I posses 2 accounts other than the mentioned one. I’m rated 1800 in one of them, which is older and 1500-1600 in the other, which is oldest. I play actively on those accounts too since I’m logged into them on my other machines, however my rating does not move much on them. I have developed a simple theory that accounts for that phenomenon; in internet chess, players may not always approach the game with utmost seriousness, things like hastiness and recklessness are likely to occur. I have observed a recurring pattern in my games. After securing approximately five consecutive victories, I tend to lose three games consecutively. This may be attributed to a sense of vexation following a loss, leading to subsequent blunders similar to the fact that you are likely to blunder even worse after your first blunder in the game, no matter how insignificant it was). Thus, I do not really acknowledge any of these ratings, not only mine but I do not think that this rating is actually valid if it is to respect player actual performance (which is not the case, it’s only interested in the record of wining/losing). I think in this case the FIDE rating is plausible since players tend to be more serious on their tournaments games.

Let’s take this game for example;

In this particular game, my opponent committed a significant blunder by playing Nc6, which ultimately granted me a knight and a favorable winning position. The computer analysis indicates that, at best, my opponent would have to sacrifice the queen to avoid an inevitable checkmate. This blunder occurred early in the opening phase, leading to their defeat in just 9 moves. My opponent held a rating of 1948, slightly higher than my own rating of 1940. However, if this player had been randomly matched against a 1400-rated player, that player would likely have taken advantage of the opportunity and secured a quick victory; this would result in 100+ rating points for this player.

During my observation of numerous chess live streams featuring top players, I came across a noteworthy phenomenon. In both rapid and blitz games, I noticed a recurring pattern of terrible blunders occurring in the opening and middle game stages. these blunders were not exploited by either side, I believe that this has to do with the complacency that those players have, yeah it is not likely that a high-rated opponent will blunder in the opening or miss a checkmate so it doesn’t worth calculating for it, and of course the player does not want to lose time.

I think those ratings are valid only if we consider how unserious people are on internet chess, thus it is not really about how good you are at the game.

I posted before on Chess and Brains, yet it was only a draft from the internet. I’ve tried to study chess effects thoroughly recently when I started to give the game more of my time. I don’t believe, as scientifically proved as wellI. N. Djakow, N. W. Petrowski, and P. A. Rudik, Psychologie Des Schachspiels (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1927)..Jorg Doll and Ulrich Mayr, “Intelligenz Und Schachleistung—Eine Untersuchung an Schachexperten.,” 1987, https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:192806221. Even other things that people would expect chess masters to be better at like cognitive processing and imagination, top players are not any better than the average of normal humans, they are only better at it in the domain of the game itself. Which I always believed about the ’cognitive improvement’ that was always exclaimed with video games, I think it’s true, but it’s only to the domain of the game.Fernand Gobet and Guillermo Campitelli, “Intelligence and Chess,” In J. Retschitzki & R. Haddad-Zubel (Eds.), Step by Step. Proceedings of the 4th Colloquium Board Games in Academia (Pp 103-112). Fribourg: Edition Universitaires Fribourg Suisse., 2014.

I believe that chess is very useful though; I like the fact that it was the only game that received adherence from Islamists back in the day, because unlike other dice-based games, which was prohibited by the prophet, chess is essentially related to your willingness and not to luck and chances.

Engaging in chess exercises the mind, providing valuable mental training, though its benefits might not always be fully quantifiable or universally experienced by players.

An exemplar lesson from chess is pragmatism. The game teaches individuals to adopt a pragmatic approach, always striving to make the best moves, even in the face of blunders. Players learn to anticipate their opponent’s potential moves and plan their tactics accordingly, preparing for the worst-case scenario (that is the best move they can play). These qualities are not only valuable within the context of the game but can also be applied to real-life situations.

However, as one’s chess rating surpasses 1800, the focus often shifts more towards memorization and minimal pattern recognition, rather than purely strategic thinking. If you want to advance over 1600; you probably have to memorize an opening, defense and a system.

The journey in chess is replete with numerous rewards before reaching that point (when memorization activity becoming dominate, and most of your opponents are ’professional’ players). It remains an exquisite abstract game, founded on fundamental principles such as precise calculations, piece development, and coordination. The path to improvement lies in wholeheartedly committing to these principles. Observing how this dedication elevates one’s mentality can be analogous to the philosophy advocated by Stoicists, which revolves around the pursuit of 1. precision. 2. action. 3. will.Marcus Aurelius, The Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius (Duke Classics, 2012), https://libgen.li/file.php?md5=1169f89cf3cb237fa6b11a8acad7ea9a.

See also All Life is Problem Solving.

Not only improvement in chess becomes more and more related to training on, studying and memorizing non-reusable knowledge, but also the state of ’maintaining’ a level or a rating mostly transforms from psychologically strenuous battles into medulla spinalis-based automatic routinized moves; it becomes more of a a time-killer.

At this point, I do not think that I will keep my routine of playing chess. I closed one of my accounts to announce the end of this peregrination but I quickly realized that I may change my mind at some point. So I kept my second account Halag2.

My closed account reached its highest rating at 1951, and it was 1940 before closing it (the other Halag2 c.r. 1808. h.r. 1861).