Is Chess a Sport?

by Rune Vik-Hansen
10/10/2022 – It never fails; in time with Magnus’ chessploits, the debate in Norwegian newspapers’ commentary fields rages red hot over whether chess is a sport or athletics, with no surprising conclusions: one agrees to disagree, definitions do not diminish or lessen Magnus’ performances and ‘you can’t compare apples and oranges.’ Study by Rune Vik-Hansen.

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An Argument for Chess as a Sport

Before arguing chess is a sport and athletics, let’s first do away with the formalism:

According to Sigmund Loland1, Professor at Department of Sport and Social Sciences at the Norwegian School of Sports Sciences, ‘athletics’ (‘idrett’, from old Norse, ‘id’, work or activity and ‘drott’, power, strength or perseverance2), in addition to bodily or physical accomplishments, which govern contemporary understanding, originally referred to all forms or expressions of highly regarded skills like music, poetry and knowledge of runes.

While athletics emphasizes the athletes’ efforts and control of the body (skiing, skating, boxing, tennis, handball and football), sports, meaning ‘anything humans find amusing or entertaining3, just as well appreciate the use of facilities, equipment, tools, devices, means of transport or animal as a basic condition (sailing, equestrianism and motor racing4, and today the concepts are more often used interchangeably without a universal definition or agreement on what separates sport and idrett (athletics) from other leisure activities5, and at the same time raising the question if the distinction, or the concepts, are at all productive or expedient.

Initially, we might say that all sports or athletic sports as defined by Wikipedia amount to being ‘only’ ‘play’ or ‘a game’ since these are ruled based activities. Claiming chess ‘just a game’, because it is rule based, and therefore unworthy of undue attention, is a tautology (self-explanatory) and explains nothing. Mind you, the activity we call life may also be perceived to be a game with rules and recipes. When asking if chess is a sport or athletics, what we’re really asking is if chess players perform, and more so, in the physical sense of the word.

When former president of the Norwegian Athletic Federation (NIF) Børre Rognlien6, and Fossum7, former vice president of the Norwegian Chess Federation (NSF) state that chess is not athletics because NSF is not a member of the NIF, this is self-contradictory. NSF not being a member of the NIF merely goes to show that NSF is not a member of the NIF, not that chess in and of itself is not athletics.

Despite agreeing in newspapers’ commentary fields that games and activities like chess, bridge, archery, dart, shooting etc., involve performance of some kind, still, the physical aspect seems to saturate contemporary understanding of what is a sporting or athletic performance. In a country obsessed with countables and quantifiables, what cannot be measured does not exist, we may ask if not the accent on the physical excludes the possibility for a finer perception of what ‘performance’ or ‘achievement’ might be. Few doubt mental gladiators perform but what, where and how? Are ‘blood, sweat and tears’8 or ‘motion’9 the only criteria on a sporting or athletic performance or achievement?

The prevalent preference for the physical may be argued to be grounded in the still deeply rooted Cartesian (after Descartes) dualism matter (body)-mind (soul) representing two ontologically separate categories impossible to combine into a higher unity. Not until Merleau-Ponty, in his Phenomenology of Perception (1945/2012), suggested that we know, experience and are-in-the-world rather through our body, consciousness (cogito) was perceived as the primary source of knowledge and experience, the body a mere appendage.

While philosophy and religion emphasise the mind rather than the body, Merleau-Ponty reminds us that the brain (still) is part of the body [sic] and thus relaunches or reintroduces man as a homogenous unity consisting both of mind and matter, body and soul, mutually interdependent. Just like religion and philosophy ignore the corporeal significance for knowledge and experience, Rognlien and 1500-meter runner, Henrik Ingebrigtsen (note 9), in their emphasis of physical motion, go to the opposite extreme and accentuate the body at the expense of the brain, as if arms and legs move all by themselves.

However, today we know that any corporeal motion starts off with electric impulses subconsciously triggered in the oubliettes of the brain. The brain’s computational power (speed and calculations per second) of between 1013 and 1016 (or one exaFLOP, i.e., one billion billion operations per second10 and the speed of thought clocked in to somewhere between 0.5-100 m/s (between 550 and 750 milliseconds for the information or perception of something to reach the brain and to be comprehended and interpreted11, testify to motion. Because external corporeal motion, arms and legs, depends on internal cerebral motion, not yet clear is why external corporeal motion should weigh heavier concerning the definition of sports or athletics.

