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Sure there's a comparison. Kasparov maxed out at 79 points higher than the second-rated player (Kramnik). Carlsen is currently 70 points higher than the second-

by dfan 13y ago

Sure there's a comparison. Kasparov maxed out at 79 points higher than the second-rated player (Kramnik). Carlsen is currently 70 points higher than the second-rated player (Aronian). By the way, Fischer at his peak was 125 points ahead of the second-rated player, Spassky.

jrs99 13y ago
James Harden is may be the best shooting guard in the NBA right now. Jordan was the best shooting guard in his time.
- dfan 13y ago
  I was specifically responding to the claim that there was no comparison of their "dominance": that is, how good they are/were relative to their competition.
- kadabra9 13y ago
  I agree that Carlsen isn't quite at Kasparov's level of dominance yet (he's only 22), but the James Harden analogy is a poor one. Harden is a great player (say someone like Aronian in the chess world) but isn't quite a once in a generation talent like, say, Lebron James. I think it's quite fair to call Carlsen the Lebron James of chess.
  - pa5tabear 13y ago
    So the greatest of all time? It's getting hard to argue LeBron is not...
    - mbreese 13y ago
      Except to those who saw Jordan play [1]. LeBron is probably a top 5 - all-time player, but his style is very different from Jordan, which makes comparisons difficult. He seems more like Magic and less like Mike. People will always gravitate toward recent greatness being greater than those in the past. But, it's frankly impossible to teller cause we don't have enough context and emotional separation. Being able to say that we saw the greatest ever play is appealing because some of that greatness can then pass over to us by association. It's better to enjoy the greatness we see now and leave the comparisons for history. It is fun to think about though. [1] I never saw Jordan live, which is something I regret.
    - clarky07 13y ago
      It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years). Obviously ppg is not the only metric, and championships are won by teams. LeBron is probably in the argument for best all time, and by the end of his career may have a legitimate argument, but he certainly isn't just obviously way better than everyone else. He's probably top 5 though.
      - mehwoot 13y ago
        It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years). In a specifically chosen 8 year period. There were 7 years before that where he didn't win a championship. LeBron's career is far from over, and titles won by a player is surely the least informative measure of an individual player's skill anyhow.
        clarky07 13y ago
        surely ppg is a relevant measure of a player's skill right? I'm just pointing out that even if you think LeBron is best ever, it's not a landslide by any means as the parent comment seemed to indicate. "hard to argue he's not best ever." It's not really. He's in the argument, but by no means is he "obviously" #1. Fwiw Lebron didn't win a championship for his first 8 years. Perhaps he will win the next 6 and make Jordan look pedestrian. He's not there yet though.
- jrs99 13y ago
  I'll agree that the analogy is poor. But I think Carlsen is not the Lebron of chess. Not yet at least. Not with his end game.
- jrs99 13y ago
  you can't compare the numbers. you have to look at their games in the era in which they were played.
Someone 13y ago
Ratings and differences of ratings may not be comparable across time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system#Ratings_inflation_and_deflation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system#Ratings_infla...: "It is commonly believed that, at least at the top level, modern ratings are inflated."
- eterm 13y ago
  Precisely why he measured difference to next player, rather than absolute rating. Rating difference should be comparable, elo is designed so that a given rating difference is a given probability of beating your opponent.
  - jrs99 13y ago
    yes, i believe that we can agree that it gives us some idea of where the players were relative to each other. but, at the same time, it's messy. and comparing the top two players only will probably not be as meaningful as looking at their games and their play. the interesting question is not that you can be dominant against bad competition, but you can dominate over great competition. I think we can agree on that point.
- dfan 13y ago
  Rating differences at any given point in time are comparable to rating differences at another given point in time. That is, A being 200 points better than B in 2013 means the same thing as C being 200 points better than D in 1963. This is a fundamental underpinning of Arpad Elo's model. It is absolutely true that the Elo model is a relative one and does not guarantee that a given rating number represents the same ability over time, but the belief that modern ratings are inflated is not unanimous. Ratings have certainly gone up over time, but computer analyses of games have indicated that intrinsic play quality has gone up over time as well. See the work of Ken Regan, for example (search for "ken regan ipr").
  - tokenadult 13y ago
    Is there a mathematical proof that the Elo ratings have interval properties (so that "Rating differences at any given point in time are comparable to rating differences at another given point in time" is a surely true statement) and not just ordinal properties? I ask, because this is a hot issue in psychology, which I study, and it appears that almost all psychological "measurements" have, at best, merely ordinal properties ("A is smarter than B") and not interval properties ("A is as much smarter than B as B is smarter than C"). Constructing interval measurements properly is HARD, and yet assuming numbers have interval properties when they have only rank-order properties is easy, so I wonder if there is really a rigorous proof on this issue as to chess ratings.
sanoli 13y ago
Well, I think the main reason we can't yet compare him to Kasparov is that Garry become world champion at a similar age, but then held the title for many years (a decade and a half depending on which title you count after the Fide/PCA thing). Carlsen will win the title, but let's see how long he holds it for. If, for some unfortunate reason (I hope not of course) he feels too much pressure, gets tired, has some breakdown, and loses the title in 2 or 4 years, then no one will compare him to Kasparov, except as being in very early 20s when winning the World Title.

