Derek Nalls wrote on Mon, Jun 5, 2006 05:49 AM UTC:
'Statistical results do not disprove that such an effect is not at work
... the subconcious is powerful.'
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Yes, you make a worthy point but ...
The first-move-of-the-game advantage for white is real- NOT merely an
imaginary, psychosomatic condition suffered by black.
Everyone (except a certain GM) can see and feel it when they play. White
controls the tempo the first and most important time in the game.
Moreover, there is no assurance that black will get to control the tempo
an equal number of times. Does anyone contend that the tempo is trivial?
White chooses and dictates the opening that black must defend against and
so, shapes the entire game. White acts and black reacts as it must ...
repeatedly. If black does not defend soundly, the advantage of white
increases further which will give white opportunities to increase it even
further and will probably, eventually lead to black's loss of the game.
Although chess is intractable, some trivial games similar to chess with
fewer pieces and small boards have been demonstrated to have greater (if
not absolute) first-move-of-the-game advantages for white than chess via
powerful computers. So, the applicability of this concept to chess
variants with the white-black turn order has been tentatively established-
zugzwang-for-white, badly designed games being the important exception.