According to Nørretranders12, studies of cerebral energy metabolism are studies of the work the brain does. Therefore, even internal mental activity, such as recalling the furnishing of a room, is a genuine physical and physiological activity with clear connections to perfectly tangible factors. Thought is an objective (material) event in the body in every way reminiscent of corporeal activities such as movement and there is no reason to consider thought any different from the rest of what the body does. Just like tennis, or any other physical activity, thought requires calories.

In other words, there is no principal difference between Magnus lifting his arm and sacking a kniggeth or Petter (Northug, now retired Norwegian cross-country skier) lifting his poles and stroking himself forward; both actions spring from subconsciously triggered impulses in the brain. Strokes and chess moves have the same source. And voila! We have compared apples with oranges!

We may therefore conclude that the definitions of sports and athletics are not based on what is really going on but on what we observe and stem from a time before organised tournament chess and insights into the brain. We see arms and legs but not neurons and synapses.

The classical concept of athletics (idrett) suffers from inherent tension between physical performance on the one hand and technique, skills and proficiency on the other. However, in the modern understanding the physical aspect weighs heavier but are those with the most ‘blood, sweat and tears’ the greatest athletes? Are cross-country skiers with shorter strokes and strides lesser athletes or perform lesser skiing than those with longer strokes and strides? High jump, with only a few seconds run before take-off, surely doesn’t qualify as athletics?

The point of technique/skills/proficiency is to reduce the physical effort, but are technically proficient athletes who makes less of a physical effort, but achieve better results greater athletes than less technically proficient athletes who makes more of a physical effort but with lesser results? High jumpers who make more of an effort but jumps lower? What about those who make the biggest effort and with the best results?

As long as different activities yield different reactions, even if lowest common multiples may be found, ‘corporeal or physical performance’ as a criterion on whether you do athletics or not, appears irrelevant because at times we do have ‘one of those days’ and definitions do not depend on our day to day condition. Are those with the most ‘blood, sweat and tears’ the greatest athletes? Do cross-country skiers with shorter strokes and strides perform less athletics or skiing than those with longer strokes and strides? What if you die on the playing field or during physical exertion? If not, we have to grade and define corporeal performance and where to draw the line?

Do physical or bodily performances or skills lend themselves to precise defining or grading? Since measuring or quantifying chess skills and chess knowledge is impossible, the rating system is our best shot. What, then, makes for a decent rating? Magnus’ latest peak? And how to decide which activities and disciplines that merit to be recognised as athletics (idrett)? In the days of yore, music, poetry and runes but today?

To play chess, professionally or not, may be compared to study for and take an exam and chess players are graduating all the time, before, under and after tournaments. Professionals work on their chess between 7-8 hours a day and perform theoretically, practically, mentally and physically. They practice different types of positions; openings, middlegames and endgames and work on their tactics (reflexes and intuition) and scrutinise positions to improve their positional feeling and ability to calculate variations, i.e., visualising sequences of moves.

During the game they worry about their preparations (do I remember them and are they good enough?), the result of the game, their opponent for the next round and the outcome of the tournament. They have to be red alert (‘Beware! The man on the other side, has bad intentions’, Bent Larsen) and keep their calm in attack as well as in defence. They worry if they can win good positions against stronger opposition and must take care not to underestimate lower rated opponents. They get headaches and sleep poorly while the mind grinds about today’s game.

All this mental tension and exertion manifests itself physically, and well known is Karpov’s purported 10 kilos weight loss during his World Championship match against Kasparov in 84-8513 and that the young replaces the old.

Inasmuch as cause and effect must be of the same type14—physical effect—physical cause—the physical effects of playing chess, therefore, likewise require physical causes, like a physical body. Just like our experience of headaches hinges on material prerequisites, chess players’ experience of physical fatigue depends on neural collaboration during strain and therefore makes it difficult with regard to the definition of sports or athletics to argue why more traditional physical exertion should weigh heavier than fatigue resulting from strong concentration over time (in studies as well as in tournament play).

Because the world basically is physical (where physicalism is concerned with how mental (non-physical) properties or states can exist in an otherwise physical universe and the metaphysical relation between mental and physical properties15, knowledge (chess knowledge in our case), if to initiate actions or behaviour (fingers lifting and letting go of pieces), which are physical effects and therefore require physical causes (a non-physical consciousness cannot initiate actions, i.e., cause arms and legs to move) be physically represented in the brain with the debate revolving around how knowledge is represented.

