In world first, Russian chess player poisons rival’s board with mercury
https://arstechnica.com/culture/2024/08/in-world-first-russian-chess-player-poisons-rivals-board-with-mercury/Open linkView original on lemmy.sdf.org819
Comments142https://arstechnica.com/culture/2024/08/in-world-first-russian-chess-player-poisons-rivals-board-with-mercury/Open linkView original on lemmy.sdf.org
What an imbecile. Mercury is a planet. It is too large to be hidden anywhere on a chess board
Wrong. Mercury is a god. He's much too powerful to do the biddings of a puny mortal.
You're both wrong, it's a car. I'm pretty crazy about one though.
You all were close but, still wrong. Marie Curie was a scientist.
You're also wrong. He's a singer known as Freddie. And I don't know what kind of necromancy was used to get him on a chess board.
This whole thread is a clue about that.
The necromancers used myrrh & curry.
Your wrong about that
She used mer-curry which she got from mer-people
It's a mer-people specialty
Is mer-curry really worth all the murmaider?
(Prob yes)
And that scientists name? Albert Einstein.
Marc Anthony is a singer/songwriter, pfffff.
I hear it’s in Gatorade
Gators are too big to fit in the bottles, can’t be that
not in microwave?
This comment is an underrated gem.
Bravo sir.
russians prove they can’t win anything legitimately
...this was a regional tournament, in the Caucasus Republic of Dagestan.
So calling them Russian is technically accurate, but really they are a brutalized and subjugated colonial subject of Russia.
Also, you'll find this kind of crazy anywhere you go. She literally just dumped mercury around her opponents chess board when she thought no one was around to notice.
I get why it's catching headlines, but give me a break. It's just crazy being crazy.
The word Russian has two meanings in English. It can mean relating to the country of Russia, or relating to the Rus ethnicity.
The Russian language distinguishes the two. The first is росси́йский. The second is ру́сский. Both words are translated as “Russian” in English, which causes confusion in English, but there’s no such confusion in Russian.
These people (Dagestanis) are Russian in the first sense, but not the second sense.
Historically, the second sense of “Russian” included Ukrainians and Belarussians (so you could say Ukrainians were Russian in the second sense, but not the first sense) but it’s become controversial to do so since the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Interesting! thanks for elaborating. A week or month ago, a local Ukrainski politician, I thought it was a lady person, proclaimed that using the Russian language the invaders use is like spitting in the face of your home country. She got a hell of a lot of pushback on that. That made it seem that a lot of locals still prefer Russian to Ukrainian language. Can you shed some light on those conflicting sentiments?
Was inspired to educate myself a bit extra on Cyrillic script, so, from the english wiki:
"As of 2011, around 252 million people in Eurasia use it as the official alphabet for their national languages. About half of them are in Russia. " ... "The Slavic languages are conventionally (that is, also on the basis of extralinguistic features) divided into three subgroups: East, South, and West, which together constitute more than 20 languages. Of these, 10 have at least one million speakers and official status as the national languages of the countries in which they are predominantly spoken: Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian (of the East group), Polish, Czech and Slovak (of the West group), Bulgarian and Macedonian (eastern members of the South group), and Serbo-Croatian and Slovene (western members of the South group) "
I can only approach this from the English language, which is why I said technically correct. But I also feel the article should have done a lot better job explaining that they were Dagestani, which is not unreasonable as if this had happened in Chechnya, it would have said Chechen.
Also, I have never seen Russian used interchangeably with Ukrainian, or Belarusian, before or after, 2014. But again, maybe that's just my English language only bias.
That said, I do appreciate you writing on the explainer for other users who aren't familiar with the status of, or distinction between Russia and the Caucasus.
TBF even Russia is a brutalized and subjugated colonial subject of Russia.
Very not true, Kaspersky® just won a legitimate label as malware.
Kasperskyⓜⓐⓛⓦⓐ®ⓔ
Yeah! Take that Kasparov! You can't win anything!
Except maybe the competition for most war crimes committed, but they are closely rivaled by the Israeli fascists
Japan, maybe? Or like the Khmer Rouge? I'm not saying the Nazis aren't monsters because they totally are, I'm just saying the competition might be closer than you think.
Dina would like a word.
who?
https://youtu.be/AdGMUA-lGAM
Is it a first?
Or is it the first time they got caught?
Yes
this type of stuff I will never get. why are you in a competition if you don't want to do the thing you competing in to win. join an assasin competition.
they HAVE those???
in Russia, they call them "democracies"
Or "defenestracies".
Lmao that's pretty a solid one, nice
Boeing sponsors a whole team.
When they win, they get a stranding ovation.
Poor choice of heavy metal.
I think sometimes competition breeds contempt and she hated this person enough to want to kill her, in addition to wanting to remove her as a challenge.
Actually that's allowed, google en poissant.
Holy nightshade!
Actual Russian.
Googling "en poissant" yields "en passant" as a suggested term.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/En_passant
En poissant = in sticking En passant = in passing En poissant = in fish
Je suis hereux d'apprendre quelques psuedo-homonymes en francais ce jour!
Merci!
Merci à vous! I do not know French, and my comment was a pun on "en passant" using the word "poison", but I appreciate the free lesson!
Vous etes remerci. "You're welcome" is literally "you are rewelcome". :)
WOOOSHHH
Is the sound the pun made as it just whizzed by you.
Between this, the antisemitism of Bobby Fischer, and the guy cheating with the power of teledildonics, I have to wonder what the hell is up with chess players.
The only murder in Antarctica was a Russian killing somrone with an ice ax over a game of chess.
