Author: Timothy J. Frohlick
Date: 13:34:45 10/01/01
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Assuming that only 10% of the world plays chess and the average number of games that each person will play to be 10,000 games during a lifetime, then we have between 10,000,000,000 and 20,000,000,000 chessplayers since the game began. Each game is on average 60 moves. 10,000 x 20,000,000,000 x 60 = number of moves/positions that have been played If you figure that openings played are similar then we can guess that the number of different positions would be 1/10th the total or 1,200,000,000,000,000 different positions. Assuming that the human species will be here for less than another 1,000,000 years and the above data obtains then we will have a total of 1,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 chess moves in the course of human existence. Far less than the silly "all possible moves" in chess. Of course I did not include computer vs computer play but who cares. Tim Frohlick On October 01, 2001 at 15:14:07, Slater Wold wrote: >I am not a math expert, and I know a lot of you (Uri) out there are. So I ask >all you experts to solve this problem: > > *How many legal positions are their in chess?* > >Also, please take into account that the king will always be present on the >board. > >I understand that there will more than likely be more positions than actually >possible. Such as the position of PPPPPPPPK vs ppppppppk. But I am willing to >deal with these. > >What would be the formula, and more importantly, the solution to this? > >Thanks! > > > >Slate
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