Kaggestad16 mentions the competitive aspect as essential to whether something qualifies as athletics and, we may add, the competitive aspect transforms (any) activity into sport, if not necessarily into athletics.

At the same time professionalisation of what formerly was perceived as leisure activities appears to challenge the leisure aspect of the concept of sport (if what we earlier did for leisure becomes our living, we must find something else to disperse ourselves) and emphasize the competitive aspect as more relevant as to if we are doing sports or not. However, skills or proficiency do not seem as embedded in the concept of sport (as in the concept of athletics) where we might compete without having the faintest idea of what we’re doing, or with the words of the Norwegian philosopher Arne Næss (1912-2009): ‘We can very well dabble at something without making anything of it.’

According to Wikipedia, chess may therefore be a sport and athletics due to physical exertion (more so during tournaments than casual games), possible use of some device, tool or equipment and scoring points; 1 for a win, ½ for a draw and 0 for a loss. Thus, the definition also covers blindfold chess where players exchange only the coordinates when playing.

The expression ‘to become a sport’, precisely ties the competitive aspect to the concept of sports since we do not say ‘to become athletics’, suggesting you may exercise athletics without competing or scoring points. Since use of equipment, tools or devices is possible but not imperative, the competitive aspect appears more relevant as to if chess qualifies as a sport. By scoring points, one exerts oneself more, because more ‘is at stake’, in the words of Gadamer (1900-2002).17

The perceptive reader may have gleaned that the variety in activities in principle renders impossible to standardise requirements to physical performance and proficiency (embedded in the classical concept of idrett (athletics) and because any exertion (no matter how small) results in a physical effect, that any activity require a minimum of knowledge or competence and because anything can ‘become a sport’ (the competitive aspect), we risk an open or boundless concept of idrett or athletics, i.e., which comprises everything and nothing. However, if we limit ourselves to proficiency, reflected in ratings, and the competitive aspect, chess (and high jump!) fulfils this requirement or perhaps NIF don’t suppose chess players compete in the right way?

The debate over whether chess is a sport and/or athletics (idrett) or ‘just a game’, may be more significant than what first meets the eye and as so many other contexts, it’s all about the money. Doing sports or athletics is considered desirable with athletes serving as examples and role models. Sports and athletics are thought to develop a host of qualities, attributes and characteristics, e.g. team spirit, perseverance, ability to plan/analyse and carry out, not to mention the noble art of defeat, i.e., it’s not the winning that counts but the taking part etc. If chess, as we have seen, lends itself to be defined as sports and athletics, chess may attract commercial attention (read: sponsorships).

Conclusion

The world being basically physical18, seems to challenge our understanding and perception of our activities as sport or athletics where chess can be defined as a sport because points are at stake, players are amused and entertained (the definition of sport) and equipment not being necessary, and athletics, not because we get in better physical shape by playing chess but because playing (tournament) chess involves physical performance and ‘know-how’, i.e., competence, skills and proficiency.

In a wider context and a broader perspective, recent discoveries on brain and consciousness suggest that the conceptual distinction between sport and athletics (‘idrett’) is less clear and/or meaningful than perhaps hitherto assumed.

Notes

  1. Loland as quoted in Skjervum, 2016; see also Bryhn, 2021; Falk & Torp, 1991, pp. 325-326.
  2. Bryhn, 2021; Falk & Torp, 1991, p. 325-326.
  3. ‘Sport’, n.d.-a, n.d.-b.
  4. ‘Sport’, n.d.-a.
  5. ‘Sport’, n.d.-b.
  6. Rognlien (as cited in Vesteng, 2012) appears to be under the impression that ‘athlete’ and ‘chess player’ are mutually exclusive.
  7. Fossum, 2013.
  8. Johan Kaggestad, (Norwegian athletics coach and TV commentator) as quoted in Holden & Hoff, 2012.
  9. Henrik Ingebrigtsen, 1500-meter runner, as quoted in Holden & Hoff, 2012.
  10. Merkle, n.d.; Staughton, 2022.
  11. ‘Clocking the Speed of Thought’, 1998; Tovée, 1994, pp. 1125-1127.
  12. Nørretranders, 1999, p. 119.
  13. ‘Karpov vs. Kasparov, 1984-85’, n.d.
  14. Analogous to David Hume’s thoughts on determinism; ‘same cause—same effect’ (Hoefer, 2016).
  15. Galaaen, 2001.
  16. Kaggestead as quoted in Holden & Hoff, 2012.
  17. Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics or theory of interpretation, formulated in his magnum opus, Truth and Method, (2013, pp. 106-178), deals with how we, through our prejudices, expectations and presuppositions, ‘encounter’ a work of art, say a painting or a text, and where this encounter jeopardises our understanding or interpretative framework, even if the painting is merely hanging on the wall. Think of a painting or a text that annoyed you or ticked you off. Congratulations, you’ve been played. A more convoluted point of bringing Gadamer into the discussion is that something may be at stake for both those who claim chess is a sport and those who claim chess is ‘just a game.’
  18. Neutral monism notwithstanding is a position from the philosophy of mind, claiming that mind as well as corporeal entities are two aspects of a singular substance, neither mental nor physical and, therefore, ‘neutral’ (Stubenberg, 2018).

