Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!decvax!cca!rmc
From: rmc@cca.UUCP (Mark Chilenskas)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: New Topic - Please Read
Message-ID: <6614@cca.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 1-Feb-84 20:22:44 EST
Article-I.D.: cca.6614
Posted: Wed Feb  1 20:22:44 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Feb-84 04:46:08 EST
References: stolaf.1341
Lines: 62


    I think that this topic has been discussed a bit before, with the
conclusion being that there probably were some statistical differences
between women and men but that the variance between people was too large
to be able to make use of the statistical differences.

    Now on to music and chess as specific cases.

    Saying that women are not / can not be competent musicians is just
fantasy, pure and simple.  There is an old saying that Piatagorsky
played the cello as well as was humanly possible, then came
Rostropovich, who plays better than humanly possible.  It is unusual to
find any area, especially of a creative field, so thoroughly dominated
by one particular individual as cellists are by the technique of
Rostropovich.  But when he listens to other cellists, who does he like?
Jacqueline Du Pre!  (this info from an old interview i heard, probably
on NPR, just after he moved to Washington DC).

    There are of course many other women who are world class musicians.
Rosalyn Turek is gone, but where would modern harpsichord technique be
without her?  And then there is Martha Argereich (sigh, that looks
mis-spelled), who set pianists on their ear with her interpretations of
romantic music, especially Schuman.  ET Swillich is a good enough
composer to have won a Pulizer.  Granted, you can not find as many noted
women as noted men, but there are easier reasons to explain that than
using some comments about femininity and agressiveness being mutually
exclusive.  

    In chess there are no women who have acheived the exhalted status of
International Grandmaster.  In fact, the disparity in play is so great
between men and women that there are separate championships and
grandmaster categories for men and women.

    Or is it the other way around?  In the Soviet Union, where chess is
a rather important political activity and their "equal treatment of
women" is an important political edge, women and men do not train for
international competition together.  After a certain age (i think around
12), their training is segregated.  But in chess, it is impossible to
progress unless you play people as good or better than yourself.  Thus,
unless women are competing in major international events they will not
become as strong as the men who compete together.  However, as usual,
there is hope.  Pia Cramling (i think of Sweden) has been playing in the
full olympics and one of the recent US candidates for Women's World
Champion (sigh, don't have my chess library here and her name slips my
mind.  Rachel someone, but Rachel Carson is a scientist.) is now a men's
International Master and working on breaking into major tournaments.

    Now chess is an activity where aggression helps if ever there was
such an activity.  And yet even though the championship cycle is
segregated, even though an unrated woman international player must start
with a rating 200 points lower than an unrated man, there are still some
fine games being played by women and some are breaking into the men's
tourneys.  This is despite the curves organized chess has thrown them.

    Give your friend some cases, and let him explain them away.  As
long as you stay in completely abstract discussions, each side can prove
anything they want.  It is only when you test your hypotheses in real
world cases that you can get anywhere.

                                    R Mark Chilenskas
                                    Chilenskas @ CCA-VMS
                                    decvax!cca!rmc