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Magnus Carlsen resigns against Hans Niemann after one move

176 points by akbarnama 4y ago

tibbar 4y ago
For context, Magnus withdrew from a major tournament last month after losing to Hans. He has not made a statement, but it is understood that he suspects Hans of cheating. Hans has admitted to cheating online, though he denies cheating in person. As more evidence comes out, it seems that Hans has cheated a lot more than he admitted, and potentially over the board as well (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) This all helps Magnus's case. I think it is likely that Hans will be slowly barred, silently or openly, from tournaments and venues all over the world. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pwtC0bH--A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pwtC0bH--A
- systemvoltage 4y ago
  This is a very uncharitable opinion that’s pretending to be a summary of a complex situation. Follow discussions on r/chess and people like GothamChess, PowerPlayChess. Facts and very little speculation. Evidence is needed.
- Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
  > As more evidence comes out I haven't seen evidence of Neumann's cheating, as is claimed in this comment. Only allegations, which do not look very strong to me.
  - tibbar 4y ago
    There are two lines of evidence: first regarding his cheating online, which is easier to do and easier to check. Chess.com banned Hans and put out a statement saying that Hans cheated more often and more seriously than he claimed. [1] The second line of inquiry is statistical analyses of Hans's over-the-board games. See my original comment for one such analysis, but he really has been playing at an absurd level in some games (performing as well 0 centipawn loss against some engines!) It's not a good look. [1] https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352
    - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
      What a person did at 16 years old is hardly relevant now, and it is definitely immoral to keep bringing it up without new evidence. How long would it take for people like you to stop bringing up 'he has a history of cheating'? 10 years? 20 years? 30 years? 50 years? He had played at a way more serious events, and still the only 'evidence' of cheating is his relatively good performance. Until someone comes up with an explanation how he is able to cheat with games streamed with delay and after metal detector scanner, I suggest treating Carlsen's behavior as tantrums of a person who can't take a loss. Also, whatever chess.com says about cheating online is irrelevant, as their methods are known to produce a lot of false positives. Additionally, since recently chess.com is in business relationship with Carlsen, so they can hardly be counted as an independent party in all of this.
      - OkayPhysicist 4y ago
        > What a person did at 16 years old is hardly relevant now That argument works better when someone's 25 than when they're 19. This isn't the distant past, this is 3 years ago. That's definitely recent enough to be a black mark on his reputation. On the other side, the main person who's suspicious of them isn't some internet random. It's the world greatest chess player, which should is decidedly a mark in one's favor reputation-wise. This is the very basis of how reputation works. You slowly establish reputation by having a track record of positive behavior, you rapidly tarnish reputation by having a track record of negative behavior, and when you are making judgements based on limited information about the activity at hand, you trust the more trustworthy. Think of how much good will Microsoft has had to build in the last 10 years to try and make up for the 20 before that. Think of the fable of the boy who cried wolf. Trusting those who have earned it and distrusting those who have wronged before is basic society 101.
        Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
        The "sin" he committed was playing no stakes online blitz, and you are projecting this 'mark' on his reputation to a professional over the board tournament with anticheating measures. The tournament organisers were very confident that no cheating took place at the event. To me it is a rather closed case. Regarding Carlsen's behavior, so far it looks like he has grown a very big ego. Not interested in a second championship match with Nepo, throwing tantrums against an up and coming player who defeated him. Maybe he's feeling he is losing his edge against a new generation of players, and doesn't like it.
  - vintermann 4y ago
    I have heard a concrete allegation that in the Capablanca Memorial 2022 tournament (which was over the board), Niemann has games where he plays normally up to a point in the midgame, then he plays the top line of a specific engine (Stockfish 11) for an implausible number of moves in sequence. There are a lot of lower-quality accusations, but this is the interesting one IMO. It should be easy enough to independently check for someone who has a setup for that sort of thing.
    - not1ofU 4y ago
      ChessBruh mentioned that this youtube channel has analysis of Hans' Games, focusing on centipawn loses after standard openers are filtered out: https://www.youtube.com/c/ChessfanMWP/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/ChessfanMWP/videos The last 5 or so vids on that channel are in English, but youtube does a decent-ish translation of his other videos too.
      - vintermann 4y ago
        Yes, he is the source of that allegation. He is very hard to follow, though. He's not a great caster, and his accent is so thick that YouTube's automatic captioning misidentifies it as Russian.
  - nextlevelwizard 4y ago
    You mean over the board, right? Because he himself has admitted to cheating online twice, but if you think about it even a bit people don't just cheat once, then get caught, then couple years later repeat the process. Most likely he had cheated at least before and between the times he got caught.
    - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
      Whatever kids do online at 16 yo playing on a second-rate chess site (and chess.com is a second-rate) is hardly relevant to how they play over the board in a top level chess events.
  - smcl 4y ago
    In my experience, people who do do deceitful stuff - steal, lie and cheat - act quite predictably when confronted with their allegations: 1. I didn't cheat! 2. Ok yeah I cheated those times but I never did it again 3. GOTO 1 It seems we've gone through this cycle once already - where Niemann has admitted that he was caught cheating on two occasions in the past. And now chess.com are saying actually he has cheated more times than that, so we're seemingly going through this cycle at least once more: https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 This is very feelings-based but as an outsider who doesn't really play Chess and can't evaluate what happened on the board, it certainly doesn't look good. He's at very least been quite dishonest
    - fwsgonzo 4y ago
      This is exactly how it works. It's disappointing how many ifs and buts people are giving him just because they don't particularly like Carlsen. It really shows. Cheaters are serial cheaters, and they will deny deny deny. The problem is really that he has admitted to cheating more than once. There is a reason why sports and just about everything else employs zero-tolerance policies: It doesn't just happen once.
      - jpgvm 4y ago
        It can though. Kids can be young and make stupid mistakes. I'm not saying that is what happened here - I really don't follow chess enough to have an informed opinion on this specific case. However I object to the blanket opinion that there aren't people who cheated once and absolutely regretted it and never did it again, especially kids, especially online.
        smcl 4y ago
        On one level you're right, if you do something dishonest then admit it that doesn't automatically mean you're never to be trusted ever again. However I think the more times someone goes through the deny/concede cycle I described, the less trustworthy they are, especially if it's for exactly the same thing each time.
- rwmj 4y ago
  Is there any clue how he may be cheating? Apparently they have metal detectors at the events.
  - manojlds 4y ago
    Elon and others seems to think beads in the back.
    - JakDrako 4y ago
      "Hans could play even better with my Hyperpoop."
- Semaphor 4y ago
  > Hans has admitted to cheating online Several years ago. I think when he was 16? (Not saying that is when he cheated, but that’s when he admitted to cheating).
  - Akashic101 4y ago
    Hans as admitted to cheating on chess.com when he was 12 and 16, so not that long ago since he is only 19 right now.
    - vintermann 4y ago
      I know he admitted this in September 2022. What I can't find out (and Google makes damn near impossible to find out due to its recency bias) is when he first admitted this.
