed. Sort of… On move sixteen he never plays the “book” move which is strongest in the variation, but I never remember how to punish him for his “mistake.” It could be easy to rationalize this with the dismissive, “Gee, that Sam sure has a poor memory.” But that would not be quite right.
My friend Dan e-mailed me the other day telling me about his summer reading and the books he plans to teach (again) this fall at College. For most of he books he mentioned the character’s names only, knowing that was enough for me to know what books he was speaking abouthe wrote “...then back to Beowulf, Arthur, Hamlet, Bernard Mark, poor Winston Smith, and little Alex. I bet you remember his convict number -- I never can.” “Of course I can,” I thought, “It’s 6655321.” Now I haven’t read that book in at least 10 years, but Dan knows that I still remember the convict number for a character?! So much for my poor memory.
Now how the heck can I remember the convict number for a fictional character from a book I haven’t read in a decade, but when I’m driving to work I often wonder silently, “Did I turn the coffee maker off?” Is it distance in time (along the lines of us remembering the past more easily than the near present)? No. I can remember all the different verb conjugations from this last year of studying Japanese (recent), but cannot even remember a single Russian verb (from 16 years ago), so that can’t be it. Is it repetition? No; I turn the coffee maker off everyday, and I don’t read A Clockwork Orange everyday (it’s been ten years). Also with repetition, Dan reads the book once or twice a year, so it should be him that remembers the convict number and not me, right? How about importance or significance? Well, I think it is much more important that the coffee maker is off keeping my home from burning to the ground rather than some dastardly Storm Trooper who may one day have me cornered and in the absence of fanatics dressed as superheroes to protect me, he offers up as my only hope of survival, if I can tell him Alex’s convict number from A Clockwork Orange he will spare my life. I don’t think that will ever happen, but on the off chance it does… Woo-hoo! I am saved!
It’s a strange thing then this abstract called memory. Think about all the things you do recall and the myriad of information which often escapes you which you wish to retain. “What’s it going to be then, eh?” As you ponder this over the next minute or two, or preferably over the next few days, also remember and ponder Keats’ final line to “Ode on a Grecian Urn” which I remember after not having read it in about five years, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
posted by Sam Barboo at 2:11 PM
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