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Genius can appear anywhere, but the origins of Carlsen's talent are particularly mysterious. In November, Carlsen, then 18, became the youngest world No. 1 in the game's history. He hails from Norway - a "small, poxy chess nation with almost no history of success," as the English grand master Nigel Short sniffily describes it - and unlike many chess prodigies who are full-time players by age 12, Carlsen stayed in school until last year. His father Henrik, a soft-spoken engineer, says he has spent more time urging his young son to complete his schoolwork than to play chess...
...actual board at home. "I might have one somewhere. I'm not sure," he says. Powerful chess programs, which now routinely beat the best human competitors, have allowed grand masters to study positions at a deeper level than was possible before. Short says top players can now spend almost an entire game trading moves that have been scripted by the same program and that such play by rote has removed some of the mystique of chess. He likens chess computers to "chainsaws chopping down the Amazon." (Read a Q&A with Carlsen...
...Harry and Mary were white: Willow attracted almost nobody of color. The gurus of the megachurch explosion were church-growth consultants, who endorsed the "homogeneous unit principle": people like to worship with people who are similar to them - in age, wealth and race. Hybels, while denying intentional exclusivity, says that "in the early days, we were all young, white, affluent, college-educated suburbanites, and we all understood each other. When we reached out to our friends, it became self-reinforcing...
...army of Imam Hussain ... supporters of Mir-Hossein." Hussain had become Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the declared loser in last June's presidential election to the "usurper" Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The authorities reacted ferociously, with bullets and batons, killing several people. The opposition responded with fists and stones, almost boastful of its long-lived defiance. The protesters, whose campaign has lasted for more than six months, acted on the belief that light will eventually overcome darkness. It's worth remembering, however, that Ashura is not a joyful festival but a day to mourn martyrs: in history, Yazid defeated the beloved Hussain...
...Almost none of this is plausible, or even logically consistent. In old Mamet, themes and character revelations bubbled up naturally, almost imperceptibly, out of the rambling dialogue--that miasma of indirection, euphemism and profanity that has been dubbed Mametspeak. The new Mametspeak is more like Mametshout: thematic statements imposed from on high and delivered with an epigrammatic stun gun. Racism is universal and unavoidable. ("I didn't do anything." "You're white.") Justice is an illusion. ("The legal process is only about three things. Hatred, fear or envy.") Free will is a joke. ("Why does he want to confess...