    - Keyframe 4y ago
      12, 16, and 19 are worlds apart.
      - willsmith72 4y ago
        16 and 19 aren't, and who's to say there's a 3 year gap there?
        Semaphor 4y ago
        I’d say 16 and 19 are further apart than 30 and 40 (said as a 36-year-old).
    - teekert 4y ago
      So he’s a kid exploring what he can get away with?
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
- ramraj07 4y ago
  As someone who’s never been able to appreciate or follow sports where a machine can be an order of magnitude better than a human, I would genuinely like to understand why people are enamored about such sports. In the end it seems like brilliant minds lost in math that’s not even novel anymore.. again everyone should do what they please, but this is just an academic question from someone unable to appreciate such skills or sports.
  - spoonjim 4y ago
    Aren't machines better than humans at most sports? Hand off a football to an Abrams tank and it's not getting tackled on its way to the goal line.
    - ramraj07 4y ago
      Absolutely. That’s why I’ve never been able to follow or watch any sport. Except maybe Ronny Sullivan playing snooker? Anyways the point is I have never been able to appreciate the value of sports as something you watch.
  - dane-pgp 4y ago
    Would you say it doesn't make sense to appreciate art because cameras exist? Actually, with the advent of image generating AIs, such questions become more relevant.
    - rglullis 4y ago
      Imagine a book, a ballet choreography, a movie entirely conceived and produced by an AI, which we collectively regard it as "art". Also imagine that, barring evidence of how the work was done, it is impossible for humans to distinguish if the work of art was produced by a human or an AI. Why should we, as "appreciators/consumers" of this art, care about how it was done? Do we think that a drawing made with the help with a computer "less artistic" than one drawn on paper? Also imagine that this AI is friendly and superhuman, and it is established that its works are aligned with our interests. All "art" produced by this AI inspires us to be better version of ourselves and enlighten us to help us solve our conflicts. In this scenario, why should we care about the work of one particular human vs another? The point that I am trying to make is that chess is already a reduced version of this hypothetical. Those that care about chess as a game will have little to learn by looking at humans. Those that want to improve their own game will do it by playing against/studying/interacting with the advancements in computers. There is very little left room for humans by themselves to show any new development in the game. As such, it seems to me that the ones interested in events related to human players are those who worry more about measuring humans against each other than in the game itself.
- Arnavion 4y ago
  Even if it turns out Niemann cheated, the way Carlsen is acting coy about it puts me off. The tweet was bad enough (unlike Mourinho he's clearly not in "big trouble" from his insinuation), but this resignation is such a publicity stunt.
  - dane-pgp 4y ago
    Maybe Carlsen doesn't know who to blame. He could suspect Niemann, or someone on Niemann's team, or someone in his own team, or a backdoor in Stockfish, or (depending on Carlsen's own mental health right now) space aliens. I can understand that out of an abundance of caution (and on the advice of his lawyers) he doesn't want to name anyone in particular, although seeing so many fingers pointed at Niemann (understandably, given his past) I do think Carlsen should at least release a statement saying "I don't want people accusing Niemann of cheating, that was not my intention".
    - morelisp 4y ago
      If there's any cheating, how could Niemann himself not be involved?
      - dane-pgp 4y ago
        Someone on Niemann's team could have been feeding him info which "coincidentally" happens to be very useful, without Niemann suspecting where the info came from. (A bug in Carlsen's hotel room?) Someone on Carlsen's team could be encouraging him to focus on lines which they've discovered (through a bug in the hotel room) that Niemann's team is preparing counters for. In both of these cases, the corrupt team member could be motivated by the possibility of winning a large bet on the outcome of the chess match, without either player being in on it. (I admit that the idea of Stockfish giving deliberately bad information only to Carlsen, to weaken his prep, is not very plausible, but we don't know how rational Carlsen is being here).
        morelisp 4y ago
        While these are both unsportsmanlike (and probably illegal) I'm not actually sure they're cheating.
- WastingMyTime89 4y ago
  I don’t understand why people are going out their way to justify Carlsen attitude. What we have is the world champion throwing a tantrum because he lost against a player there is absolutely no evidence has cheated against him and is now calling for him to be expelled despite having no evidence whatsoever. This is harassment pure and simple. The whole thing is disgraceful and reflects extremely badly on competitive chess.
  - romanovcode 4y ago
    >is now calling for him to be expelled He made no comment.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - WastingMyTime89 4y ago
      He just refused to play against him. You don’t need to talk to make a comment. I don’t understand how an adult can defend Magnus there. As a public figure his attitude is simply shocking.
      - alpaca128 4y ago
        You interpreting Carlsen's actions as "tantrum" and calling for measures against the other player has just as much evidence as there is for the cheating. For a public figure his response is unusually quiet and calm to me. Though I'm not into chess so I don't know how it is perceived from that angle.
        jagrsw 4y ago
        > unusually quiet and calm to me. The crux seems to be that a genetl(wo)man would either directly accuse, or remain silent. What M.Carlsen is doing is de-facto accusing while saying "don't look at me, I didn't say it out loud". It's so... un.. hacker.. style.
  - 4y ago
- CydeWeys 4y ago
  > As more evidence comes out, it seems that Hans has cheated a lot more than he admitted, and potentially over the board as well (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) This is being overstated. There's not any hard evidence suggesting he's been cheating over the board, and for such a potentially career-ruining allegation you'd want some pretty strong evidence.
  - Consultant32452 4y ago
    What does the expression "over the board" mean?
    - viscanti 4y ago
      Playing on a physical chess board instead of on the computer.
    - a_bored_husky 4y ago
      Face to face.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - emmelaich 4y ago
      Not online, i.e. face to face.
    - howeyc 4y ago
      offline / in-person
    - icemelt8 4y ago
      offline chess, in person with a real board.
  - o_nate 4y ago
    Not being that familiar with the chess culture, it's weird to me that the distinction of "over the board" vs "online" seems to carry so much weight. Is it considered more acceptable to cheat online than "over the board"? I would think cheating is cheating.
- addicted 4y ago
  There is nothing that can help Magnus’s case because Magnus has made no case. He played Hans at the meltwater tournament, and beat him. A few weeks later, he played Hans again at the Sinquefeld cup, and lost to him. After which he posted a cryptic Jose Mourinho meme. And a few weeks later he played Hans online and resigned in 1 move. What’s Magnus’s case? What has he said his case is? What’s his argument? That losing to Hans was too traumatic for him and that he can’t play him anymore? Because he had no problem playing him while he was still winning against him.
  - greyman 4y ago
    >After which he posted a cryptic Jose Mourinho meme AND left the tournament, which he never did before, and it almost never happens that someone leaves the tournament without stating why. Magnus case is, that he accuses Niemann of cheating, it is very simple. :-) He didn't say that, but he acted like that, he communicated it with his actions.
    - bosie 4y ago
      > He didn't say that, but he acted like that, he communicated it with his actions. couldn't it be something else that is causing grief between the two?
- CrazyStat 4y ago
  > (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) Ken Regan, who is the world expert on identifying engine-assisted cheating in chess, disagrees [1]. No offense to random YouTube creator but I'll trust Regan's analysis over Chess fan MWP. [1] https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world-renowned-expert-ken-regan-analyzes https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world...
kareemsabri 4y ago
Kind of a basic question but how do you cheat at chess, especially "over the board" ?
- century19 4y ago
