5GW Chess

On viewing Neil Burger’s The Illusionist (2006) it occurred to me that perhaps the magician can be cast as a 5G warrior.

Introducing the magician, Fischer says, “From the furthest corners of the world where the dark arts still hold sway he returns to us to demonstrate how nature’s laws may be bent.” Is the desire to subvert the natural order by bending others to our will the aim of war?

Eisenheim, magician (and 5G warrior?), says, “Everything you have seen here has been an illusion,” but he has been busy weaving the fabric of his desire into reality.

I loved the chess trick when I saw it on TV.

There is something to planning a grand magic trick (the manipulation of perceptions) that should be similar to the mindset of a 5GW planner (or a con-man too).

Alas, I am no magician. It might be interesting to run the 5GW idea against some magician for feedback. It might also be interesting to learn magic to build a 5GW friendly mindset.

Oh the other lesson:

Really smart people can be fooled and manipulated - even in subject areas were they are world-class experts.

5GW does not need to rely upon manipulating Average Joe types.

5GWers could focus the manipulation on a small set of experts…and get magnified results perhaps.

Really smart people can be fooled and manipulated - even in subject areas were they are world-class experts.

In fact, they were not manipulated, unless you count the mere impression this magician left that he was the one to actually beat some of them. In truth, they really were playing and choosing their own moves, based upon their own observation of the board/pieces and according to their own understanding of the game.

So this is a metaphor for co-opting via altering observations which means altering the environment — not via manipulation. Indeed, “manipulation” suggests that you are forcing someone to do something, whereas in 5GW you don’t have to force them. They do what they want, based upon the environment they observe and their own personal objectives.

There’s a lesson in secrecy here too, but I want think about that one more.

I don’t know if I’m jumping the gun but I’m going to put in the ‘lesson’ as I see it now. Sorry if I didn’t give enough opportunity for readers to weigh in.

I think Curtis is thinking along the same lines as I am but I’m looking at it from a slightly different point of view.

To me there was only one person in this who was being manipulated, and Brown is able to do this because he is thinking on all three levels of conflict and his opponents (or targets) are not or are actively restricted from doing so.

Tactical: This is level of each of the individual games. At the tactical level Brown is only playing one game. The rest of his opponents are playing each other.

“In truth, they really were playing and choosing their own moves, based upon their own observation of the board/pieces and according to their own understanding of the game.”

Indeed, they are just doing what they naturally do and by proxying them he is guaranteed to win half and lose half of the games. His opponents, by design, may only work on this level. Even if one or more of his opponents suspects Brown is playing them against each other the asymmetric number of opponents, the statement that he has been studying them individually, and that he feels utterly prepared, should be enough to keep them from saying anything at least until the event is over. Additionally, they all came to play chess, so they are already thinking of the event in that context.

Operational: Brown has restricted/redirected the Observation of his targets so that they cannot operate at his level except to observe when each game ends and who is the winner of the game. However, there is only one player that Brown needs to notice this.

Strategic: While I am not sure if Brown’s target was actually the last game to finish or not (possibly it was editing) the positioning of Robert Chan, the only opponent Brown was actually playing, at table 9 meant that it is almost a certainty that Chan will see Brown appear to beat one or more Grandmaster level players before their own game finishes. If it was the last game to finish then Chan saw Brown walk into a room full of greats and beat half of them at the same time (even though he really didn’t). This is the target and the level of Brown’s manipulation. The entire event is staged to convince Robert Chan that Brown is able to play on the level of a Grandmaster and that he is standing in a room full of giants with cameras watching. This engineered context contains the implied meme that as a chess player Chan has no real chance of beating Brown.

So he doesn’t.

Even if one or more of his opponents suspects Brown is playing them against each other the asymmetric number of opponents, the statement that he has been studying them individually, and that he feels utterly prepared, should be enough to keep them from saying anything at least until the event is over.

The video is endlessly fascinating to think about in 5GW terms. I think you are right, we should look at all steps of the match, which includes looking at the way Brown told them just before the matches that he’s pretty good at chess (although he told the audience that he sucks.) I suspect, however, that these Grand Masters and masters may well have played along simply because they were intrigued by the experiment. Even if one or more suspected what was happening (and I doubt that more than, say, one probably suspected), still this would be a test of their own chess skills against a secret enemy. In fact, even knowing what was happening wouldn’t have helped them one bit, although they may have been a bit more on guard if they had known.

