# At Play: A Personal Odyssey in Chess - by TJ Williams
**URL:** https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321
**Category:** Metapsychosis journal
**Tags:** feature
**Created:** [June 14, 2017, 5:29pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321 "2017-06-14T17:29:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@mindful\_ai](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/mindful_ai)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2017, 5:29pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/1 "2017-06-14T17:29:55Z")
> **[At Play: A Personal Odyssey in Chess](https://www.metapsychosis.com/at-play-personal-odyssey-chess/)**
>
> Chess is two wills locked not only in combat but also in cooperation. Players must together create the conditions allowing one to emerge triumphant—or not.
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### Author:  [@johnnydavis54](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/johnnydavis54)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2017, 9:53pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/2 "2017-06-14T21:53:50Z")
A charming reflection of an evolving family-mind entangled in the evolving field of a popular board game. A sweet story, a pleasure to read. I don’t play chess but after reading this I wish that I did.
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### Author:  [@MC\_DC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/MC_DC)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2017, 10:24pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/3 "2017-06-16T22:24:46Z")
This one hit me hard. I also learned from and used lose in chess with my dad. Sadly, we didn’t continue with the tradition once the digital world took over.
Great writing on this one, and I also appreciate the ideas and philosophy behind the article. A+.
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### Author:  [@patanswer](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/patanswer)
#### Post date: [June 17, 2017, 12:43pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/4 "2017-06-17T12:43:31Z")
Thank you both for such kind commentary. I’m glad you liked the piece.
> [@johnnydavis54](#):
>
> I don’t play chess but after reading this I wish that I did.
It’s never too late! 😀
> [@MC\_DC](#):
>
> Sadly, we didn’t continue with the tradition once the digital world took over.
The effect of the digital world on socialization in general seems interestingly ambivalent. In our case, we could and maybe even should take advantage of virtual play, but of course half the fun is the old dynamics.
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### Author:  [@mindful\_ai](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/mindful_ai)
#### Post date: [July 10, 2017, 8:14am UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/5 "2017-07-10T08:14:08Z")
Twitter giveth:
>
###Chess: The Great War Between Light and Darkness – by Manley P. Hall
> **[Chess: The Great War Between Light and Darkness | Gnostic Warrior By Moe Bedard](https://gnosticwarrior.com/chess.html)**
>
> By Manly P. Hall – In its symbolism chess is the most significant of all games. It has been called “the royal game”–the pastime of kings. Like the Tarot cards, the chessmen represent the elements of life and philosophy. The game was played in India...
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### Author:  [@soulnavigatour](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/soulnavigatour)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2017, 11:34pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/6 "2017-07-12T23:34:55Z")
Thank you for this. I am now interested in the history of chess. For instance, something as simple as the term “chess”? What is the origin of the word and its meaning?
And from their what was the first chess board and what stirred man to create such a game? Where was it predominantly played? These are all questions I would like answered. More importantly, the deeper symbolism…“strategy across the board and the two.” Strategy is decision making and will, and the two a relationship of opponents who achieve an ultimate synthesis. Even if one person “loses” they learn where their decision and will is better directed. And this game probably carries over into one’s real life…in the more important decisions of living. The universe and chess and on this board: Physics in action.
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### Author:  [@patanswer](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/patanswer)
#### Post date: [July 14, 2017, 12:12pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/7 "2017-07-14T12:12:52Z")
Great observations and deep questions indeed.
Former player and author Raymond Keene wrote an illustrated history that I have lying around here somewhere…
Found almost everywhere, board games are likely as old as the first villages. Chess itself seems to have bubbled up from the cross-cultural stew that was the ‘ancient’ world between the Aegean and the Ganges. According to Keene, if I remember correctly, some time in the wake of Alexander the Great Indian pieces and a Greek version of something like ‘othello’ got together. The rules of the game evolved over centuries to their present form as it spread through Eurasia but, perhaps fittingly, originated in lands where epic (Mahabharata, Iliad) ruled the mythic imagination.