  Using a computer. Have been examples of devices hidden in toilets, that kind of thing.
- oefnak 4y ago
  Use a computer to calculate your moves.
- cupofjoakim 4y ago
  There are many ways. You need outside help for everything though - you need someone to input the current board state into some kind of chess engine, and then relay the best possible move back to you somehow. There have been cases where someone has hidden a phone in the bathrooms to use for either communicating or inputting into a chess engine themselves. In Niemanns case people have joked about vibrating anal beads communicating in morse code as well as shoe inserts.
  - moralestapia 4y ago
    And all of those are extremely easy to prevent/spot in a tournament setting. Carlsen is just throwing a tantrum here, IMO. Sore loser.
  - kareemsabri 4y ago
    Wow, this goes deep!
    - rendall 4y ago
      Well done!
  - KingMob 4y ago
    The shoe insert has actually been built, though I haven't heard if it, or something similar, has been used in real cheating yet. It's a shoe-to-Pi device called Sockfish (a pun on the Stockfish chess engine): https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/sockfish.html https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/sockfish.html
nkzd 4y ago
Interesting to see a prominent figure like Magnus acting childish. Brings them down to the level of the rest of us mortals.
- bongobingo1 4y ago
  > Interesting to see a prominent figure ~~like Magnus~~ acting childish Is it?
- finikytou 4y ago
  chess is everything for him he gave it his life. I wonder how you will react when you deeply convinced that what is the dearest for you has been taken away by what you believe is 100% a cheater?
  - nkzd 4y ago
    If you are deeply convinced someone is a cheater why not come out with a proper, official statement? Resigning like this is immature and ridiculous.
    - finikytou 4y ago
      its hard to prove. lets say you played millions of games, you deeply understand how a human mind plays chess but you can't write it down you just know it because it is your art and you practice it everyday for the major part of your life. How do you explain to someone else this conviction?
    - vintermann 4y ago
      This has been answered many times. He probably has deals regarding what kind of public statements he can make for a while, in connection with the sale of his company.
- jstx1 4y ago
  I'm not seeing any childishness in what he's done.
tromp 4y ago
Applying sound statistical methods to thousands of Niemann games, cheating expert Ken Regan finds no evidence of cheating [1]. > The verdict > Dr. Regan analyzed all of Hans Niemann's games over the last two years, including online games, such as played on Chess.com and their events, and his conclusion is there is no reason whatsoever to suspect him of cheating. The wide range of results in a bell curve, with some good and some bad, is actually a sign of a healthy distribution of results. Many of the so-called points of suspicion are in fact quite normal and suspicion is really the result of faulty analysis by zealous amateurs. Even online his play has been quite devoid of anything unusual. [1] https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world-renowned-expert-ken-regan-analyzes https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world...
- nhinck2 4y ago
  Even his online play where he admitted to cheating?
  - freddie_mercury 4y ago
    The online cheating occurred more than 2 years ago. The analysis covered the past 2 years. Not that hard to reconcile......
  - CydeWeys 4y ago
    "Dr. Regan analyzed all of Hans Niemann's games over the last two years."
- tibbar 4y ago
  This is a strong point in Hans's favor, and Regan is very reputable, but he's also going against the Chess.com team (and Hans himself!) in claiming that he finds no evidence of Hans cheating *online* either.
  - mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
    His analysis is on games in the last two years, and Hans' admitted cheating online is before that.
xiphias2 4y ago
I love what Magnus is doing. Of course can't accuse Hans of cheating, because AlphaZero works much more similar to humans than alpha-beta search. The article shows the amount of pressure tournament organizers are putting on him, but nowdays the money is in streaming more than in tournaments.
- radarsat1 4y ago
  > because AlphaZero works much more similar to humans than alpha-beta search. Just curious, what do you base that on? Is there a relevant article? If so I'd love to read it.
  - xiphias2 4y ago
    I think the best is just to listen to videos of Demis Hassabis (Lex Friedman interview was great as well). He loves to talk about how much it shocked the go community when AlphaGo created new moves / strategies that humans could learn as opposed to just brute force search algorithms. And of course it translated to chess as well somewhat. https://www.fnac.pt/Game-Changer-AlphaZero-s-Groundbreaking-Chess-Strategies-and-the-Promise-of-AI-Matthew-Sadler/a6682646 https://www.fnac.pt/Game-Changer-AlphaZero-s-Groundbreaking-...
  - hackinthebochs 4y ago
    Broadly speaking, NN based engines make more human looking moves compared to rule-based evaluations: https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~ashton/pubs/maia-kdd2020.pdf https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~ashton/pubs/maia-kdd2020.pdf
    - xiphias2 4y ago
      It looks cool if Maia can make difference between a human vs Leela playing, it would be interesting to see if it can find cheating.
- aaron695 4y ago
mellosouls 4y ago
Yesterday, also discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32901249 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32901249
Mathmanjetson 4y ago
frankjr 4y ago
More context: https://old.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/xii9dz/champions_chess_tour_magnus_resigned_a_game/ip3f9p0/ https://old.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/xii9dz/cham...
- systemvoltage 4y ago
  Magnus has made spectacular blunders of embarrassing levels in the past and after world champion title. It just shows he is human. Chess players cannot be just treated like exact subjects in an experiment, especially with a sample size of 1 and std deviation of infinity. Noise factors are too many and sample size needed to account for that is huge. Also current rating is not a reliable measure. Many young players are rising and they climb by beating players stronger than them.
  - davidguetta 4y ago
    You can use the rating computed on a shorter time period
jeroenhd 4y ago
I don't follow chess. I've heard of Carlsen in passing but that's about it. As far as I can make up from this story, Niemann admitted to cheating online as a child (not exactly uncommon) but as of yet there's not an ounce of proof that he cheated against Carlsen. What I don't understand is that people just take Carlsen's side without any proof. Some guy beat Carlsen so he must be cheating? What kind of reasoning is that? Surely the hyper-analytical chess community can provide some kind of statistic to prove that he cheated in the match against Carlsen? A comparison with Stockfish and friends in various combinations, perhaps? _Something_ more than "he beat the best of the best that one time therefore he's a cheating liar". Until Carlsen and his friends can provide proof of cheating, I can only conclude that Niemann is now the superior chess player. He has now beaten Carlsen twice; once for real, once by Carlsen's resignation.
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  People have done copious analyses of his game with Carlsen and found no evidence of cheating. And analyses of his tournament play the last two years have also not turned up anything suspicious, suggesting his meteoric rise in rating has been genuine.
- mayankkaizen 4y ago
  I don't follow chess much except for some headlines. Carlson is legend and Niemann practically nobody. This is very common tendency to side with legends in any field. But in this case, it is not like Carlson lost the game only for the first time so his accusations against Niemann does carry some weight, especially when Niemann himself admitted to cheating (albeit when he was a kid). Since I am totally unaware of Chess world, my first hunch would be 'Carlsen may be right' but I don't want Niemann's career to be destroyed simply based on that hunch. That is where evidence matters. But yes, Carlsen should be careful because if it turns out he made accusations out of nothing or out of spite, his entire reputation is at stake. I hope Carlsen made those accusations based on something solid.
- YetAnotherNick 4y ago
  There are other suspicious things as well like fast unusual jump in rating, not having any formal training or group, few suspicious interviews, chess.com saying he cheated in more rounds than he admitted to and not to mention proved cheating online. While any one of them is not a proof of cheating, he has got many unusual things about him.