Bibliography:

Bryhn, R. (19 January 2021). Idrett [Athletics]. In Store norske leksikon. https://snl.no/idrett 

Clocking the speed of thought. (28 May 1998). SCIENCEAGOGO.
http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/1998042803290data_trune_sys.html 

Falk. H. & Torp, A. (1991). Etymologisk ordbog over det norske og det danske sprog. [Ethymological dictionary on the Norwegian and Danish language]. Bjørn Ringstrøms antikvariat.

Fossum, W. (6 April 2013). –Sjakk er ikke idrett [Chess is not a sport]. Aftenposten..
http://www.aftenposten.no/meninger/debatt/i/5VxAm/--sjakk-er-ikke-idrett 

Gadamer, H. G. (2013). Truth and method. Bloomsbury Academic.

Galaaen, Ø.S. (2001). Emergens og autonomi: det mentales status i minimal fysikalisme [Emergentism and autonomy: the status of the mental in minimal physicalism] (Post-graduate thesis). University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.

Hoefer, C. (2016). Causal determinism. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2016 ed.). Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2016/entries/determinism-causal/

Holden, L. & Hoff, J. B. (21 December  2012). Kaggestad: -Sjakk er i høyeste grad idrett [Chess is a sport to the greatest extent].VG.
http://www.vg.no/sport/sjakk/kaggestad-sjakk-er-i-aller-hoyeste-grad-idrett/a/10048981/ 

Karpov vs Kasparov, 1984-85: The aborted match. (n.d.). Chessgames.com.
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=55015

Merkle, R. C. (n.d.). Energy limits to the computational power of the human brain. Merkle.com. http://www.merkle.com/brainLimits.html

Merleau-Ponty, M. (2012). Phenomenology of perception. [D. A. Landes, Trans.]. Routledge. (Original work published 1945)

Nørretranders, T. (1999). The user illusion (J. Sydenham, Trans.). Penguin.

Skjervum, E (14 November 2016), Er sjakk idrett? [Is Chess Sport?]. Dagbladet.
https://www.dagbladet.no/sport/er-sjakk-idrett/65143421

Sport. (n.d.-a). In Wikipedia. Retrieved 26 September 2022, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sport 

Sport. (n.d.-b). In Wikipedia. Retrieved 26 September 2022, from http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sport  

Staughton, J. (17 January 2022.). The human brain vs. supercomputers… which one wins? Science ABC. Retrieved 26 September 2022 from https://www.scienceabc.com/humans/the-human-brain-vs-supercomputers-which-one-wins.html

Stubenberg, L. (2018). Neutral monism. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2018 ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2018/entries/neutral-monism/

Tovée, M. J. (1994). How fast is the speed of thought? Current Biology, 4(12), 
http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/neurosci/courses/bio330/pdf/94CurrBiolTovee.pdf

Vesteng, C. (21 December 2012). Idrettspresidenten: - Carlsen er ingen idrettsutøver [President of the Norwegian Athletic Association (NIF): - Carlsen is no athlete]. VG.
https://www.vg.no/sport/i/E7dyl/idrettspresidenten-carlsen-er-ingen-idrettsutoever


Rune Vik-Hansen

Born in 1968, Rune Vik-Hansen graduated from the University of Tromsø in 1999 with a thesis on Heidegger's concept of Dasein. Other fields of interests are metaphysics, ontology, theory of science, political ethics, and the philosophy of mind and free will.

Besides having worked as a teacher on different levels, Vik-Hansen also writes philosophical texts, chronicles, papers and essays as well as children’s literature. Periodically he takes part in public debates.

Photo: Anniken Vestby

 

 


Born in 1968, Rune graduated from the University of Tromsø in 1999 with a thesis on Heidegger's concept of Dasein. Other fields of interests are metaphysics, ontology, theory of science, philosophy of mind, free will and morality.

