Who are your favourite living thinkers / intellectuals?

The answers so far make me feel a bit dumb as I haven't heard of any of them.

The only brainy person I can think of who I admire is Garry Kasparov - I enjoy chess but I'm not very good at it, and the Grand Masters amaze me.

I've never understood chess, do you think it's one of those things where you either get it or you really don't?

I've never understood chess, do you think it's one of those things where you either get it or you really don't?

monopoly????? speaking for myself - nooooooooo!!!!  drafts and snap yes :-)  :-)

I agree Almond, I think it's one of the reasons I dislike working in groups, there's always somebody who wants to be in charge and sets a narrative and will broke no argument.

For me competing gets in the way of learning. It is hard to find people for thinking together. And many just love competing or find it natural.

Sometimes it is possible to think more collaboratively on the internet (uncommon though.)

I used to enjoy playing chess when I had someone to play with and I was in the school chess club. My next door neighbour taught me how to play. I am really attracted to the chess piece characters; the knight being the favourite because it is represented in the form of a horse, and because of how it moves. Like you, I am drawn to the patterns of the moves and of the board.

I don’t enjoy playing a bot online so much. No matter what standard you set it up to play at, the game seems weighted in its favour, so it’s not much fun. 

I was taught to play by my uncle who I think enjoyed winning to much, I wasn't very old when he tried to teach me. I think I just found chess boring, I dont' have anyone to play with even if I wished to learn.

I'm happy playing scrabble or some card games, I don't like competitive stuff or people, I don't think it makes me avoid learning as I don't see learning as in any way competitive. I've never been competitive, for as long as I can remember, maybe it was something that as an only child I never needed to do, and like so much else about school I didn't understand it. I feel uncomfortable around competitive people, if I win fairly, why do they get upset? If I lose why do they enjoy it so much? These things are supposed not to matter, but they obviously do, a great deal.

I also don't know many if any women who are chess players, I was brought up to think it was something for boys, which was the standard answer for anything like this.

It’s not for me, I prefer monopoly or drafts. Maybe a simple game of snap?

TheCatWoman said:

I've never understood chess

It is just a shortish list of rules about how pieces can move on the chessboard and you are competing against someone else to take their king.

Rules are something most autists can get and enjoy as they are not prone to interpritation and with practice it can be quite stimulating to work out a strategy to beat your opponent.

You have mentioned before that you don't like competing so do you think this could be making you avoid learning it? Not that you need to, but I'm just curious as to the driving force behind this.

Probably - I like the shapes of the pieces and the patterns that they move in across the board. I'm usually a natural problem solver, but there are so many different permutations to take into account when playing chess that I find it difficult to plan ahead. I now occasionally play it against an AI on my Xbox and can set the level of difficulty.

Kasparov would probably fall about laughing if he saw me play chess!