Taylor Kingston wrote:
Alan OBrien wrote:
"Ian Burton" wrote in message
news:7yDfg.25109$ZW3.11770@dukeread04...
I was watching the Aronian game on the ICC yesterday when a kibitzer
noted that Aronian was only 137 cm tall (about 5'4"). Is this true?

I have seen him and he is probably about 4 foot 10".
He is a hell of a short guy.

4'10", seriously?

How 'seriously' would Taylor Kingston know Alan O'Brien? :-)

I've sometimes thought about who was the greatest chess player
for his size. They used to call "Sugar" Ray Robinson "the greatest
boxer pound for pound," but who was the greatest chess player
inch for inch?

(Yes, I noticed that Taylor Kingston wrote 'his size'.)
Without making any distinction on account of sex, however,
I would submit that Judit Polgar probably has the highest
FIDE rating / physical size ratio in history.

Some obvious candidates would include Morphy,
Steinitz, Reshevsky, Fine and Karpov.

Given that the average height of men in the United States
has been increasing with each generation, I doubt that
it's quite fair, say, to compare Morphy's height to
Fischer's height without taking into account the different
average heights of American men for each generation.

--Nick

Nick wrote:
Taylor Kingston wrote:
Alan OBrien wrote:
"Ian Burton" wrote in message
news:7yDfg.25109$ZW3.11770@dukeread04...
I was watching the Aronian game on the ICC yesterday when a kibitzer
noted that Aronian was only 137 cm tall (about 5'4"). Is this true?

I have seen him and he is probably about 4 foot 10".
He is a hell of a short guy.

4'10", seriously?

How 'seriously' would Taylor Kingston know Alan O'Brien? :-)

Since my question was about Aronian, the relevance of this comment
eludes me.

I've sometimes thought about who was the greatest chess player
for his size. They used to call "Sugar" Ray Robinson "the greatest
boxer pound for pound," but who was the greatest chess player
inch for inch?

(Yes, I noticed that Taylor Kingston wrote 'his size'.)
Without making any distinction on account of sex, however,
I would submit that Judit Polgar probably has the highest
FIDE rating / physical size ratio in history.

Some obvious candidates would include Morphy,
Steinitz, Reshevsky, Fine and Karpov.

Given that the average height of men in the United States
has been increasing with each generation, I doubt that
it's quite fair, say, to compare Morphy's height to
Fischer's height without taking into account the different
average heights of American men for each generation.

Well then, you go right ahead and take that into account, Nick, with
my full blessing. We're behind you all the way on this.

Taylor Kingston wrote:
Nick wrote:
Taylor Kingston wrote:
Alan OBrien wrote:
"Ian Burton" wrote in message
news:7yDfg.25109$ZW3.11770@dukeread04...
I was watching the Aronian game on the ICC yesterday when a kibitzer
noted that Aronian was only 137 cm tall (about 5'4"). Is this true?

I have seen him and he is probably about 4 foot 10".
He is a hell of a short guy.

4'10", seriously?

How 'seriously' would Taylor Kingston know Alan O'Brien? :-)

Since my question was about Aronian, the relevance
of this comment eludes me.

It was just my joke, given that a friend of mine knows
Alan O'Brien personally and his sense of humour.

I've sometimes thought about who was the greatest chess player
for his size. They used to call "Sugar" Ray Robinson "the greatest
boxer pound for pound," but who was the greatest chess player
inch for inch?

(Yes, I noticed that Taylor Kingston wrote 'his size'.)
Without making any distinction on account of sex, however,
I would submit that Judit Polgar probably has the highest
FIDE rating / physical size ratio in history.

Some obvious candidates would include Morphy,
Steinitz, Reshevsky, Fine and Karpov.

Given that the average height of men in the United States
has been increasing with each generation, I doubt that
it's quite fair, say, to compare Morphy's height to
Fischer's height without taking into account the different
average heights of American men for each generation.

Well then, you go right ahead and take that into account, Nick,
with my full blessing. We're behind you all the way on this.

In the interest of clarity, I have no serious dispute with
Taylor Kingston about any subject in this thread.
I was attempting to present an alternative way of
considered 'tallness'.

Being considered 'tall' can be construed both absolutely
(in terms of a measured height) and comparatively
(in terms of one's ranking in one's population).

Let's suppose that A and B are American men who were
born a few generations apart. Let's suppose that A was
5' 10" tall when the average height of an American man
was 5' 5". Let's suppose that B was 6' tall when the
average height of an American man was 5' 9".

In the usual sense, B would be considered taller than A
(comparing 6' to 5' 10"). But in an alternative sense,
A *could* be considered taller than B if, say, A's height
was in the top 10 percent of his population, while B's
height was only in the top 20 percent of his population.

I am *not* saying that these two interpretations have
equal value in general application. The first interpretation
would be the most common way to perceive 'tallness'. Yet
the second interpretation could be an interesting alternative
perception of 'tallness'.

Some people have conjectured that Napoleon felt impelled
to conquer in order to compensate for feelings of inferiority
on account of being very short. But was Napoleon really
very short when compared to Frenchmen of his generation?
As far as I know, Napoleon actually was above average
in height for a Frenchman of his generation.

--Nick