If Chess never existed...

What do you think the world would be like? How would it change the course of history?

Next time, try to be a bit more original

cool ....... but no chess                  no checkers

I would now be playing Go or Shogi.

@ChessTroll You say that you don't know whether chess changed history, then give a small view of how it can affect history directly. But since when does it have to be a direct relationship?

Chess was invented a long time ago. When? Well, it was over 1000 years ago, and there's not much more needed to know to get to my point.

There is a phenomenon called the Butterfly Effect, predicted under Chaos Theory. Chaos Theory states that every single little thing that happens in the world produces a phenomenal change in the course of history eventually. Weather is one example. Weather is absolutely unpredictable as of predicting years ahead of time. You know it's going to be colder in the Arctic than the Sahara, and you now it will be rainier in the Amazon Rainforest than Death Valley, but you can't predict the exact weather. This is because of the so many variables that occur within this atmosphere. It is absolutely impossible to predict the weather, and we will never be able to no matter how advanced we get. We must be able to predict every single thing that will happen with every single molecule in the world, and all asteroids that will land on the earth. This is why the Butterfly Effect is called the Butterfly effect; because a butterfly can change the world. A butterfly in Beijing that flaps its wings would surely eventually change the weather in New York. So would chess not eventually change the course of history, especially that it is so widespread with so many years that have passed? Because of chess, World War II occurred. Also because of chess, Albert Einstein was born, the computer was invented, the country of Brazil was called Brazil, Tesla died before completing the death ray, the site was invented (obviously), the iPad was invented, and MUCH MORE! You would definitely have not existed without chess, and neither would have I. Maybe we would have already people using teleporters to teleport small objects. Maybe we would still have not invented touchscreen yet. Maybe 8 1/2 x 11 paper would have been thicker, or maybe would not be the standard of paper. Maybe it would be square. That does make sense after all. Maybe we would have 12 x 12 paper. Maybe we would have stopped global warming. If a butterfly eventually changes the world and makes it different than it would have been in a dramatic way, why would chess not? How chess changed the world, we will never know. Maybe some stuff would not have changed. Maybe the Leaning Tower of Pisa would have still been leaning. Maybe we would have still invented the mouse, tape, and Rubix Cube. But one thing for sure, if these items were still invented, they would almost surely have been invented by different people in a different point in time with a different style of design. Maybe the mouse would not be plastic, but metal. Maybe duct tape would have been only clear. Maybe the Rubix Cube would have had purple as one of the standard colors. But one thing for sure, chess has definitely changed every single aspect of the world we live in in some way.

And..... breathe

Wikipedia: A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment. Such fact-supported theories are not "guesses" but reliable accounts of the real world.

A theory is different from a scientific theory. A theory is basically just a guess with some thought in it. A SCIENTIFIC theory is a theory that is well proven. This is why the Theory of Evolution is called the Theory of Evolution. It is proven. As a matter of fact, we use evolution in every day life, vaccines being just one example

Magnus Carlsen would never have become world chess champion.

lol attempted to go to that site, but there is not a link for it

There is plenty of proof. The only proof needed is logic (although weather could count as proof too). You just aren't thinking hard enough.

Your first thought is, "How can a butterfly change the weather on the other side of the world? More so, how can a butterfly change the history of the Earth?" However, the question that is more logical is, "How would a butterfly NOT change the course of the world after thousands of years have passed?"

It is obvious that a butterfly does not change the course of the world in a few days. It can not change any course of actions by flying from one spot to another immediately (except for the rare occasion, such as a driver getting distracted by the butterfly, and consequentially running into a gas station, in which explodes, killing dozens of people and causing massive damage)

I doubt that a butterfly can even change the weather after a few days have passed. However, the atoms that have been moved will change the atmosphere around it slightly. This change will spread, although a slight change. However, this slight change will make another slight change, and the change will keep spreading. The change made will keep spreading throughout the atmosphere, and will become bigger and bigger, changing slightly faster. Eventually, other courses of action will change, such as bugs, plants, and bacteria dying or living due to these slight changes. This will cause bigger changes, and this will spread changes even further. Bigger and bigger changes might occur, such as animals dying, lightning striking a good distance away from where it would have stricken, rain falling in a slightly different place. This will cause even bigger changes. This can cause the landscape to slightly change and will start having a greater probability of significantly changing at least one event significant to humans. This will cause greater change. Eventually, people will start having minor changes in their life, such as losing a baseball game or forgetting to do the bills. Weather will greatly change. Eventually, these actions will change everyday lives within a greater radius. The weather will also change, to the point in which it is completely different from what it would have been. This effect is bound to spread throughout the world eventually. People will start dying and being saved because of the effects taking place. This domino effect becomes more of a snowball effect, in which creates such great changes, it will be bound to change history. People will be born that will directly change history, for the good or the worse. People will die that would have directly changed history but instead changes history by being an absence to this world. Wars will be declared, diseases will be cured, laws will be made, companies will collapse, countries will shift their borders, split, or even fall completely. Soon enough, every single person that is alive wouldn't have been alive, because there would have been different people if it weren't for this avalanche of events that would have taken place.

Culture, politics, and country boundaries would be different. Household items, the Internet, and social media would be different. College, toilet seats, pencils, technology, global warming, and clothing would be different. None of would be alive, neither me nor you. None of us would be on this forum. President Trump wouldn't be president, as he wouldn't exist. And that's just assuming USA would exist. Nobel prizes wouldn't exist. People as we know it would be different.

But everything that we know has come to be

All because a butterfly was daring enough to flap its wings

I took almost half an hour to write that lol. I really get wrapped up in these kinds of subjects.

But seriously, don't let the insignificant butterfly fool you into thinking that it is insignificant to begin with.

A butterfly flapping its wings?

 Will a silent fart in a shopping mall affect global politics?

i always loved the butterfly effect, it showed me that no action, whether large or small, was insignificant.

And just the thought that something so small (such as a butterfly flapping their wings) could change the world in a major way was... interesting to say the least

Exactly. I also get wrapped up and fascinated by such topics such as this and the vast expanse of the universe. An idea I got as a child after seeing the idea of time travel,  even before I knew of the butterfly effect, I thought about how a time traveller needs to be so careful, or everything and everyone he knows from his time would either not exist or not the same. The original idea I thought of was not of a butterfly, but of an ant. What if said time traveller goes back in time, say, 1000 years back, and steps on an ant? He wouldn't even know of it. He would go on, thinking that he has kept the timeline intact. But there are so many things that ant could have done if it was alive, ranging from the fact that it could just be that it helps build some of the ant mound, to that it could have been destined to bite a man on the foot, which in turn would cause him serious itching and not being able to drive well and at some point getting so itchy that his foot shakes and he accidentally speeds on a red light creating a devastating crash. Now that man survived, as well as the others who were part of the crash one of those people would go and become a murderer, killing someone who in the future was supposed to create a device that would greatly advance tech knowledge. There are so many possibilites of what that ant could have done, all changing history in some way.

I have thought of that too. No one is insignificant, and everyone can AND WILL change the world. The only thing is, you don't know what. Ever since I was a child, I have thought up of the Butterfly Effect myself (although not to the extent of something as small as a butterfly) and I have always wondered to myself how many people got saved because of me and how many people died because of me

I never really got time travel books/movies. I was always like, there is NO WAY you only changed TWO THINGS in the present world by traveling back in time 200 years, staying there for a week, and encountering random people you never met before lol