wheresmycraisin 4y ago
Magnus Carlsen has basically been a model champion for close to a decade now. He's not known for controversy and the odd situations where he dealt with less-than-classy opponents, he's taken it on the chin and moved on, usually with nothing more than brief statement. And he has been very positive about other younger GM's. So him coming out and "accusing" Niemann is akin to a nobel prize winning scientist accusing a graduate student of plagiarism... even if chess cheating isn't very provable, I have to take Magnus seriously and give him a giant benefit of the doubt, he's earned it.
- H8crilA 4y ago
  What? Just because of reputation? What are you even talking about... Have you ever heard of "innocent until proven guilty"? The burden of proof is on the accuser. We should be shown evidence, or Carlsen should apologize.
  - vasco 4y ago
    Turns out if someone acts in a way for years people start to believe they'll act the same way later on. Crazy.
  - NotYourLawyer 4y ago
    It’s not a court of law, and the kid has cheated before.
  - eschatology 4y ago
    It's just a principle, used in some laws in some legal systems in some countries — nothing dictates all accusations made on the planet has to abide by "innocent until proven guilty" principle. Nothing dictates that burden of proof is always on the accuser, especially in the internet where there isn't really any authority or agreements on subjects like this. It's just a statement/opinion by grandparent and it baffles me why presumption of innocence is even brought up like it's something to be held everywhere.
    - concinds 4y ago
bayesian_horse 4y ago
I found the speculation about anal beads hilariously entertaining. Now whenever a colleague stumbles to find an answers I have to suppress the urge to say something to the effect of "Did the anal beads' batteries run out?"
- zimpenfish 4y ago
  > I found the speculation about anal beads hilariously entertaining. Especially since AFAICT it seems to have come from a clearly joke Reddit post[1] about how they discovered the cheating because Carlsen's own anal beads were vibrating in the match... [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/chessmemes/comments/x8217h/the_real_answer_is_actually_elementary_magnus/ https://www.reddit.com/r/chessmemes/comments/x8217h/the_real...
  - Tenoke 4y ago
    It comes from a twitch follower saying it as a joke in the chessbrah stream and GM Eric Hansen running with the joke. It's never been a serious theory even if mainstream media and Colbert or Trevor Noah make it seem like it is for views. This reddit post is just someone else running with the joke later by saying that Magnus also uses them.
peter_retief 4y ago
I need to know a lot more about this before I make up my mind. There is definitely something amiss. Carlsen might be over reacting but he seems to have very strong suspicions. Look forward to the sequel, chess is in an exciting space.
huijzer 4y ago
A possible explanation I haven’t seen yet is that Magnus his second move is meant as a test. It reminds me of the old days where a chess computer would take much longer for an uncommon move at the start than a common move. Maybe Magnus was testing the response of Hans to his uncommon move and wasn’t pleased with the result? I don’t think that Magnus his behaviour is random. I mean he is literally a chess player.
- morelisp 4y ago
  AIUI you need to make at least one move before resigning and you can only resign on your turn. Magnus resigned as early as possible.
- __s 4y ago
  At the top level Nf6 is the most popular response to d4. & 2. c4 the most popular response to 1. d4 Nf6
- marcusbuffett 4y ago
  Are you talking about this most recent game? Because the move he played was 1… Nf6, after 1.d4, which is one of the top three responses to d4, called the King’s Indian. Whether Hans is cheating or not, there’s zero chance he doesn’t know what to do against a King’s Indian. Magnus plays some off-the-wall openings and I think he could use it as a bit of a test like you’re saying, but this one wasn’t one of them
jokabrink 4y ago
Two peculiar side notes here: 1) The first three and only moves of this game at Julius Bär Generation Cup with Niemann as white is the same opening as the first controversial game (2022-09-05) at the Sinquefield Cup but with flipped sides (Magnus white). 2) Chess.com, the organization that decided to ban Niemann [1] sometime between these two games based on his online play behaviour on that platform, just bought Play Magnus (a competitor to chess.com that Magnus formed) less than a month ago and is in the state of merging. [2] - [1] https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 - [2] https://www.chess.com/news/view/chesscom-playmagnus https://www.chess.com/news/view/chesscom-playmagnus
- nottorp 4y ago
  Then I guess he's not allowed to disparage his buyer by the sales contract, or something like that. And probably won't be for some years.
aaron695 4y ago
jongjong 4y ago
Surely they can install a device to detect unusual radio signals at such chess tournaments to put any accusations to rest.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
SilverBirch 4y ago
I just don't know how this can possibly be resolved. It's not possible to prove Niemann cheated, especially after the fact, and you can't ban him if he's not been proven to cheat. I think the only productive thing going forward will be an absurd level of checks to deter cheats. I mean literally you would have to have airport style security for Chess matches. I don't think that's going to happen. So what's going to happen? Just Magnus always resigning against this one player? And if he really is cheating then Chess is going to turn into Cycling - a sport where everyone is cheating, it's an open secret and the whole thing is pointless.
- origin_path 4y ago
  Wasn't this an online game? You'd think it'd be much easier to cheat in such contexts. Airport security is irrelevant if both sides play from their own chosen locations. Maybe the first step is to not use online matches anymore, or at least require both participants to agree to them.
  - SilverBirch 4y ago
    The first match was in person, obviously it's easier to cheat online but that's kind of secondary to the fact that Magnusson clearly already thinks the guy is a cheat. Obviously everyone can discount online games based on the ease of cheating.
davidguetta 4y ago
Even Karpov said he played badly in the Sinquefield game. Personally I think Hans didn't cheat in this game ...... but: my best theory is that Carlsen is afraid to play against people who HAVE cheated once, because there mere thought that he COULD be cheating right now is enough to derail him from clear thinking. I think this because it's exactly what he declared in an interview ABOUT cheating on 2021. So basically he's boycotting someone as a message for other cheaters and, even if hans is innocent, and keep Chess clean. It's of unfair for Hans if he's not cheating but ... what is a fair justice anyway ? There's always a message sent by a sentence.
- puffoflogic 4y ago
  I like this explanation because unlike all the other theories that have been rehashed in this thread from previously, it actually explains the most recent game. Possibly Carlsen thought he was psychologically capable of playing this game and then discovered after a couple moves that he wasn't.
yakkomajuri 4y ago
Note: I know little about chess but this story captivated me. I think basing most of the argument on the fact that Niemann has cheated as a kid is not very solid. Even our laws take age into account. Plus from my _personal_ experience highly gifted kids are known to "push boundaries" during their upbringing to test their capacity. I also don't weigh too much into the "he doesn't analyze like a 2700" argument. I know a very good chess player that could never explain very well why things should be done a certain way. Plus the analysis referred to is in a quite unnatural setting for a chess player. A final point I want to bring up is that I also instinctively saw this as Carlsen "throwing a tantrum". However, others have been quick to point out that Carlsen has routinely been humble in defeat, praising his opponents. What nobody has mentioned though is that having retired from the world championships, his new stated goal is to reach 2900. With a rating-based goal like such, losing to a sub-2700 player is not only a blow to the ego but also the Elo, which is something that could tip someone over the line. That one loss put Magnus back significantly from his goal, if my understanding is correct. Anyway, I recognize the chess community gives Magnus the benefit of the doubt, and I can see how he might deserve it. But this certainly needs more than just speculation.
pks016 4y ago
I mean, it's a personal decision of Magnus not to play someone who cheated before. Maybe he got to know something about Hans after the game he lost. Possible theories: cheating impossible to prove or prep leak.

