“This sickness unto death is what Kierkegaard calls despair. According to Kierkegaard, an individual is “in despair” if he does not align himself with God or God’s plan for the self. In this way, he loses his self, which Kierkegaard defines as the “relation’s relating itself to itself in the relation.” Kierkegaard defines humanity as the tension between the “finite and infinite”, and the “possible and the necessary”, and is identifiable with the dialectical balancing act between these opposing features, the relation. While humans are inherently reflective and self-conscious beings, to become a true self one must not only be conscious of the self but also be conscious of being grounded in love, viz the source of the self in “the power that created it.” When one either denies this self or the power that creates and sustains this self, one is in despair.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sickness_Unto_Death#Summary
What is the impact of smartphone on our cognitive ability?
How much is smartphone use a question of self-control?
What is the effect of self-control on our cognitive ability?
“We all understand the joys of our always-wired world—the connections, the validations, the laughs … the info. … But we are only beginning to get our minds around the costs.”
Andrew Sullivan (2016)
Despite the tremendous, global revolution that smartphones have initiated economically, its invisible force controls and shapes our social relations. It constantly connects us to “to faraway friends”and thus creates a universal field of social reliability and distraction that “may undermine [our] performance”. The “phantom vibration syndrome” only indicates the new problems we are facing (QUELLE).
The forces smartphones exert on us are not actively established, but are a silent pressure that we cannot escape. They operate anonymously at any time by virtue of the complete transformation of our social surroundings. While personal computers are localized workstations, smartphones are transportable and therefore with us. The smartphone as a universal tool for almost any activity penetrates almost any moment of our everyday life, our social activities and our privacy. It is therefore nearly impossible to create a free space of relaxation independent of social and work-related stress.
Smartphone-users “interact with their phones an average of 85 times a day, including immediately upon waking up, just before going to sleep, and even in the middle of the night (Perlow 2012; Andrews et al. 2015; dscout 2016).”
Moreover, smartphones initiate a trend of exploiting us as a creative resource. We are mined for our attention and constant participation in semi-commercial and semi-social market. Our creativity, once source of relaxation, is now a manageable source of recognition within the net of social relations. The force driving this exploitation is, of course, the goal of providing services and sell products. Practically, however, it is a competition for attention. The more attention we give our phones, the more likely we will be a customer.
Gaining independence from smartphones is particularly difficult in China where the whole social life is built around smartphones. Metro-tickets have to be validated with smartphones, payments are processed via smartphones, sometimes you even identify yourself with your smartphone. This trend will probably be extended.
There are many additional negative impact factors of smartphone:
An increase of accidents on roads (phones “cause performance deficits such as delayed reaction times and inattentional blindness” (QUELLE)
Smartphones and Learning
The thesis is that smartphone impacts processes of learning negatively.
“attentional cost of receiving cellphone notifications indicates that awareness of a missed text message or call impairs performance on tasks requiring sustained attention”
Since learning is a deep state of meditation, an innate capability of intense concentration, smartphones impact these capabilities of retreat. Learning is in a sense an asocial function. It means to retreat from the society for a moment just in order to return in an improved state. If extroversion means connectedness to all of one’s surrounding, then introversion is the opposite and probably comparable to its extreme, i.e., sleep and absense. Learning can be reconstructed as an aspect of introversion. For this article, I will therefore look at the smartphone-induced braindrain. We might call it Smartphone-induced ADHS (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Syndrom).
How do smartphones interfere with our processes of knowledge?
In general, we can say that our attentional resources are limited. For example, our working memory “supports complex cognition by actively selecting, maintaining, and processing information relevant to current tasks and/or goals”. The mind in terms of a computer metaphor makes understandable how smartphones can distract. If the smartphone is close our working memory is not empty. Our automatic attention will be constantly redirected to our phones.
“Automatic attention generally helps individuals make the most of their limited cognitive capacity by directing attention to frequently goal-relevant stimuli without requiring these goals to be constantly kept in mind.”
Smartphones capture our automatic attention and thereby diminish our working memory. Fatigue occurs faster.
How is this hypothesis tested in an experiment?
Thesis: Smartphone users fluid intelligence but also their working memory is tied to their devices.
Study-Design:
520 university students with the task of solving tests in mathematics, memory and reasoning, while smartphones were placed on their desks, in their bags or in another room. Alerts had to be turned off.
PICTURE
Results: Smartphones reduce people’s intelligence and attention spans
Remarkable: If the phones were on the desk, students scored 10 percent lower compared to phones being stored in another room. If the phones were further out of sight (for example, in their pockets or their bags), they scored only slightly better than when phones were placed on desks. The effect was measurable even when the phones were switched off.