If it was the last game to finish then Chan saw Brown walk into a room full of greats and beat half of them at the same time (even though he really didn’t). This is the target and the level of Brown’s manipulation. The entire event is staged to convince Robert Chan that Brown is able to play on the level of a Grandmaster and that he is standing in a room full of giants with cameras watching.

The ace up Brown’s sleeve. Considering the fact that he told the viewing audience at the outset that he was a bad chess player, Brown needed a little more than luck to beat Chan who probably has more talent and experience. The effect you describe strikes me as being rather 4GW though: “Give up, you have no chance of winning!”

As a 5GW, the game seems to have been aborted. Although the video evidence we have is intriguing and a fertile source for 5GW speculations, no real consequences will flow from the game with respect to Brown’s “foes,” who win some and lose some (probably against each other face-to-face) normally. I.e., Brown hasn’t capitalized on the event. Chan may be another story: seeing that he was bested in chess by a trickster on-camera for everyone to see. (A 4GW effect?) We must assume that they have viewed the video and know the trick by now, as we have. Incidentally, had Brown not revealed his secret, would we have been able to suspect that we, the viewing audience, were the actual target and these other players merely pawns?

Addendum:

Lesson on co-opting, re:

In fact, even knowing what was happening wouldn’t have helped them one bit, although they may have been a bit more on guard if they had known.

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with respect to Brown’s “foes,” who win some and lose some (probably against each other face-to-face) normally.

Actually, if these players have played each other before, they may have some secret information about relative abilities and standard playing styles, which they could have used against one another if they had only known their true opponent. So Brown’s method of limiting their observation (backs to each other; they didn’t see other games in progress and can’t have formed strategy against a familiar foe) may have been quite important indeed.

(I’m guessing a little bit and making a leap. I would suspect that Grand Masters probably have a wide variety of standard tactics, perhaps equally held and understood, so that even if they play one another, they can’t depend on quirks of playing style for finding an opening or strength/weakness.)

Curtis: I think I use “manipulation” to me the same thing as you mean by “alteration”.

“As a 5GW, the game seems to have been aborted. Although the video evidence we have is intriguing and a fertile source for 5GW speculations, no real consequences will flow from the game with respect to Brown’s”

Only because he gave away the secret!

Hey, any thought on how he new how many pieces would be left by each? He kept that secret to himself!

PSlog,

I think there is a stark differentiation between manipulation and alteration, or may be if we look at it like this:

Brown may have altered the usual environment for chess games (which are usually face-to-face encounters), and he certainly altered the boards every time he made a move; so you could say he “manipulated” the environment, insofar as moving inanimate objects is manipulation. (Lol, there’s an etymological pointer too.)

But this doesn’t mean he “manipulated” the people, since he didn’t alter them. They played as they would have against any foe making the moves Brown made.

OTOH, we could extend the idea of “manipulation” to include, perhaps, a consideration that his foes played differently than they would have if face-to-face with one another (re: my last comment) and that Chan was manipulated — and thus altered to play differently than he normally would — in the way Arherring described.

I think however that we need to be clearer in our use of the idea of manipulation, or any activity we do upon the Earth can be considered manipulation of others, vis-a-vis some of my posts on socialized OODA loops. [1] I.e., if everything we do in altering environments — moving inanimate objects — is to be considered some type of manipulation of other people, then nothing is. At least, we grow sloppy or may grow sloppy in our understandings and utilizations of alteration and manipulation.

I have some theories on the number secret, ranging from statistical studies Brown may have made, to algorithms, to even slight-of-hand. Are there only so many combinations possible in this number of pairings, so that if of a pair one person is left with X number then the other is left with Y? On sleight of hand: I did find it odd that Brown insisted the letter-carrier be the only one to touch the letter….then, at the very end, Brown helped him to open it, touching it. Was the “wrong number” the number left w/ Chan? If so, then I suspect some sort of statistical correlation; that game being the random win/loss game of the lot would lead to the wrong starting number.

[1] http://www.phaticcommunion.com/archives/2006/07/social_ooda_loo.php

Incidentally, re-watching it, he got Chan’s “5 left” right.

A statistical analysis of possible combinations could still be his method. Notice how he wasn’t too troubled by the first wrong number? He could have been wrong on 2 or 3 and still acted a little nonchalant as long as the others were correct.

Arherring:

Brown is only playing one game. The rest of his opponents are playing each other. [Tactical. Aside: meaning, there are many “games” going on for his opponents, but he is only playing one.]

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Brown has restricted/redirected the Observation of his targets so that they cannot operate at his level [Operational]

Excellent! I missed these earlier in my response.