One plausibility anyway…
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### Author:  [@soulnavigatour](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/soulnavigatour)
#### Post date: [July 29, 2017, 5:28pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/8 "2017-07-29T17:28:08Z")
I was recently reading about Sumeria and discovered the “Game of Ur.” You may enjoy this article:
> **[Board games history: The Royal Game of Ur in Mesopotamia](https://clevergames.wordpress.com/2009/07/07/histoy-of-games-the-royal-game-of-ur-in-mesopotamia/)**
>
> In 1920 British archaeologist Sir Charles Leonard Woolley, during some excavations in the Royal Cemetery of Ur in Mesopotamia, found the rests of a Royal tomb full of ancient and beautiful finds. I…
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### Author:  [@MC\_DC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/MC_DC)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2017, 11:32am UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/9 "2017-08-22T11:32:30Z")
Wow, that was a great read also, Manly P. Hall never disappoints.
“East Indian princes were wont to sit on the balconies of their palaces and play chess with living men standing upon a checkerboard pavement of black and white marble in the courtyard below.”
This reminds me of a scene in “The Prisioner”, I don’t really remember what happens, just that Patrick McGoohan is hilarious in it.
Anyway, I have to read that “Secret Teachings of all Ages” book.
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### Author:  [@achronon](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/achronon)
#### Post date: [November 20, 2017, 5:08pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/10 "2017-11-20T17:08:30Z")
I realize it’s been a while on this thread, but I read this today, and while it ties into a number of other themes that are being worked in other threads, I found it most appropriate to post it here:
> It is now evident, for example, that chess-playing computer programs represent progress toward real intelligence in roughly the same sense that climbing a tree represents progress toward the moon.
(Edward F. Kelley (2007) “Introduction”, in E.F. Kelley, _et al._ (eds.), _Irreducible Mind: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century_, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Plymouth, pp. xxiv-xxv)
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### Author:  [@patanswer](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/patanswer)
#### Post date: [November 20, 2017, 7:11pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/11 "2017-11-20T19:11:47Z")
In this case, my “like” really is akin to:
🤣😂😂😂👍👍👍🕶
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### Author:  [@Gennifrey\_Edwards](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/Gennifrey_Edwards)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2018, 6:31pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/12 "2018-02-24T18:31:01Z")
> [@soulnavigatour](#):
>
> I was recently reading about Sumeria and discovered the “Game of Ur.” You may enjoy this article:
A few tangential comments about this discussion. Although I don’t play chess (although I know how to, I’m just not very good at it), my brother, Rod Edwards, does so and developed a historical rating system for comparing chess players across time. Rod is a mathematics professor at the University of Victoria, B.C., Canada. Here is a review of his work along with an interesting video that presents results of his rating system :
[Historical Chess Ratings – dynamically presented | ChessBase](https://en.chessbase.com/post/historical-chess-ratings-dynamically-presented)
Also, you mention the game of Ur. My brother found evidence of an interesting Viking game related peripherally to chess. My other brother, Cliff Edwards, who is a professional programmer and electronic engineer, and Rod, developed a computer version of the game. It still works and is available online here :
[http://www.user.dccnet.com/cedwards/](http://www.user.dccnet.com/cedwards/)
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### Author:  [@achronon](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/achronon)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2018, 6:43pm UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/13 "2018-02-24T18:43:46Z")
Sooo … weirdness runs in the family, eh? _Très bon_. 👍
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### Author:  [@michael\_dangelo](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/u/michael_dangelo)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2018, 2:45am UTC](https://www.infiniteconversations.com/t/at-play-a-personal-odyssey-in-chess-by-tj-williams/1321/14 "2018-07-12T02:45:03Z")
This was a captivating read, your writing is excellent. I learned chess from my grandfather, but I never managed to beat him. Thank you for sharing this story.