Possible explanations
Smartphones seem to effect us even if they are “Consistent with this position, research indicates that signals from one’s own phone (but not someone else’s) activate the same involuntary attention system that responds to the sound of one’s own name (Roye, Jacobsen, and Schröger 2007).”
“Even when people are successful at maintaining sustained attention – as when avoiding the temptation to check their phones – the mere presence of these devices reduces available cognitive capability.”
Conclusions
Self-control with respect to smartphones demands our attention and thus occupies working memory, which overall makes us perform worse. The best solution is to remove phones from our workplaces and if possible even maintain an internet-free work environment.
Considering that our output will be decreased by 10 percent, we can see how this will impact us in the long-run significantly due to compound effects.
“Your conscious mind isn’t thinking about your smartphone, but that process — the process of requiring yourself to not think about something — uses up some of your limited cognitive resources. It’s a brain drain.”
We suffer from our devices:
“those who depend most on their devices suffer the most from their salience, and benefit the most from their absence.”
This article addresses, discusses or answers the following questions:
In general, does the internet mean progress or regress for our society?
How is chess an example for improved learning in the internet?
What is a Grandmaster in chess and why did their number inflate?
What are the major internet chess channels?
Where to find the World Champion Carlsen
What are the best educational channels (Agadmator, Smirnov and Finegold)?
What elements are there to be learned in chess?
How to separate fun and learning?
Because of the commonly felt cultural digress (cultural pessimism), many people have expressed disbelief in the internet. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are all framed as tools that dumb down society. In fact, many recent studies show that smartphones and I-pads reduce the intelligence of the younger generations (for scientific resources see my notes on the impact of smartphones). Nevertheless, in my view, the usefulness of the internet depends on the user. In recent years, for example, the number of young grand-masters has increased (see further down below) and also the theory of chess advanced. In this article I will argue that this is because the access to high quality content was made possible by the internet.
Interesting Fact: Contrary to the achievements of recent years, Donald Trump claimed in 2016 that the US has no grand-masters in chess anymore. Motivated by a general fear that the USA is recently not winning, he produced this misleading statement (see also the problem with lies and misleading statements).
The facts are different: “Currently, the United States has 90 grand-masters, counting both men and women.” While “Russia, a longtime chess powerhouse, ranks first with 234 grand-masters,” the US is third in chess. As a German, it is interesting that “Germany ranks second with 91, just one more [grand-master] than the United States”. Overall, there are about 1300 grand-masters around the world (source: wikipedia).
How strong is a Grandmaster (GM)?
In terms of the distribution we can say that a chess master belongs to the top 2 percent of all tournament players, while a GM belongs to the top 0.02 percent.
Why did the Number of Grandmasters inflate?
1972 there were 88 GMs in the world. Is it easier to become a GM now? There are some factors that we have to consider: worldwide and cheaper air travel made “chess more accessible to globe-trotting chess professionals”. Today players of the former Soviet Union enjoy the freedom of movement compared to the 1990s ( see chess.com). Moreover, there are more tournaments. All of this means that there are more opportunities to fulfill so-called GM-norms. Nevertheless, before Grand-masters were considered as serious contenders for the world-championship. For that reason, Nigel Short has suggested that we should introduce the title of Elite Grand-master.
But did Grand-masters become better?
I recently talked with an older acquaintance. He denied any of my statements for why the internet is helping us in research. His major argument was that their generation also produced quality articles and research back then. They only needed a bit more time to find the adequate resources. I consider this view as naive. For their time, they obviously produced well done research, but while technology was progressing, knowledge of chess improved. Especially, the quick access to research data is key for improvement. So my claim is that the inflation of Grand-masters can be explained by our access to more knowledge in chess in a shorter period of time.
When I once wanted to find reliable chess books in the Pittsburgh Public Library, I could only find books that were more than 20 years and older. The beginner’s books they offered were hopelessly superficial and some didn’t even have a modern notation. They were so old-fashioned that not even older friends knew their forgotten form of chess notation.
We could argue that the content of these books is still valuable. Of course, it is true that I can still learn a lot from a Grand-master of that time, but new books have tremendously improved with regard to their didactic qualities and also with regard to the specificity of content. They press more content on a smaller amount of pages and make it more understandable, at the same time. Overall, it just saves me time for approaching modern chess theory today.
Another factor is that search-fatigue induced by library-rides with a particular purpose is tremendous and though it might not weigh highly for one book, 20 searches daily on the internet cannot be accomplished with 20 library rides. We have to take into account that equally to the stock-market a 5 percent interest rate pays off tremendously in the long-run. Speeding up the process of research is key. For my field of publication (philosophy), I can say that articles nowadays have tremendously improved compared with articles from 20 years ago. So while there was a lot of mental energy wasted on older formats, it is now about a couple of clicks.
