SGU Episode 898

Questions/Emails/Corrections/Follow-ups (1:16:39)

Followup #1: Chess Cheating

S: All right. So we had a few emails about our discussion last week about the the chess cheating. So part of it was, I'm not going to read any specific email. We got a bunch of emails just basically saying that there were some details that we got wrong and there's been some updates since we talked about it. We were kind of just having it as a more of a casual discussion as the news was breaking. Couple of just factual things. We said that it was, that the number one ranked player beat the lowest ranked player in the first round. So actually it was the third round of play and it was a round robin. It was not one of those tournaments where the first round is where the first and last person would play each other.

E: The Swiss system is what that's called. It was round robin instead. Didn't know that.

S: Doesn't matter to the actual discussion, but just to get those details correct. Again I think that we were pretty clear about this, but just really emphasize this, the accusation about there being anal beads or some kind of anal vibrating situation was completely made up speculation. And maybe speculation is even too strong. It was really just a made up joke that sort of went viral. And there was never anything to that.

E: So on YouTube, there's a person who has a chess channel, his name's Eric Hanson, and we believe it started with him in which he was asked about how someone could possibly cheat what's called over the board, OTB, which means live as opposed to, as opposed to online. And in joking he said, well we could have something inserted. But it was meant to be a joke. But the video was watched a lot. It got picked up actually, Elon Musk commented on it sort of perpetuating the joke a little bit. And then that's when the news media ran with it and it got splashed on the headlines. So it became this kind of out of control runaway joke that, that it I guess enhanced the story in a way. But I could whatever gets you clicks, I guess. So Eric Hanson, he seems to be the source of that original joke.

S: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the question of whether or not he was cheating, again, we were making a very superficial point because none of us are chess experts that people are trying to infer whether or not it was more or less likely that he was cheating based upon circumstantial evidence, things like analyzing his moves and seeing if they were consistent with his level of play. Was he making really high end decisions too quickly? And another thing that somebody brought up that we had didn't mention was in discussing, analyzing his own moves after the game, when you're talking, to reporters, whatever, and talking about your own moves, could he give a cogent explanation of his strategy or not? Normally a player would be able to say exactly why they made, what they were thinking and why they made the moves they did. And if they, if a computer told them to make it, they won't really know what to say.

B: And neither would the computer.

S: So there was some implications, this is all subjective, which is why it's hard to know unless you're an expert yourself. There was some suggestion that maybe he was giving pretty light explanations for his own moves. But then somebody else brought up a fact that he was a last minute substitution, one week before the tournament started. And that's not enough time to set something like this up. An elaborate cheating scheme that worked because he wasn't caught red handed that worked in that sense. So whatever I don't think we may not ever know a hundred percent. At this point it's not even really an official accusation. It's just sort of this implication that was thrown out there and there's no proof that he cheated. I haven't read any definitive analysis saying he must have cheated or he couldn't possibly have cheated. It's just which type of evidence do you want to listen to? And there's a lot of subjectivity to it. And we don't have any strong opinions because none of us know enough to have any strong opinions. We're just trying to reflect what's being said out there in the chess community. I'm sure there's a lot of chess aficionados in our audience who do have strong opinions about it. And that's fine. We're just trying to say what is being reported. And just again, the phenomenon we were interested in was in the lack of definitive physical direct evidence, people are happy to latch on to subjective inferential evidence and circumstantial evidence and try to build a case that way. And at the end of the day, unless you have a statistically solid analysis, I think we just need to be humble and just say, well, we don't know. And maybe we should you can make an argument, I guess, for innocence until proving guilty or the presumption of innocence. Of course, he has a history of cheating a couple of times when he was younger. And how does that play in?

C: Not that much younger.

S: Yeah, but that's a sort of, again, what does that mean? Is it poisoning the well? Is it unfair? Should he still be given the benefit of the doubt or is he a cheater and therefore has forfeited the benefit of the doubt? That's I don't know. It's a little ambiguous. I think we're in the gray area there.

E: I will bring up someone I was directed to. I did not know about this gentleman. His name is Dr. Kenneth Regan, R-E-G-A-N. He is a computer scientist from the University of Buffalo. He's considered the foremost authority on chess cheating. He himself is a master or a grandmaster of chess but also is massively brilliant at statistical analysis and this is part of what he does. In fact, he's the Kojak, if it were, of chess cheating. When there's an accusation brought in, they bring in this fellow, Dr. Regan, to offer his opinion. He has analyzed, so the chess player in question, Hans Niemann is his name, and Dr. Regan analyzed 106 of his matches, both live over the table and computer, which is all the data available on his matches that Hans Niemann has participated in, and bottom line is, Ken Regan could find no statistical evidence of cheating in any of his games. Everything falls within the margins expected.

S: So he's a really good cheater. (laughter)

E: He's either the best cheater ever.

S: Anyone who moves is VC. Anyone who doesn't move is a well-disciplined VC.

E: So Dr. Regan is considered the authority.

B: Those venture capitalists.

E: He gets hired by various chess organizations and other professional organizations having to deal with chess online ones as well. So he's very well established and I suppose if you're going to believe anyone, you can count on his analysis, I would assume.

S: Sounds reasonable. All right, guys, let's move on with Science or Fiction.