I have no idea if this snippet is authentic, but someone over on http://groups.google.com/group/alt.... posted this "quote from Ayn Rand's open letter to Boris Spassky":

---[ [attributed] quote from Ayn Rand's open letter to Boris Spassky ]---

Would you be able to play if the rules of the game remained as they are at present, with one exception: that the pawns were declared to be the most valuable and nonexpendable pieces (since they may symbolize the masses) which had to be protected at the price of sacrificing the more efficacious pieces (the individuals)?

---[ end quote ]---

Now, I am not a particular kindred spirit to Ms. Rand, but I do appreciate some points that she makes here and there. Though I'm not certain the above snippet is authentic, it is interesting in an odd way....

Excellent point about "universal free" health care in the former Soviet Union. Awful, I fear.

Choose one: Moscow or Arles? Arles is in the South of France and, I believe, Spassky's primary residence.

If one is born in The People's Republic of Pawns, then one might have to go along to get along. When Boris had the chance , he moved to Arles.

I would give that move a !!!!!.

We remember a lot of stories about our late friend Bobby Fischer. Boris is in the process of writing his memoir about Bobby. He even showed me a number of their pictures from private meetings…but not to expect it to be published in his lifetime.>

Here is a list of things wrong with your post:

1) Present day ELOs are absurd

2) ELO ratings "belong" in a particular range

3) Present day non-World Champions cannot be rated higher than World Champions from earlier eras

4) Inflated ratings are a bad thing

And here is where I explain how the points from your post are wrong:

1) ELO is just math. That's all it is. When you plug numbers into the formula, you get other numbers back. How is the present day ELO list more absurd than lists from 30 years ago? No one is making up these numbers. Data goes in, data comes out.

The problem people like you have is that you assign more meaning to ELO than it deserves. ELO is not a measure of chessplaying ability, nor is it meant to directly compare players from different eras.

2) You probably have some sort of general scale in mind for a "proper" ELO spectrum: 2400+ for IMs, 2500+ for average GMs, 2600+ for top GMs, 2650+ for WC-calibur GMs, 2700+ for WCs. Does that look about right?

Why does it follow that that this scale should never change even though there are more people playing competitve chess now than in 1970? That's like saying that because suits used to cost $1.00, they should always be $1.00. That would be nice, but with much more money in the pool it's unrealistic, to say the least.

3) When Boris Spassky achieved his lifetime high of 2690, it was <really> hard to get a rating of 2690. Nowadays it's easier, by virtue of a greater number of opportunities to do so, to obtain a higher rating than that. No one would argue that all the 2700's today are stronger than Spassky ever was based on the fact that Spassky never reached 2700.

4) Ratings inflation, like other inflation, is neither good nor bad. It's just a thing. People make more money today than they made in 1950 because there is a greater pool of money available. More people, more goods, more services equals more money. Sure, back in the day a gallon of gas only cost 10 cents or whatever, but people were making a lot less money at the time.

That "lifetime high" dates back to the very first official Elo list, 1971. Which means he reached his actual "lifetime high" probably slightly before that list. Elo's historical rating list puts his highest 5-year average at 2680, which means he probably was over 2700 at some point...

Spassky W - 84 L - 9 D - 134
Fischer W - 119 L - 10 D - 47

IMO he was only the best in the world from 1971-1972. Spassky was his superior from 1960-1970. By 1970 Bobby had overtaken Petrosian but not Spassky, who beat him soundly on Board 1 at the 1970 Olympiad. I believe Spassky would have won a 1968 Candidates Final against Fischer and Fischer knew it.>

AVRO38, we may have butted heads before, but this is an excellent post.

Interesting thoughts. I don't actually agree with most of this but for anyone who was there at the time (1971-1972) it is difficult even today to be objective about Fischer.

The cold war was raging and comes now this icconoclastic lone American who took it to the Soviet machine. I also saw the Fischer-Larsen match (all six games) live and I can tell you that by the third game there were very, very few spectators who did not think 6-0 was already a fait accompli.

For me, what his career lacked in length it made up in power. 6-zip, 6-zip against world class GMs is not going to be duplicated again and opponents crying 'I was sick' or 'I was hypnotized' or 'I saw the pieces through a fog' just don't cut it.