by dfan 13y ago

jrs99 13y ago

James Harden is may be the best shooting guard in the NBA right now. Jordan was the best shooting guard in his time.

dfan 13y ago
I was specifically responding to the claim that there was no comparison of their "dominance": that is, how good they are/were relative to their competition.
kadabra9 13y ago
I agree that Carlsen isn't quite at Kasparov's level of dominance yet (he's only 22), but the James Harden analogy is a poor one. Harden is a great player (say someone like Aronian in the chess world) but isn't quite a once in a generation talent like, say, Lebron James. I think it's quite fair to call Carlsen the Lebron James of chess.
- pa5tabear 13y ago
  So the greatest of all time? It's getting hard to argue LeBron is not...
  - mbreese 13y ago
    Except to those who saw Jordan play [1]. LeBron is probably a top 5 - all-time player, but his style is very different from Jordan, which makes comparisons difficult. He seems more like Magic and less like Mike. People will always gravitate toward recent greatness being greater than those in the past. But, it's frankly impossible to teller cause we don't have enough context and emotional separation. Being able to say that we saw the greatest ever play is appealing because some of that greatness can then pass over to us by association. It's better to enjoy the greatness we see now and leave the comparisons for history. It is fun to think about though. [1] I never saw Jordan live, which is something I regret.
  - clarky07 13y ago
    It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years). Obviously ppg is not the only metric, and championships are won by teams. LeBron is probably in the argument for best all time, and by the end of his career may have a legitimate argument, but he certainly isn't just obviously way better than everyone else. He's probably top 5 though.
    - mehwoot 13y ago
      It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years). In a specifically chosen 8 year period. There were 7 years before that where he didn't win a championship. LeBron's career is far from over, and titles won by a player is surely the least informative measure of an individual player's skill anyhow.
      - clarky07 13y ago
        surely ppg is a relevant measure of a player's skill right? I'm just pointing out that even if you think LeBron is best ever, it's not a landslide by any means as the parent comment seemed to indicate. "hard to argue he's not best ever." It's not really. He's in the argument, but by no means is he "obviously" #1. Fwiw Lebron didn't win a championship for his first 8 years. Perhaps he will win the next 6 and make Jordan look pedestrian. He's not there yet though.
jrs99 13y ago
I'll agree that the analogy is poor. But I think Carlsen is not the Lebron of chess. Not yet at least. Not with his end game.
jrs99 13y ago
you can't compare the numbers. you have to look at their games in the era in which they were played.

Someone 13y ago

Ratings and differences of ratings may not be comparable across time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system#Ratings_inflation_and_deflation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elo_rating_system#Ratings_infla...: "It is commonly believed that, at least at the top level, modern ratings are inflated."

eterm 13y ago
Precisely why he measured difference to next player, rather than absolute rating. Rating difference should be comparable, elo is designed so that a given rating difference is a given probability of beating your opponent.
- jrs99 13y ago
  yes, i believe that we can agree that it gives us some idea of where the players were relative to each other. but, at the same time, it's messy. and comparing the top two players only will probably not be as meaningful as looking at their games and their play. the interesting question is not that you can be dominant against bad competition, but you can dominate over great competition. I think we can agree on that point.
dfan 13y ago
Rating differences at any given point in time are comparable to rating differences at another given point in time. That is, A being 200 points better than B in 2013 means the same thing as C being 200 points better than D in 1963. This is a fundamental underpinning of Arpad Elo's model. It is absolutely true that the Elo model is a relative one and does not guarantee that a given rating number represents the same ability over time, but the belief that modern ratings are inflated is not unanimous. Ratings have certainly gone up over time, but computer analyses of games have indicated that intrinsic play quality has gone up over time as well. See the work of Ken Regan, for example (search for "ken regan ipr").
- tokenadult 13y ago
  Is there a mathematical proof that the Elo ratings have interval properties (so that "Rating differences at any given point in time are comparable to rating differences at another given point in time" is a surely true statement) and not just ordinal properties? I ask, because this is a hot issue in psychology, which I study, and it appears that almost all psychological "measurements" have, at best, merely ordinal properties ("A is smarter than B") and not interval properties ("A is as much smarter than B as B is smarter than C"). Constructing interval measurements properly is HARD, and yet assuming numbers have interval properties when they have only rank-order properties is easy, so I wonder if there is really a rigorous proof on this issue as to chess ratings.

sanoli 13y ago

Well, I think the main reason we can't yet compare him to Kasparov is that Garry become world champion at a similar age, but then held the title for many years (a decade and a half depending on which title you count after the Fide/PCA thing). Carlsen will win the title, but let's see how long he holds it for. If, for some unfortunate reason (I hope not of course) he feels too much pressure, gets tired, has some breakdown, and loses the title in 2 or 4 years, then no one will compare him to Kasparov, except as being in very early 20s when winning the World Title.