176 points by akbarnama 4y ago

For context, Magnus withdrew from a major tournament last month after losing to Hans. He has not made a statement, but it is understood that he suspects Hans of cheating. Hans has admitted to cheating online, though he denies cheating in person. As more evidence comes out, it seems that Hans has cheated a lot more than he admitted, and potentially over the board as well (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) This all helps Magnus's case. I think it is likely that Hans will be slowly barred, silently or openly, from tournaments and venues all over the world. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pwtC0bH--A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pwtC0bH--A

systemvoltage 4y ago
This is a very uncharitable opinion that’s pretending to be a summary of a complex situation. Follow discussions on r/chess and people like GothamChess, PowerPlayChess. Facts and very little speculation. Evidence is needed.
Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
> As more evidence comes out I haven't seen evidence of Neumann's cheating, as is claimed in this comment. Only allegations, which do not look very strong to me.
- tibbar 4y ago
  There are two lines of evidence: first regarding his cheating online, which is easier to do and easier to check. Chess.com banned Hans and put out a statement saying that Hans cheated more often and more seriously than he claimed. [1] The second line of inquiry is statistical analyses of Hans's over-the-board games. See my original comment for one such analysis, but he really has been playing at an absurd level in some games (performing as well 0 centipawn loss against some engines!) It's not a good look. [1] https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352
  - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
    What a person did at 16 years old is hardly relevant now, and it is definitely immoral to keep bringing it up without new evidence. How long would it take for people like you to stop bringing up 'he has a history of cheating'? 10 years? 20 years? 30 years? 50 years? He had played at a way more serious events, and still the only 'evidence' of cheating is his relatively good performance. Until someone comes up with an explanation how he is able to cheat with games streamed with delay and after metal detector scanner, I suggest treating Carlsen's behavior as tantrums of a person who can't take a loss. Also, whatever chess.com says about cheating online is irrelevant, as their methods are known to produce a lot of false positives. Additionally, since recently chess.com is in business relationship with Carlsen, so they can hardly be counted as an independent party in all of this.
    - OkayPhysicist 4y ago
      > What a person did at 16 years old is hardly relevant now That argument works better when someone's 25 than when they're 19. This isn't the distant past, this is 3 years ago. That's definitely recent enough to be a black mark on his reputation. On the other side, the main person who's suspicious of them isn't some internet random. It's the world greatest chess player, which should is decidedly a mark in one's favor reputation-wise. This is the very basis of how reputation works. You slowly establish reputation by having a track record of positive behavior, you rapidly tarnish reputation by having a track record of negative behavior, and when you are making judgements based on limited information about the activity at hand, you trust the more trustworthy. Think of how much good will Microsoft has had to build in the last 10 years to try and make up for the 20 before that. Think of the fable of the boy who cried wolf. Trusting those who have earned it and distrusting those who have wronged before is basic society 101.
      - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
        The "sin" he committed was playing no stakes online blitz, and you are projecting this 'mark' on his reputation to a professional over the board tournament with anticheating measures. The tournament organisers were very confident that no cheating took place at the event. To me it is a rather closed case. Regarding Carlsen's behavior, so far it looks like he has grown a very big ego. Not interested in a second championship match with Nepo, throwing tantrums against an up and coming player who defeated him. Maybe he's feeling he is losing his edge against a new generation of players, and doesn't like it.
- vintermann 4y ago
  I have heard a concrete allegation that in the Capablanca Memorial 2022 tournament (which was over the board), Niemann has games where he plays normally up to a point in the midgame, then he plays the top line of a specific engine (Stockfish 11) for an implausible number of moves in sequence. There are a lot of lower-quality accusations, but this is the interesting one IMO. It should be easy enough to independently check for someone who has a setup for that sort of thing.
  - not1ofU 4y ago
    ChessBruh mentioned that this youtube channel has analysis of Hans' Games, focusing on centipawn loses after standard openers are filtered out: https://www.youtube.com/c/ChessfanMWP/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/ChessfanMWP/videos The last 5 or so vids on that channel are in English, but youtube does a decent-ish translation of his other videos too.
    - vintermann 4y ago
      Yes, he is the source of that allegation. He is very hard to follow, though. He's not a great caster, and his accent is so thick that YouTube's automatic captioning misidentifies it as Russian.
- nextlevelwizard 4y ago
  You mean over the board, right? Because he himself has admitted to cheating online twice, but if you think about it even a bit people don't just cheat once, then get caught, then couple years later repeat the process. Most likely he had cheated at least before and between the times he got caught.
  - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
    Whatever kids do online at 16 yo playing on a second-rate chess site (and chess.com is a second-rate) is hardly relevant to how they play over the board in a top level chess events.
- smcl 4y ago
  In my experience, people who do do deceitful stuff - steal, lie and cheat - act quite predictably when confronted with their allegations: 1. I didn't cheat! 2. Ok yeah I cheated those times but I never did it again 3. GOTO 1 It seems we've gone through this cycle once already - where Niemann has admitted that he was caught cheating on two occasions in the past. And now chess.com are saying actually he has cheated more times than that, so we're seemingly going through this cycle at least once more: https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 This is very feelings-based but as an outsider who doesn't really play Chess and can't evaluate what happened on the board, it certainly doesn't look good. He's at very least been quite dishonest
  - fwsgonzo 4y ago
    This is exactly how it works. It's disappointing how many ifs and buts people are giving him just because they don't particularly like Carlsen. It really shows. Cheaters are serial cheaters, and they will deny deny deny. The problem is really that he has admitted to cheating more than once. There is a reason why sports and just about everything else employs zero-tolerance policies: It doesn't just happen once.
    - jpgvm 4y ago
      It can though. Kids can be young and make stupid mistakes. I'm not saying that is what happened here - I really don't follow chess enough to have an informed opinion on this specific case. However I object to the blanket opinion that there aren't people who cheated once and absolutely regretted it and never did it again, especially kids, especially online.
      - smcl 4y ago
        On one level you're right, if you do something dishonest then admit it that doesn't automatically mean you're never to be trusted ever again. However I think the more times someone goes through the deny/concede cycle I described, the less trustworthy they are, especially if it's for exactly the same thing each time.
rwmj 4y ago
Is there any clue how he may be cheating? Apparently they have metal detectors at the events.
- manojlds 4y ago
  Elon and others seems to think beads in the back.
  - JakDrako 4y ago
    "Hans could play even better with my Hyperpoop."
Semaphor 4y ago
> Hans has admitted to cheating online Several years ago. I think when he was 16? (Not saying that is when he cheated, but that’s when he admitted to cheating).
- Akashic101 4y ago
  Hans as admitted to cheating on chess.com when he was 12 and 16, so not that long ago since he is only 19 right now.
  - vintermann 4y ago
    I know he admitted this in September 2022. What I can't find out (and Google makes damn near impossible to find out due to its recency bias) is when he first admitted this.
