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From: Ron
Newsgroups: rec.games.chess.misc
Subject: Elo on Fischer's conditions vs. Karpov
Organization: Organization?
References: . com

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(Mon, 06 Nov 2006 14:35:13 EST)
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Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 19:35:13 GMT

In article ,
Jud McCranie wrote:

3. Thus a win by either player in the next decisive game shows
no superiority any more than a single throw of a coin shows a
superiority of heads or tails.

This doesn't make any sense to me. Whomever wins the next game as won
10 to 9.

Two things:

First of all, a 10 to 9 victory is less decisive than a 9 to 8 victory.

The difference isn't much, but, at some point, it does make sense to
say
that the difference is too small to make a meaningful judgement.

(Eg, compare the relative skills of two players of a match which ends
2:1 compared to two players of a match which ends 101:100. The first
victory has outplayed his opponent much more clearly).

Where you draw the line and say that a one-win victory becomes trivial
is completely arbitrary. Arbitrary isn't bad, and, for practical
purposes you need to make that arbitrary decision at some point.

-Ron
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