Every player has, at some time or other, reflected on how it came about that after studying the position, both sitting there staring at it and seeing it in the mind's eye, he decided on a move and then sent a message to the hand to reach out and play the decided upon move only to realize that somehow the whole process went south and the hand played a different move.
Excitement, fatigue, nervousness, time pressure...all these are possible reasons, but there are others, too. Sometimes a player can become so deeply absorbed in a certain move that he overlooks something that is all too obvious to the onlookers...including his opponent. This is a case of chess tunnel vision.
Then there are times a player calculates everything accurately and as he reaches out his hand to move, he has a sudden odd notion or unpredictable change and decides on another move...one that may even be calamitous.
There have also been times where we have seen that a move is bad and so continued searching only to forget why the move is bad and
end up playing it any way.
We have all asked ourselves why we made made a certain choice only to realize we don't actually know, but psychological science can offer some surprising insights.
One finding comes from a psychologist named Benjamin Libet back in the 1980s. He devised an experiment which was deceptively simple, but it has created a lot of debate.
Participants sat in a relaxed manner in front of a clock that had a small light revolving around the face. All they had to do was flex their finger whenever they felt the urge and remember the position of the light on the clock face when they experienced the initial urge to move their finger.
The experiment showed that the electrical activity in the brain built up well before people consciously intended to flex their finger and then did it.
What that means is unconscious mechanisms prepare us for any action we decide to take, but this all happens before we consciously experience intending to do something. The experiment suggests our unconscious rules all actions we take.
Can we make good decisions without consciously thinking? One study examined whether the best choices were based on active thinking or not. The startling findings were that people often made better choices when not thinking at all.
The argument is that our unconscious processes are less constrained than conscious processes. Unconscious processes, such as intuition, function in ways that automatically and rapidly synthesize a wide range of complex information and this gives an advantage over thinking deliberately. Think of Grandmasters playing blitz of one minute games..they are surprisingly good...better than most of us are even with unlimited thinking time.
So, where do all these scientific observations leave us when it comes to avoiding blunders? I have no idea; I just thought it was interesting.
IM Nikolay Minev was born in Bulgaria November 8, 1931 and was the the country's champion in 1953, 1965, and 1966. Minev and his wife emigrated to the United States in the mid-1980s and settled in Seattle, Washington where he passed away on March 10, 2-17. He was also a noted author and one of his books, David Bronstein: Fifty Great Short Games, published in 1997 is well worth the $19 and change price tag.
Here's an example of what's in the book...it's a game Bronstein played against Ewfim Geller in Moscow in the 1961 USSR Championship.
link to the crosstable HERE.
[Event "USSR Championship 1961"]
[Site "Moscow URS"]
[Date "1961.01.11"]
[Round "?"]
[White "David Bronstein"]
[Black "Efim Geller"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "E27"]
[Annotator "Stockfish 15.1"]
[PlyCount "39"]
[EventDate "1961.??.??"]
{Nimzo-Indian: Saemisch} 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. a3 {In the Saemisch
white gives up a tempo and concedes doubled c-Pawns to gain the Bishop pair.}
Bxc3+ 5. bxc3 {Black has several possibilities, the most common of which is to
blockade the doubled Pawns with 5....c5 then attack the P on c4 with ...b6, ...
Ba6, ...Nc6–a5 and ...Rc8. In the meantime white establishes a powerful
center which he hopes to use for an attack.} O-O 6. f3 {This seems to give
white better results than the equally popular. 6.e3} d5 {Black reacts quickly
to hinder 7.e4} 7. cxd5 exd5 8. e3 Bf5 9. Ne2 Nbd7 10. Nf4 c5 (10... Nb6 {
was played in Koneru,H (2578)-Dzagnidze,N (2573) Monaco 2015, but it didn't
turn out so well for black.} 11. Kf2 Rc8 12. g4 Bxg4 13. fxg4 Ne4+ 14. Kg1 Qh4
15. Qe2 c5 {Appearance to the contrary, thgis position favors white and she
went on to win.}) 11. Bd3 {An interesting possibility was 11.g4} Bxd3 12. Qxd3
Re8 13. O-O Rc8 14. Rb1 Qa5 {This is, as one would expect from Geller, much
more active than defending with 14...Nb6} (14... Nb6 $15) 15. Rxb7 {While
there is nothing wrong with this, it is not without risk. The option was to
forego taking the b-Pawn and playing 15.g4 at once.} Nb6 16. g4 {[%mdl 32]} h6
{Black should probably not have wasted a move trying to stop the advance of
the g-Pawn and counterattacked with 16...c4} (16... c4 {This, however, leads
to some very tricky play with an obscure outcome that would not be possible to
calculate OTB!} 17. Qf5 h6 (17... Rb8 18. Rc7 Nc8 (18... Rec8 19. Re7 Na4 (
19... Rf8 20. g5) 20. g5 {White is winning.}) 19. Rxc8 Rexc8 20. g5 Ne8 21.
Nxd5 Qd8 22. e4 {with an excellent position.}) 18. h4 Qa6 19. Rxb6 Qxb6 20. g5
hxg5 21. hxg5 g6 22. Qxf6 Rc6 23. Nxd5 Rxf6 24. Nxf6+ Kh8 25. Nxe8 {with about
equal chances.}) 17. h4 {[%mdl 2048] White is in control.} cxd4 ({Keeps
fighting.} 17... c4 18. Qc2 (18. Qf5 {leads to the same murky results as in
the previous note.} Qa6 19. Rxb6 Qxb6 20. g5 hxg5 21. hxg5 g6 22. Qxf6 Rc6 23.
Nxd5 Rxf6 24. Nxf6+ Kh8 25. Nxe8) 18... Qa6 19. Rxb6 Qxb6 20. g5 hxg5 21. hxg5
Nh7 22. Nxd5 Qb3 23. Qg2 Rc6 24. e4) 18. g5 (18. exd4 {is less accurate.} Rxc3
19. Rxa7 Rxd3 20. Rxa5 Rxd4 {with equal chances.}) 18... dxe3 {This is the
losing blunder, but who could have anticipated the finish?} (18... hxg5 {
At this point I took a break for breakfast and let Stockfish 15.1 running.
Upon return this was it's best line...} 19. hxg5 Nfd7 20. cxd4 Qa4 21. g6 fxg6
22. Qxg6 Qc2 23. a4 Qxg6+ 24. Nxg6 Rb8 25. Rxa7 Ra8 26. Rc7 Rxa4 27. Rf2 Rc4
28. Rc2 Rxc2 29. Rxc2 Nf6 30. Ne5 Nfd7 31. Nxd7 Nxd7 32. Kf2 {And white is a P
up, but the previous play is engine play and the game's outcome is in doubt.})
19. gxf6 {Black is already lost and there is no way of saving the game so it
really is a moot point that Geller missed the fact that this move threatens
mate.} Rxc3 (19... Qc5 20. Qg6 {Now this fails.} e2+ 21. Kg2 exf1=Q+ 22. Kxf1
Qf8 (22... fxg6 23. Rxg7+ Kh8 24. Nxg6#) 23. Qg3 Rxc3 {with equal chances.})
20. Qg6 {[%mdl 512] An abrupt end. Geller resigned.} (20. Rxf7 {It's
interesting that after this white also has a Q sacrifice that mates in 6!} Rc7
21. Rxc7 Nd7 22. Rxd7 Re4 23. Qxe4 dxe4 24. Rxg7+ Kf8 25. Ne6+ Ke8 26. Re7#) (
20. Qg6 fxg6 21. Rxg7+ Kh8 22. Nxg6#) 1-0
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