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Vik-Hansen Vik-Hansen 10/12/2022 12:44
@frederic:
Speaking about chess and pulse... Let me share my experience from my game in the club championship the last week of September this year (We play 90 + 30, see game below).

For quite some time, the game was evenly fought but then, on the 29th, White, without Black noticing, blunders the exchange. Having fought the whole game against a possible White knight on d5, Black, down to his last 5 minutes, therefore, retracts his knight instead of jumping forward, forking Re1 and Qc1.

Then, on the 35th, White blunders a pawn, and, instantly, my pulse starts racing. And it did not seem to have any intentions of stopping, while Black considered capturing the pawn or not. Unfortunately, I was not wearing my sports watch at the moment but compared to my highest pulse when working out (186) this felt like 400… much more intense, and differently...

It felt like my heart was about to jump out of my chest and already half across the board, and no less unfathomable is that White did not notice. I have never experienced anything remotely close to this. And, I had been working out since late July, so the physical form in general ought to have been not too shabby. Still...

The high pulse might be caused by nerves or stress of not managing to win won positions (scoring two draws from 10 clearly won positions), so that now, when at last, facing the possibility of actually scoring a point, broke the camel’s back.

N. N. (1811) - Vik-Hansen, Rune (1833)
Club Championship (2), 21.09.2022

1.e4 c5
2.Nf3 d6
3.Bb5+ Bd7
4.Bxd7+ Qxd7
5.0–0 Nc6
6.d4 cxd4
7.Nxd4 Nf6
8.Re1 g6
9.b3 Bg7
10.Bb2 0–0
11.c4 a6
12.Na3 Rac8
13.Nac2 Rfd8
14.Qe2 e6
15.Rad1 Qc7
16.Qf3 Ne5
17.Qe2 Nc6
18.h3 Qb6
19.Nxc6 Qxc6
20.Nd4 Qc5
21.Ba1 Re8
22.Qd2 Rcd8
23.Nf3 Qc7
24.Bc3 Nh5
25.Ba5 b6
26.Bb4 Bf8
27.Bc3 e5]
28.Qc1 Nf4
29.Bd2? Ne6? [29...Nd3!]
30.Be3 Qb7
31.Qb1 Rc8
32.Re2 b5
33.cxb5 axb5
34.Ne1 Rc7
35.Nc2? Qxe4!
1–0 (59)
pfitschigogerl pfitschigogerl 10/11/2022 06:44
re Frederic:
Why is the fact that somebody is suffering from stress at all relevant to the question if an activity can be called a sport? We face so many situations in life where we experience stress/pressure/discomfort and nobody would dream of calling these a sport. I know that the argument has been around for so long and Dr. Pfleger has mentioned it many times but it does not make sense at all. Even if a reaction to stress enhances performance -as it does in many life situations-it does not constitute an activity to be a sport.
Frederic Frederic 10/11/2022 04:11
Decades ago I helped GM Dr Helmut Pfleger conduct research on chess players. We strapped monitors on GMs like Spassky and Ulf Andersson, and measured their heart rate. Turns out that chess players sitting perfectly still can have a periodic increase to over 150 per minute. Clearly when they were attacking or under attack they were pumped up with adrenalin, which evolution developed to enable them to better run, fight, bite or scratch. But they will instead move a pawn one square... I have always wondered if this is healthy, if chess players suffer side effects.

Recently my friend Ashwin has been carrying research on the subject -- with much more sophisticated hardware (https://en.chessbase.com/post/biofeedback-in-chess-2). And next year it will be systematically continued in a top GM tournament. Details later.
Meijin66 Meijin66 10/11/2022 12:52
Question: Is Chess a sport? Answer: Yes. Please, move on to less momentous (albeit more interesting) subjects.
tom_70 tom_70 10/11/2022 05:31
Chess has no element of chance. You and rise and fall by your own abilities. Very few competitive 'games' can claim this. So by that reasoning, I would say it absolutely is a sport.
Frits Fritschy Frits Fritschy 10/11/2022 12:25
Chess is 'not just' a game, it's a game.
Is gambling at the stock exchange considered a sport? After all it's competitive, entertaining and exhausting. People there however would be flabbergasted if anyone would suggest to make it a sport - there is no financial need for it. Why does anyone want chess to be a sport? Because there is a lot of money involved for federations, by government subsidies.
Nobody seems to have come to the idea that games should have the same possibilities in this respect as sports. Sports get government subdidies; arts, theatre as well. Why not games? Games keep people busy and entertained (and away from worse activities, like ding-dong ditch, vandalism and revolution).
After all, it's not about chess organisations wanting chess to be a sport, it's about the opinion of the great majority of not-chessplayers: that it is NOT a sport. Which is reflected in the verdict of the European Court (in a tax exemption case) on bridge, for some reason not mentioned in this article.
AidanMonaghan AidanMonaghan 10/10/2022 11:54
If boring Poker competitions can obtain major broadcast coverage, Blitz/Bullet Chess could also.