  - Keyframe 4y ago
    12, 16, and 19 are worlds apart.
    - willsmith72 4y ago
      16 and 19 aren't, and who's to say there's a 3 year gap there?
      - Semaphor 4y ago
        I’d say 16 and 19 are further apart than 30 and 40 (said as a 36-year-old).
  - teekert 4y ago
    So he’s a kid exploring what he can get away with?
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
ramraj07 4y ago
As someone who’s never been able to appreciate or follow sports where a machine can be an order of magnitude better than a human, I would genuinely like to understand why people are enamored about such sports. In the end it seems like brilliant minds lost in math that’s not even novel anymore.. again everyone should do what they please, but this is just an academic question from someone unable to appreciate such skills or sports.
- spoonjim 4y ago
  Aren't machines better than humans at most sports? Hand off a football to an Abrams tank and it's not getting tackled on its way to the goal line.
  - ramraj07 4y ago
    Absolutely. That’s why I’ve never been able to follow or watch any sport. Except maybe Ronny Sullivan playing snooker? Anyways the point is I have never been able to appreciate the value of sports as something you watch.
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  Would you say it doesn't make sense to appreciate art because cameras exist? Actually, with the advent of image generating AIs, such questions become more relevant.
  - rglullis 4y ago
    Imagine a book, a ballet choreography, a movie entirely conceived and produced by an AI, which we collectively regard it as "art". Also imagine that, barring evidence of how the work was done, it is impossible for humans to distinguish if the work of art was produced by a human or an AI. Why should we, as "appreciators/consumers" of this art, care about how it was done? Do we think that a drawing made with the help with a computer "less artistic" than one drawn on paper? Also imagine that this AI is friendly and superhuman, and it is established that its works are aligned with our interests. All "art" produced by this AI inspires us to be better version of ourselves and enlighten us to help us solve our conflicts. In this scenario, why should we care about the work of one particular human vs another? The point that I am trying to make is that chess is already a reduced version of this hypothetical. Those that care about chess as a game will have little to learn by looking at humans. Those that want to improve their own game will do it by playing against/studying/interacting with the advancements in computers. There is very little left room for humans by themselves to show any new development in the game. As such, it seems to me that the ones interested in events related to human players are those who worry more about measuring humans against each other than in the game itself.
Arnavion 4y ago
Even if it turns out Niemann cheated, the way Carlsen is acting coy about it puts me off. The tweet was bad enough (unlike Mourinho he's clearly not in "big trouble" from his insinuation), but this resignation is such a publicity stunt.
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  Maybe Carlsen doesn't know who to blame. He could suspect Niemann, or someone on Niemann's team, or someone in his own team, or a backdoor in Stockfish, or (depending on Carlsen's own mental health right now) space aliens. I can understand that out of an abundance of caution (and on the advice of his lawyers) he doesn't want to name anyone in particular, although seeing so many fingers pointed at Niemann (understandably, given his past) I do think Carlsen should at least release a statement saying "I don't want people accusing Niemann of cheating, that was not my intention".
  - morelisp 4y ago
    If there's any cheating, how could Niemann himself not be involved?
    - dane-pgp 4y ago
      Someone on Niemann's team could have been feeding him info which "coincidentally" happens to be very useful, without Niemann suspecting where the info came from. (A bug in Carlsen's hotel room?) Someone on Carlsen's team could be encouraging him to focus on lines which they've discovered (through a bug in the hotel room) that Niemann's team is preparing counters for. In both of these cases, the corrupt team member could be motivated by the possibility of winning a large bet on the outcome of the chess match, without either player being in on it. (I admit that the idea of Stockfish giving deliberately bad information only to Carlsen, to weaken his prep, is not very plausible, but we don't know how rational Carlsen is being here).
      - morelisp 4y ago
        While these are both unsportsmanlike (and probably illegal) I'm not actually sure they're cheating.
WastingMyTime89 4y ago
I don’t understand why people are going out their way to justify Carlsen attitude. What we have is the world champion throwing a tantrum because he lost against a player there is absolutely no evidence has cheated against him and is now calling for him to be expelled despite having no evidence whatsoever. This is harassment pure and simple. The whole thing is disgraceful and reflects extremely badly on competitive chess.
- romanovcode 4y ago
  >is now calling for him to be expelled He made no comment.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - WastingMyTime89 4y ago
    He just refused to play against him. You don’t need to talk to make a comment. I don’t understand how an adult can defend Magnus there. As a public figure his attitude is simply shocking.
    - alpaca128 4y ago
      You interpreting Carlsen's actions as "tantrum" and calling for measures against the other player has just as much evidence as there is for the cheating. For a public figure his response is unusually quiet and calm to me. Though I'm not into chess so I don't know how it is perceived from that angle.
      - jagrsw 4y ago
        > unusually quiet and calm to me. The crux seems to be that a genetl(wo)man would either directly accuse, or remain silent. What M.Carlsen is doing is de-facto accusing while saying "don't look at me, I didn't say it out loud". It's so... un.. hacker.. style.
- 4y ago
CydeWeys 4y ago
> As more evidence comes out, it seems that Hans has cheated a lot more than he admitted, and potentially over the board as well (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) This is being overstated. There's not any hard evidence suggesting he's been cheating over the board, and for such a potentially career-ruining allegation you'd want some pretty strong evidence.
- Consultant32452 4y ago
  What does the expression "over the board" mean?
  - viscanti 4y ago
    Playing on a physical chess board instead of on the computer.
  - a_bored_husky 4y ago
    Face to face.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - emmelaich 4y ago
    Not online, i.e. face to face.
  - howeyc 4y ago
    offline / in-person
  - icemelt8 4y ago
    offline chess, in person with a real board.
- o_nate 4y ago
  Not being that familiar with the chess culture, it's weird to me that the distinction of "over the board" vs "online" seems to carry so much weight. Is it considered more acceptable to cheat online than "over the board"? I would think cheating is cheating.
addicted 4y ago
There is nothing that can help Magnus’s case because Magnus has made no case. He played Hans at the meltwater tournament, and beat him. A few weeks later, he played Hans again at the Sinquefeld cup, and lost to him. After which he posted a cryptic Jose Mourinho meme. And a few weeks later he played Hans online and resigned in 1 move. What’s Magnus’s case? What has he said his case is? What’s his argument? That losing to Hans was too traumatic for him and that he can’t play him anymore? Because he had no problem playing him while he was still winning against him.
- greyman 4y ago
  >After which he posted a cryptic Jose Mourinho meme AND left the tournament, which he never did before, and it almost never happens that someone leaves the tournament without stating why. Magnus case is, that he accuses Niemann of cheating, it is very simple. :-) He didn't say that, but he acted like that, he communicated it with his actions.
  - bosie 4y ago
    > He didn't say that, but he acted like that, he communicated it with his actions. couldn't it be something else that is causing grief between the two?
CrazyStat 4y ago
> (for example, this analysis [1] shows that he's playing at superhuman levels in some games.) Ken Regan, who is the world expert on identifying engine-assisted cheating in chess, disagrees [1]. No offense to random YouTube creator but I'll trust Regan's analysis over Chess fan MWP. [1] https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world-renowned-expert-ken-regan-analyzes https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world...

