Im just gonna add that Magnus has spent most of his life playing, studying and thinking about chess. If you do anything at that level of intensity and from such a young age you will become exceptionally good at it. Which for a normal person who is a lot more diversified in his experiences and skills, will look unbelieveable.

For what its worth, there is a german comicbook collection series with donald duck and micky mouse storys. We had over 300, each like 400 pages, you couldve handed me any random page of those 120.000 pages and I couldve told you whats going to happen in that story, because Ive read them so often. Even now, after not having read any in many years Im sure I would still get many right. For someone like Magnus, who spends a big proportion of his every day in the materia, its no surprise to know his topic inside out.

I honestly don't understand why is there a discussion at all. Like, do you realize how deep that is? There are of course specific positions where one could calculate that deep, for example the famous round-and-round problems and so on, but they are all linear, forced, one liners. If we are talking about a normal chess opening/middlegame position, 30-40 is so far out of realm of possibility that it is not even funny. Kasparov's immortal game vs Topalov in 99' Wijk an Zee, disputably, had Kasparov calculate about 15 moves ahead in a middlegame position, and it is considered to be an absolutely ridiculous achievement in calculation. And that's if he actually calculate that deep and didn't go on instinct! And the variation tree is growing exponentially with every move... Again, I don't know why are we even discussing this, it is so painfully obvious.

Hmmm... I have no idea how deep some players can calculate. But you dont have to calculate every move, just the likely ones which can probably be narrowed down a lot if you know the other player well. And of course it depends on the position aswell, Kasparov might be able to calculate 10 moves more in a slightly less complex situation (I havent seen the game or am not aware of it). I mean I can do a few moves and I have played less than 0.x% of what someone like Magnus did.

Would really be interresting to see what GMs can bring to the table.

You lost credibility on the subject with your second sentence.

I am not able to see the clear picture of the full board, I can only see parts of the board, but every GM and even every IM whom I asked about this, confirmed that they can see it. In fact my personal theory on the subject is that this ability is key for being able to play chess on a high level.

You are an amateur and all of this stuff sounds like magic to you, because you can't do it. This subject isn't about logic or what you think is reasonable or not. It is about physical abilities that a few people have and most others don't. Do your research on it. Ask a bunch of Elo 2400+ guys and you will be surprised.

Soon there will be the London Chess Classic, where Peter Svidler is going to participate. Check him out on the live coverage. His typical thinking position is with his eyes closed. Svidler can go into some sort of deep think mode, where he is calculating blindfold seemingly at rapid speed.



He says that he doesn't need the board for his own positions and that should tell us a lot (3:20).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGr47oenN-s

Well, technically I am closer to an IM than I am to an amateur, having two norms and all FWIW, I can see the board absolutely clearly when playing a blindfold game. I can do it without great difficulty for 3 simultaneous blindfold games, but at later stages of the game I start to feel fatigue and need to focus really hard to continue. Of course, this is not 10 simultaneous opponents like Carlsen, or ~40ish like Gareev. But it is enough for me to tell you that this ability, as useful as it is for general speed and accuracy of calculation, does not mean that you can calculate 40 moves ahead in a middlegame position. I don't understand why you think that it does?

40 moves is probably about an average length of a chess game. The fact that you can ENVISION a full chess game, hell, 20 full games at a time, does not mean that you can CALCULATE it from beginning to the end.

You offer me to ask a bunch of 2400+ guys about this question - I retort with my own offer, for you to ask a bunch of 2700+ guys if they can calculate not 40, but 20 moves ahead in a middlegame position - you will be surprised. Hell, make it 10 and you will still be surprised by answers like "only in some positions".

In the field of calculation, what separates the pros from the joes is calculation speed and accuracy, NOT the depth. That's because there is a certain treshhold in depth through which the human brain just cannot pass and go deeper, we don't have enough mental capabilities. And that treshhold is certainly less than 40, by a mile. Sorry to dissapoint you, but Carlsen is not a super human.

I don't think it's that there's a threshhold of depth for the human brain.. but more so that there are very few positions where it is useful to calculate more than a few moves ahead.

If there was some forced sequence leading to a pawn ending that required thinking 20 moves deep to evaluate it, a strong player would be able to do it, but such situations come up incredibly infrequently.

I really wonder why this ****ing board features so many ****ing idiots who want to argue about even the most obvious **** like their life depended on it. Maybe being right on the internet counts for something, I don't know. Dude, just believe whatever you want!

Perhaps this kerfuffle stems from a semantic issue involving the meaning of "calculation."

I also can't believe anyone thinks top GMs actually do pure calculation at 80ply or even 40ply or whatever. But I do believe they can do it for relatively forced lines.

The chapter in Pump Up Your Rating on calculation might help with this. Iirc (although I never went through it carefully) while it seems the example player for that chapter went through a lot of complex stuff, none of it seemed anywhere close to 40 or 80ply or anything like that.

It is amazing to me that a person who essentially argues for the equivalent of "Santa exists" has the audacity to call others names. On the other hand, I can't argue that I am not an idiot since I keep wasting my time coming to this thread. I am out, you can now feel free to continue spreading your demagogy without anyone calling you out for it.

YOU'VE BEEN SHANDRAX'D

*hidden cameramen roll out*

i think you are totally missing the point and this line of thought is actually even more ******, no offense intended on you but the thought you put out...

this line of thinking brings in this world nut heads religious people who for example, focus more on creationist instead of darwinism , lacking arguments...
Same case can be made for economist, religious dogma,etc.

believing stuff without a solid foundation, which often can only be tested with arguments, can make some dangerous individuals.
Like the nut case in Syria...

Of course i am not saying you are a nut case or w.e, but just saying the concept you just put out there is pretty much where those individuals find the foundation of their stupid belief system.

Just believing makes something right without need for proof by debating or scientific evidence is nonsense ....