A resurrection of Intel Grand Prix style broadcasts is in order.

Video production advances will produce even better viewing.

But organizers are lacking imagination & motivation.
AidanMonaghan AidanMonaghan 10/10/2022 11:47
Blitz/Bullet require mental/physical agility/coordination.
Based Based 10/10/2022 11:12
Is Tic Tac Toe a sport? Is Dots and Boxes a sport? Is [insert any board or card game] a sport? I don't even see why Chess wants to be considered as a sport. In the end it comes down to whatever definition one comes up with. There is no absolute by which you can decide what is a sport and what not. There is no measuring rod you can hold to chess and say yes or no. I think that chess is missing some key aspects that go with what commonly is considered to be sport. A scoring system and the physical aspect of thinking long hours is not what makes something a sport - or writing a maths exam is doing sport as well.
tauno tauno 10/10/2022 10:27
I must apologize for a mistake in my previous post. I did some research on the subject and found that alcohol is no longer on WADA Prohibited List as of 2018 (any abuse prior to that is probably already time barred), so here you go!
Jacob woge Jacob woge 10/10/2022 10:27
“Snooker is generally considered a sport, as is darts.

Its not *that* big a leap from those sorts of examples to see chess as a sport too.”

There is one difference, though. In neither of these endeavours (snooker, darts), can you play by substitute, meaning commanding someone else to carry out exactly your intentions. “Now hit triple twenty”. In chess, as in a number of other board games, you can.

Is correspondance chess sport? Is consultancy games?

Is chess played by computers sport? And, if not, is chess played by computers not chess? What if you don’t know if the game was played by a human? Chess, or not? Sport, or not? Is the computer programme a sportsman?
Keshava Keshava 10/10/2022 10:19
It depends on how you define sport. Chess is not athletics (theoretically a quadra-plegic could become a Grandmaster) but organized chess competition is treated like a sport, i.e. the Olympiad. Therefore there are athletic sports and non-athletic sports.
tauno tauno 10/10/2022 06:56
Chess is definitely a sport, although it has its own special rules that distinguish it from other sports. These two in particular stand out:

1) Chess is the only sport where you are allowed to play drunk, both in online and over-the-board tournaments. This also applies to WC tournaments.

2) Chess is the only sport where you can be banned at any time for no reason whatsoever.

There are probably a few more. What would you like to add to this list?
Mamack1 Mamack1 10/10/2022 05:57
Snooker is generally considered a sport, as is darts.

Its not *that* big a leap from those sorts of examples to see chess as a sport too.
CpnDunsel CpnDunsel 10/10/2022 04:26
Apples and oranges are easily compared. Both have:

~ Seeds
~ are spherical
~ yield juice
~ are fruits
~ have skin



Turns out there are more similarities than dissimilarities. Anything can be compared to anything else. Comparing identical things makes no sense.
mc1483 mc1483 10/10/2022 03:33
Indeed it is, but not for the reasons stated in the article (as pfit correctly highlighted). It is a sport because there are competitions all over the world, rankings, national/world championships, complex selections of players, high prize money and so on.
pfitschigogerl pfitschigogerl 10/10/2022 02:50
pfitschigogerl 3 minutes ago
with all due respect for serious academic endeavours: The common sense definition of "sport" seems to be somewhat more convincing: athletics or at least some motoric element should be involved.

How ludicrous the debate has become shows a piece published in the brochure celebrating the centenary of the Austrian chess federation (of 2020) The article claiming that chess is a sport states four rather comedic "reasons" :

1) The others do it too (i.e.other federations).
2) In order to do well at the sport of chess you have to do "real" sports.
3) During a game of chess you suffer from high stress levels so it must be a sport. (What about exams, funerals etc? All sports?
4) The achievements of our Austrian youngsters would never have been possible without the money provided by the programmes that support sport federations. (At least one honest point - it´s all about funding!)