kareemsabri 4y ago

Kind of a basic question but how do you cheat at chess, especially "over the board" ?

century19 4y ago
Using a computer. Have been examples of devices hidden in toilets, that kind of thing.
oefnak 4y ago
Use a computer to calculate your moves.
cupofjoakim 4y ago
There are many ways. You need outside help for everything though - you need someone to input the current board state into some kind of chess engine, and then relay the best possible move back to you somehow. There have been cases where someone has hidden a phone in the bathrooms to use for either communicating or inputting into a chess engine themselves. In Niemanns case people have joked about vibrating anal beads communicating in morse code as well as shoe inserts.
- moralestapia 4y ago
  And all of those are extremely easy to prevent/spot in a tournament setting. Carlsen is just throwing a tantrum here, IMO. Sore loser.
- kareemsabri 4y ago
  Wow, this goes deep!
  - rendall 4y ago
    Well done!
- KingMob 4y ago
  The shoe insert has actually been built, though I haven't heard if it, or something similar, has been used in real cheating yet. It's a shoe-to-Pi device called Sockfish (a pun on the Stockfish chess engine): https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/sockfish.html https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/sockfish.html

nkzd 4y ago

Interesting to see a prominent figure like Magnus acting childish. Brings them down to the level of the rest of us mortals.

bongobingo1 4y ago
> Interesting to see a prominent figure ~~like Magnus~~ acting childish Is it?
finikytou 4y ago
chess is everything for him he gave it his life. I wonder how you will react when you deeply convinced that what is the dearest for you has been taken away by what you believe is 100% a cheater?
- nkzd 4y ago
  If you are deeply convinced someone is a cheater why not come out with a proper, official statement? Resigning like this is immature and ridiculous.
  - finikytou 4y ago
    its hard to prove. lets say you played millions of games, you deeply understand how a human mind plays chess but you can't write it down you just know it because it is your art and you practice it everyday for the major part of your life. How do you explain to someone else this conviction?
  - vintermann 4y ago
    This has been answered many times. He probably has deals regarding what kind of public statements he can make for a while, in connection with the sale of his company.
jstx1 4y ago
I'm not seeing any childishness in what he's done.

tromp 4y ago

Applying sound statistical methods to thousands of Niemann games, cheating expert Ken Regan finds no evidence of cheating [1]. > The verdict > Dr. Regan analyzed all of Hans Niemann's games over the last two years, including online games, such as played on Chess.com and their events, and his conclusion is there is no reason whatsoever to suspect him of cheating. The wide range of results in a bell curve, with some good and some bad, is actually a sign of a healthy distribution of results. Many of the so-called points of suspicion are in fact quite normal and suspicion is really the result of faulty analysis by zealous amateurs. Even online his play has been quite devoid of anything unusual. [1] https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world-renowned-expert-ken-regan-analyzes https://en.chessbase.com/post/is-hans-niemann-cheating-world...

nhinck2 4y ago
Even his online play where he admitted to cheating?
- freddie_mercury 4y ago
  The online cheating occurred more than 2 years ago. The analysis covered the past 2 years. Not that hard to reconcile......
- CydeWeys 4y ago
  "Dr. Regan analyzed all of Hans Niemann's games over the last two years."
tibbar 4y ago
This is a strong point in Hans's favor, and Regan is very reputable, but he's also going against the Chess.com team (and Hans himself!) in claiming that he finds no evidence of Hans cheating *online* either.
- mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
  His analysis is on games in the last two years, and Hans' admitted cheating online is before that.

xiphias2 4y ago

I love what Magnus is doing. Of course can't accuse Hans of cheating, because AlphaZero works much more similar to humans than alpha-beta search. The article shows the amount of pressure tournament organizers are putting on him, but nowdays the money is in streaming more than in tournaments.

radarsat1 4y ago
> because AlphaZero works much more similar to humans than alpha-beta search. Just curious, what do you base that on? Is there a relevant article? If so I'd love to read it.
- xiphias2 4y ago
  I think the best is just to listen to videos of Demis Hassabis (Lex Friedman interview was great as well). He loves to talk about how much it shocked the go community when AlphaGo created new moves / strategies that humans could learn as opposed to just brute force search algorithms. And of course it translated to chess as well somewhat. https://www.fnac.pt/Game-Changer-AlphaZero-s-Groundbreaking-Chess-Strategies-and-the-Promise-of-AI-Matthew-Sadler/a6682646 https://www.fnac.pt/Game-Changer-AlphaZero-s-Groundbreaking-...
- hackinthebochs 4y ago
  Broadly speaking, NN based engines make more human looking moves compared to rule-based evaluations: https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~ashton/pubs/maia-kdd2020.pdf https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~ashton/pubs/maia-kdd2020.pdf
  - xiphias2 4y ago
    It looks cool if Maia can make difference between a human vs Leela playing, it would be interesting to see if it can find cheating.
aaron695 4y ago

mellosouls 4y ago

Yesterday, also discussed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32901249 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32901249

Mathmanjetson 4y ago

frankjr 4y ago

More context: https://old.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/xii9dz/champions_chess_tour_magnus_resigned_a_game/ip3f9p0/ https://old.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/xii9dz/cham...

systemvoltage 4y ago
Magnus has made spectacular blunders of embarrassing levels in the past and after world champion title. It just shows he is human. Chess players cannot be just treated like exact subjects in an experiment, especially with a sample size of 1 and std deviation of infinity. Noise factors are too many and sample size needed to account for that is huge. Also current rating is not a reliable measure. Many young players are rising and they climb by beating players stronger than them.
- davidguetta 4y ago
  You can use the rating computed on a shorter time period

jeroenhd 4y ago

I don't follow chess. I've heard of Carlsen in passing but that's about it. As far as I can make up from this story, Niemann admitted to cheating online as a child (not exactly uncommon) but as of yet there's not an ounce of proof that he cheated against Carlsen. What I don't understand is that people just take Carlsen's side without any proof. Some guy beat Carlsen so he must be cheating? What kind of reasoning is that? Surely the hyper-analytical chess community can provide some kind of statistic to prove that he cheated in the match against Carlsen? A comparison with Stockfish and friends in various combinations, perhaps? _Something_ more than "he beat the best of the best that one time therefore he's a cheating liar". Until Carlsen and his friends can provide proof of cheating, I can only conclude that Niemann is now the superior chess player. He has now beaten Carlsen twice; once for real, once by Carlsen's resignation.

mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
People have done copious analyses of his game with Carlsen and found no evidence of cheating. And analyses of his tournament play the last two years have also not turned up anything suspicious, suggesting his meteoric rise in rating has been genuine.
mayankkaizen 4y ago
I don't follow chess much except for some headlines. Carlson is legend and Niemann practically nobody. This is very common tendency to side with legends in any field. But in this case, it is not like Carlson lost the game only for the first time so his accusations against Niemann does carry some weight, especially when Niemann himself admitted to cheating (albeit when he was a kid). Since I am totally unaware of Chess world, my first hunch would be 'Carlsen may be right' but I don't want Niemann's career to be destroyed simply based on that hunch. That is where evidence matters. But yes, Carlsen should be careful because if it turns out he made accusations out of nothing or out of spite, his entire reputation is at stake. I hope Carlsen made those accusations based on something solid.
YetAnotherNick 4y ago
There are other suspicious things as well like fast unusual jump in rating, not having any formal training or group, few suspicious interviews, chess.com saying he cheated in more rounds than he admitted to and not to mention proved cheating online. While any one of them is not a proof of cheating, he has got many unusual things about him.

wheresmycraisin 4y ago

Magnus Carlsen has basically been a model champion for close to a decade now. He's not known for controversy and the odd situations where he dealt with less-than-classy opponents, he's taken it on the chin and moved on, usually with nothing more than brief statement. And he has been very positive about other younger GM's. So him coming out and "accusing" Niemann is akin to a nobel prize winning scientist accusing a graduate student of plagiarism... even if chess cheating isn't very provable, I have to take Magnus seriously and give him a giant benefit of the doubt, he's earned it.

