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Nature or Nurture


The question of "Nature or Nurture" has always been asked, especially by parents. In some cases, it has been used as an excuse when the children did not do well or when comparing with others who seem to have everything.  We would think, "Well, she's born smart...we are just not so fortunate". 

But is it true that your future is determined by our genes, from our parents? Can we change that?

This is a story of the Polgar sisters whose lives were not determined by nature. Perhaps after reading this, we may have to reconsider what it means to be a genius.

Laszlo Polgar studied intelligence in university and observed that a majority of the geniuses started at a young age and studied intensively to arrive where they are. He then developed a hypothesis that it is possible to turn any healthy newborn into a genius. When his daughters were born, he ran his so-called "experiment" with his wife, Klara, who agreed to support him in his quest. The subject he chose (after considering various subjects such as math and foreign languages) is chess - as there are very few women in the chess world at the time (even until this day) plus the fact that Laszlo himself is a mediocre player.  

Did it work?

Laszlo and Klara has 3 girls - Zsuzsa, Zsofia and Judit...all three became chess prodigies. Zsusza (or Susan), the eldest, was the world chess champion at 15 and became a grandmaster. Zsofia got the tile of international master and was ranked the 6th best woman player in the world. Judit, the youngest, became a grandmaster at 15, breaking the record held by Bobby Fischer. She was the No. 1 rated woman chess player in the world and has played (and beaten) the greats such as Anatoly Karpov, Garry Kasparov, Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand, to name a few...

In upcoming posts, we shall explore some of the actions taken by Laszlo to achieve this....

By the way, in case there is a question of "is this just a fluke by the Polgars?", well, the Straits Times (Singapore) has just published an article on May 27, 2024 on Siddharth Jagadeesh, the country's youngest grandmaster at 17. None of he parents are pro chess players but they hired coaches and spent " large sums of money" to help Siddharth chase his dreams.

Another story of similar nature to the Polgars is the one with Richard and this 2 daughters, Venus and Serena Williams. The 2 sister are, without a doubt, one of the craziest stories in the world of tennis. The Williams were from Compton, a city with gang-related issues, where he decided to use tennis as a way out. As highlighted in the movie "King Richard" starring Will Smith, they did excel. Both Venus and Serena made to the top of the world rankings and multiple Slams. 

Yes, Richard has a plan - let's have one, too...






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