Poker, Chess and "IQ"

Second Tyler Cowen post today. Tyler is hubba hubba over the fact that Steve Levitt made the top tier (or maybe he didn’t) in the World Series of Poker (link). It took Tyler to the second paragraph to work in the tag “IQ”:

So how many dimensions does IQ have?

He drops it there, but even as posed, it is a backhanded recognition of a stark fact: insofar as poker takes “IQ,” takes a highly specialized form of IQ. Say what you will about calculation, bluffing, reading the table: the stark fact is that very few poker players are much good at anything else, and many are really terrible at anything else. Bill Buckley once said something picking the government from the first page of the Boston phone book. Would you want your government chosen from the roster at an international chess championship?

Tyler also says that “Some top chess players, such as Etienne Bacrot” are moving to poker. I admit I never heard of Etienne Bacrot, but I doubt that very many top chess players are moving to poker. Insofar as chess takes IQ, it takes a very different sort of IQ from poker—lots of visual imagination. I doubt that the “innate” qualities are easily transferable.

I don’t play either chess or poker, but I do spend a lot of time reading in coffee shops near university campuses, so I’ve had a chance to observe a fair amount of chess. I offer two thoughts:

• A lot of these guys look to me like they learned their skills in the joint. Which would stand to reason: low opportunity cost on their time.

• A lot of the really good ones are black. Which may or may not stand to reason but it probably violates a common perception. I’m just waiting for the first black grandmaster, so I can watch Charles Murray explain him away (link).

Fn: Wait a minute! Here he is (link)! So much for common perception. And here is an interesting post on the general topic of prejudice against blacks in chess (link).