H8crilA 4y ago
What? Just because of reputation? What are you even talking about... Have you ever heard of "innocent until proven guilty"? The burden of proof is on the accuser. We should be shown evidence, or Carlsen should apologize.
- vasco 4y ago
  Turns out if someone acts in a way for years people start to believe they'll act the same way later on. Crazy.
- NotYourLawyer 4y ago
  It’s not a court of law, and the kid has cheated before.
- eschatology 4y ago
  It's just a principle, used in some laws in some legal systems in some countries — nothing dictates all accusations made on the planet has to abide by "innocent until proven guilty" principle. Nothing dictates that burden of proof is always on the accuser, especially in the internet where there isn't really any authority or agreements on subjects like this. It's just a statement/opinion by grandparent and it baffles me why presumption of innocence is even brought up like it's something to be held everywhere.
  - concinds 4y ago

bayesian_horse 4y ago

I found the speculation about anal beads hilariously entertaining. Now whenever a colleague stumbles to find an answers I have to suppress the urge to say something to the effect of "Did the anal beads' batteries run out?"

zimpenfish 4y ago
> I found the speculation about anal beads hilariously entertaining. Especially since AFAICT it seems to have come from a clearly joke Reddit post[1] about how they discovered the cheating because Carlsen's own anal beads were vibrating in the match... [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/chessmemes/comments/x8217h/the_real_answer_is_actually_elementary_magnus/ https://www.reddit.com/r/chessmemes/comments/x8217h/the_real...
- Tenoke 4y ago
  It comes from a twitch follower saying it as a joke in the chessbrah stream and GM Eric Hansen running with the joke. It's never been a serious theory even if mainstream media and Colbert or Trevor Noah make it seem like it is for views. This reddit post is just someone else running with the joke later by saying that Magnus also uses them.

peter_retief 4y ago

I need to know a lot more about this before I make up my mind. There is definitely something amiss. Carlsen might be over reacting but he seems to have very strong suspicions. Look forward to the sequel, chess is in an exciting space.

huijzer 4y ago

A possible explanation I haven’t seen yet is that Magnus his second move is meant as a test. It reminds me of the old days where a chess computer would take much longer for an uncommon move at the start than a common move. Maybe Magnus was testing the response of Hans to his uncommon move and wasn’t pleased with the result? I don’t think that Magnus his behaviour is random. I mean he is literally a chess player.

morelisp 4y ago
AIUI you need to make at least one move before resigning and you can only resign on your turn. Magnus resigned as early as possible.
__s 4y ago
At the top level Nf6 is the most popular response to d4. & 2. c4 the most popular response to 1. d4 Nf6
marcusbuffett 4y ago
Are you talking about this most recent game? Because the move he played was 1… Nf6, after 1.d4, which is one of the top three responses to d4, called the King’s Indian. Whether Hans is cheating or not, there’s zero chance he doesn’t know what to do against a King’s Indian. Magnus plays some off-the-wall openings and I think he could use it as a bit of a test like you’re saying, but this one wasn’t one of them

jokabrink 4y ago

Two peculiar side notes here: 1) The first three and only moves of this game at Julius Bär Generation Cup with Niemann as white is the same opening as the first controversial game (2022-09-05) at the Sinquefield Cup but with flipped sides (Magnus white). 2) Chess.com, the organization that decided to ban Niemann [1] sometime between these two games based on his online play behaviour on that platform, just bought Play Magnus (a competitor to chess.com that Magnus formed) less than a month ago and is in the state of merging. [2] - [1] https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 https://twitter.com/chesscom/status/1568010971616100352 - [2] https://www.chess.com/news/view/chesscom-playmagnus https://www.chess.com/news/view/chesscom-playmagnus

nottorp 4y ago
Then I guess he's not allowed to disparage his buyer by the sales contract, or something like that. And probably won't be for some years.

aaron695 4y ago

jongjong 4y ago

Surely they can install a device to detect unusual radio signals at such chess tournaments to put any accusations to rest.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

SilverBirch 4y ago

I just don't know how this can possibly be resolved. It's not possible to prove Niemann cheated, especially after the fact, and you can't ban him if he's not been proven to cheat. I think the only productive thing going forward will be an absurd level of checks to deter cheats. I mean literally you would have to have airport style security for Chess matches. I don't think that's going to happen. So what's going to happen? Just Magnus always resigning against this one player? And if he really is cheating then Chess is going to turn into Cycling - a sport where everyone is cheating, it's an open secret and the whole thing is pointless.

origin_path 4y ago
Wasn't this an online game? You'd think it'd be much easier to cheat in such contexts. Airport security is irrelevant if both sides play from their own chosen locations. Maybe the first step is to not use online matches anymore, or at least require both participants to agree to them.
- SilverBirch 4y ago
  The first match was in person, obviously it's easier to cheat online but that's kind of secondary to the fact that Magnusson clearly already thinks the guy is a cheat. Obviously everyone can discount online games based on the ease of cheating.

davidguetta 4y ago

Even Karpov said he played badly in the Sinquefield game. Personally I think Hans didn't cheat in this game ...... but: my best theory is that Carlsen is afraid to play against people who HAVE cheated once, because there mere thought that he COULD be cheating right now is enough to derail him from clear thinking. I think this because it's exactly what he declared in an interview ABOUT cheating on 2021. So basically he's boycotting someone as a message for other cheaters and, even if hans is innocent, and keep Chess clean. It's of unfair for Hans if he's not cheating but ... what is a fair justice anyway ? There's always a message sent by a sentence.

puffoflogic 4y ago
I like this explanation because unlike all the other theories that have been rehashed in this thread from previously, it actually explains the most recent game. Possibly Carlsen thought he was psychologically capable of playing this game and then discovered after a couple moves that he wasn't.

yakkomajuri 4y ago

Note: I know little about chess but this story captivated me. I think basing most of the argument on the fact that Niemann has cheated as a kid is not very solid. Even our laws take age into account. Plus from my _personal_ experience highly gifted kids are known to "push boundaries" during their upbringing to test their capacity. I also don't weigh too much into the "he doesn't analyze like a 2700" argument. I know a very good chess player that could never explain very well why things should be done a certain way. Plus the analysis referred to is in a quite unnatural setting for a chess player. A final point I want to bring up is that I also instinctively saw this as Carlsen "throwing a tantrum". However, others have been quick to point out that Carlsen has routinely been humble in defeat, praising his opponents. What nobody has mentioned though is that having retired from the world championships, his new stated goal is to reach 2900. With a rating-based goal like such, losing to a sub-2700 player is not only a blow to the ego but also the Elo, which is something that could tip someone over the line. That one loss put Magnus back significantly from his goal, if my understanding is correct. Anyway, I recognize the chess community gives Magnus the benefit of the doubt, and I can see how he might deserve it. But this certainly needs more than just speculation.

pks016 4y ago

I mean, it's a personal decision of Magnus not to play someone who cheated before. Maybe he got to know something about Hans after the game he lost. Possible theories: cheating impossible to prove or prep leak.