How can we enhance our chess skills today?
I wish in my youth when I used to play chess, I could have watched a classical-, rapid-, and Blitz-world-champion coming out of the shower and sharing his expert knowledge on bananas with me.
One could argue that focusing on these banal, human surroundings of chess does not improve our knowledge of chess. Yet, it motivates to dive deeper into the knowledge that chess can offer. Of course, Carlsen also instructs us with more educational videos. In my youth, I was so thirsty for little hints from the current world-champion. Today, I can consume them on a daily basis. More than this, there are many channels that give you valuable lessons that merely focus on education. In the following paragraphs, I would like to give you a list of my favorite resources for education and entertainment that we can approach in chess nowadays.
Watch an American bullet-chess-legend solving Puzzle Rush
The probably more entertaining and insightful videos are streamed by Hikaru Nakamura, former Number 2 of the world and Bullet-Chess-Legend. Here are some of my Top-Five-Videos from Nakamura.
One of the most interesting videos is on Nakamura’s attempts to solve Puzzle-Rush. In Puzzle-Rush you are constantly presented with new puzzles. You have 5 minutes to solve as many puzzles as possible. Nakamura’s vision in solving these puzzles is astonishing and easily demonstrates the difference between a SuperGM and an average player. Sometimes, it is unbelievable that he can recognize a position that quickly.
2. The second amazing video is watching Nakamura playing Bullet Chess. In a so-called speed-run, he starts with a rating of 1200 rating-points and tries to develop as quickly as possible until he reaches a super-GM rating of 3000 (each time you win, you gain points from your opponent based on the probability of how likely it was that you beat her).
3.Beyond standard chess, Nakamura also plays matches with disadvantages and unusual material. In the following video, he has to beat his opponent with 8 knights.
4. No Nakamura is not always nice. In his match with Danya, he shows some nerves and complains about his opponent though he also has proven to to be not always the fairest player. Still it is interesting to watch two GMs hyperbulleting against each other (each player has only 30 seconds).
5. Besides these fun games, it is also interesting to see how Nakamura analyzes a game between the strongest chess engines there are (Stockfish against AlphaZero).
All of these examples are not necessarily teaching us the depths of chess, but channels as Agadmator reveal in-depth-analysis of chess-positions. Agadmators initial “hello everyone” is known by everyone, even though he is not in the Top of the world chess players. In the following video, we can see how Agadmator (as better average player) loses against Carlsen in an alternate game of Chess.
Agadmator’s analysis of the games of AlphaZero are probably some of his best analyses.
Agadmator’s shows are short but always give insight in the history of chess and some interesting points of analysis. Now, you might say, however, this is like watching somebody in the Gym doing a workout. Well, as always, it is a bit up to you. On Chess.com you can make good friends in order to improve. It is also up to you how good you are in maintaining social relationships via the internet. Besides this, however, for more systematic studies you can also watch the humorous Ben Finegold. In his beginner’s lessons, you learn the basics.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM9c-AqtJ5o
Of course, you can also pimp your opening knowledge. The Ginger GM has many lectures on the managable London System
Opening knowledge is not everything. Who wants to systematically study with good didactics might want to search for GM Smirnov
In in all these senses, the internet helps you but it depends on you how you use your Youtube-Channel. If you use your channel for sharing beauty secrets and studying the art of looking better you might fall behind and identify yourself with people becoming a merely superficial surface of who they want to be. If get into this question, you will get occupied with people who are constantly discussing this question and thus they will establish certain norms. In this context, it is often claimed that we are the average of the 5 people who are closest to us, but in fact it is even worse (see my notes on the influence of social networks): you are the average of all your broader networks of friends. Nowadays, we might expand this theory to the question of the internet and our social contacts. How much does your facebook-network determine your personality?
What is the take-away from this article? If you ask yourself the following questions, it might increase your learning curve:
Does the internet mean progress or regress for our society?
What can you learn in the internet?
What can we learn in the internet with respect to chess?
How did chess progress with the rise of the internet?
Who are Carlsen, Nakamura, Agadmator, Smirnov and Finegold
How Grand-masters are there?
Did the number inflate?
How strong is a Grand-master?
Are we the average of the 5 people who are closest to us?
To all netizens who have made the word ‘lie’ to a part of their standard vocabulary, it would be a misleading statement to call a misleading statement a lie. Actually, a lie is a qualified misleading statement, precisely a statement by which the speaker intentionally misleads. Since not every misleading statement is intentionally misleading, it is a misleading statement if we call a misleading statement a lie. If you claim that this is still a lie then probably you are a liar too.
The same argument applies for people who routinely accuse others of red herring.
