I freely admit that chess, for those who enjoy it, is a wonderful game, but I honestly believe that as a game , backgammon is better (and this isn't just because I'm a lot better at playing backgammon than chess). Having relatively recently written a book on game theory, I have given quite a lot of thought to the nature of games, and from that I'd say that chess has two significant weaknesses compared with backgammon. One is the lack of randomness. Because backgammon includes the roll of the dice, it introduces a random factor into the play. Of course, a game that is totally random provides very little enjoyment. Tossing a coin isn't at all entertaining. But the clever thing about backgammon is that the randomness is contributory without dominating - there is still plenty of room for skill (apart from very flukey dice throws, I can always be beaten by a really good backgammon player), but the introduction of a random factor makes it more life-like, with more of a sense...
Hey, that's terrific! You've got a super voice for this stuff, too, Brian.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the broadcast. You touched on many of the details, such as the Radium Girls and various consumer products, that I discuss in my book Something Out of Nothing: Marie Curie and Radium (FSG, 2006).
ReplyDeleteCarla Killough McClafferty
www.carlamcclafferty.com
Amy - thank you so much!
ReplyDeleteCarla - I haven't seen your book - the source of most of the information on Marie Curie and the applications of radium I used was The Curies by Dennis Brian, though I did also make use of a number of other sources.
If your publisher is interested, I edit the popular science website www.popularscience.co.uk which reviews such books - they can contact the site on info@popularscience.co.uk