
Bobby Fischer in Socio-Cultural Perspective (2013) - lainon
http://nsuworks.nova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1452&context=tqr
======
wallace_f
In this long-winded 'psychobiography,' I was unable to find mention of one of
the more peculiar aspects of Fischer's life: Some events of his life appear to
indicate he either had extraordinarily bad luck, or had somehow pissed off
some powerful people in America. These events started at least a decade before
his participation in a $5 million match in Yugoslavia, which is what led to an
official warrant being issued for his arrest.

> On May 26, 1981, while walking in Pasadena, Fischer was arrested by a police
> patrolman, allegedly because he matched the description of a man who had
> just committed a bank robbery in the area.[436] Fischer, who alleged that he
> was slightly injured during the arrest,[437] said that he was held for two
> days, subjected to assault and various types of mistreatment,[438] and
> released on $1,000 bail.[439] Fischer published a 14-page pamphlet detailing
> his alleged experiences and saying that his arrest had been "a frame up and
> set up".[1]

1 -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fischer)

~~~
nilkn
I've never believed Fischer was as crazy as he is often portrayed. Many
aspects of his life are actually very easy to explain and understand:

(1) His departure from professional chess after winning the world championship
seems mysterious to many. Clearly he was just burnt out. He had achieved his
goal: beat the Russians and get the highest title in the game. There was
nothing left for him to do except repeat what he'd already done. He didn't
want to do that, so he just wanted out. I'm sure there are at least some
developers here who've dealt with burnout and can understand the psychology
here. It's not insanity.

(2) Fischer dealt with a lot of dishonesty on his way to the world
championship. He wrote a Sports Illustrated article accusing Soviet players of
collusion against him in the Candidates matches, and it's now accepted that he
was, in fact, correct. FIDE completely restructured the matches as a result.
Fischer was not being paranoid. I'm sure experiences like this contributed to
his burnout in chess, especially considering that he more or less tackled the
Soviet chess machine alone.

(3) Fischer was abandoned by mostly any family he ever had. It's natural he
would develop some mistrust of power figures, including the US government.

(4) He had religious and political views that liberals would consider extreme.
However, go over to /r/the_donald and tell me honestly if Fischer seems so
one-of-a-kind anymore politically. He wasn't at all. There were (and are)
millions of Americans who think like he did politically.

(5) He actually was arrested and held in jail for no good reason, as mentioned
above.

(6) After playing the Spassky rematch, he really was declared an outlaw and
was sought after by the US government. It wasn't paranoia. To Fischer, this
was just yet another act of betrayal by a power figure in his life.

~~~
lomereiter
Regarding the first point, an illustrative example is that of Nico Rosberg who
retired recently, right after winning F1 championship:
[https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/dec/02/nico-
rosberg-s...](https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2016/dec/02/nico-rosberg-
shock-retirement-f1-formula-one)

------
iamthepieman
Skimmed the first couple pages. First thing that stood out was the term
"Psychobiography" which, along with it's brief description from the posted pdf
seemed very familiar. It reminds me of psychohistory from Asimovs Foundation
series[0]

[0][http://asimov.wikia.com/wiki/Foundation](http://asimov.wikia.com/wiki/Foundation)

------
akkartik
Upvoting in case someone can explicate wtf this is..

~~~
PeterWhittaker
The punchline is at the end of the article, after the references and other
end-matter: A chart normally used in other fields that attempts to
contextualize in time significant events and periods of Fischer's life.

I found the chart intriguing, but not really explicative, but I didn't spend a
lot of time on it....

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JamilD
The historical review of Fischer's life is interesting, but I always found
these post-hoc analyses kind of dubious. It's almost like astrology; coming up
with a theory that explains human behavior, and then figuring out how to fit
an individual case (like Fischer's) with the theory you came up with. In this
case, it's instead the apparently scientific-sounding "MLCC methodology to
psychobiographical research"

~~~
vinchuco
"(...) when should a theory be regarded as scientific?" \- Science as
Falsification
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztmvtKLuR7I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztmvtKLuR7I)

