"Quadibloc" wrote in message
...
On Apr 26, 9:14 pm, "David Kane" wrote:
"Jürgen R." wrote in ...

If challenger and champion have the same chance of winning
a 24-game match then the champion will retain the title
75% of the time, winning either the match or the rematch.

Because losing the match and winning the rematch *isn't* retaining
the title. It's losing the title and then winning back the title. There
is nothing in mathematics that allows us to equate the cases.

Nothing in the _mathematics_, but one certainly could change the
rules, so that if the challenger wins the match, the match isn't over
till the rematch is played. Then the champion would mathematically
have just the enormous advantage noted.


Sure. I willl grant that *in that case* one could calculate a mathematical
advantage.

As long as we don't do that, then, you are right, a rematch is not a
problem for that reason.

But a rematch clause gives a champion an advantage just the same.

This was never denied. It does not give him an advantage *in the
initial match* though. It is logically similar to the practice of seeding the
loser of the championship match into the last round of the
next Candidates cycle. Karpov's defenses in 78, 81, and 84 are
historically exceptional in that they contained no champion's advantage.

Personally I think the rules should be designed so that tie matches
are statistically very improbable and giving the champion tie-odds
is only a very small advantage. But that is contrary to the game's
traditions.