The Russians did it again in 2018, apparently. This time either over a rude comment or a book spoiler.
Hmmm lets examine this statement.
Isolated weird place, scary Russians, Russian stereotypes of intellectual game + tremendous violence.
Gee, it almost sounds like this is a too convenient racist lie. Any proof? The oldest reference just says 'it totally happened' and cites something I can't access on Google books. It's 20 years after the fact and not a primary source.
Hell hath no fury like a competitive nerd being put on a pedestal.
I think this happens a lot anytime someone who perceives themselves as being shunned by society gets too much positive feedback and an iota of power over people.
I think its the same reason why every nerdy twitch streamer ends up being outed as an abusive child predator.
Nice to see an instance of my favorite word in the wild.
Good guess.
Should I be scared to google it?
You might like what you find.
This sounds like a mini threat
Edit: holy macaroni the future is now
What a bizarre way to try to murder someone. And over a chess game? I know Russians take their chess seriously, but this is insane.
wait till you hear about their approach to roulette!
Oh boy, just wait until you read up on Russian politics/polonium toxicity!
'traditional russian values' on display for all to see
You had the chance to legitimately used 'defenestration' and you didn't jump on it?!
No no, the point is to make someone jump on it. In this case, it was you!
I'm not taking the fall!
No no. You see. You didn't actually chose to jump on it, the other person made you. You have no say in the taking the fall.
Russian suicides you mean? Russian has never once in its history killed anyone, they died of their own accord.
They also started a misinformation campaign about a female boxer's gender.
This wasn't assassination though, the headline is just deceptive. It was just a lone psycho in Russia trying to kill another Russian. Not an international competition, like was implied in the headline. (Or at least that's the impression I got from the headline.
You fool! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous is "Never get involved in a land war in Ukraine." But only slightly less well known is this: "Never go in against a Russian when death is on the line!"
I'm surprised it actually worked. Liquid mercury isn't really that harmful, it's the vapors that get you. I'd be concerned about it affecting me too, since I'd also be sitting at the board.
It just says attempted poisoning so I'm not even sure it did actually work.
Comments above say the opponent was hospitalized but not killed. I can’t swear to the veracity. There are many forms of mercury though and they vary in toxicity.
Filters shoved deep in the nostrils maybe?
I’m no chemist but understand the liquid mercury is safe to handle for short periods provided you wash your hands well. It can absorb through your skin over time though.
Probably not pure mercury but one of the extremely nasty mercury compounds that is easily absorbed through the skin. The victim was very sick.
Kamikaze poisoning.. people at both sides will be suspects, seems like a good plan.
ever watched the princess bride?
It's a product of the state of a country that calls Gary Kasparov a terrorist. https://www.chess.com/news/view/russia-issues-arrest-warrant-for-kasparov-on-terrorist-charges
Sounds pretty Russian
If chess players do this, what do you think Russian secret service it's capable of?
These chess strategies are getting more and more creative
I bet all the people who said "chess is a solved game" are feeling really silly right now
People that say that should always feel silly because chess isn't solved.
FYI
endgame tablebases (strong solutions) have been found for all three- to seven-piece endgames, counting the two kings as pieces.
So not solved then.
Correct. It is interesting to know just how unsolved.
They're thinking out of the box now. Or out of the board.
Out of the window.
"I learned it by watching you, Vlad!"
Someone grew up in the 80s.
The Quicksilver Gambit? In modern chess? We're far beyond that!
This opening move is called "The Russian Statesman". Very traditional.
Russians doing Russian things
I mean, the article states that the victim did suffer some symptoms, so I wouldn't say they were totally unaffected. If the article is accurate, would it be possible that she was inhaling vapor from the spill? The victim is quoted as saying she had to be at that board for 5 hours, and the Wikipedia article indicates that the primary danger of elemental mercury is inhalation of vapor (it claims 80% absorption rate via respiration, as opposed to the 1% via direct contact). Unfortunately, I am pretty ignorant of chemistry, so I've no idea if my speculation is plausible. How much room temp mercury would need to be sitting in front of you before you felt the effects of the vapor. Or even if you would at all, since the CDC website says the vapor is more dense than air.
Additionally, I noticed that one of the symptoms of mercury inhalation is cognitive impairment. Obviously this is more speculation, but perhaps the intent was not to kill, but rather to sabotage the victim's play? After all, it seems like the perpetrator and the victim were rivals. Could be a Nancy Kerrigan-Tonya Harding situation, just more classically Russian what with the use of poison rather than brute force.
should've used dimethylmercury
The potion of instant dementia
I don't know what the exact rules are here, but if there's no specific clause about it one surviving competitor is technically a win.
Cut to the chess judges frantically flipping through the rulebook like in Air Bud...
What is it with Russian athletes (being it mental or physical) just always cheating so much that at this point it's just expected?
Would it have anything to do with living in a dictatorship with a leader who always needs to be perceived as the best with the best countryband the best people because of his policies?
Russia has enough of a population that crazies pop up. Think Florida man.
Probably because they were raised in the post-Soviet mafia era.
Its pretty common practice to cheat. Jon Jones has been getting away with cheating for years.
This is a story made for all the chess meme communities
Opening move Move poison to c1 Poison opponent
I don't get this, mercury will absorb into the skin but it's not lethal unless you're exposed to a constant amount over time
Evidently, she didn't understand that dimethylmercury is not the same thing as elemental mercury.
What’s the difference? (So I don’t embarass myself at my next chess tournament.)
this was a death in paradise episode!
s11e08
Lol just learned about that series. 100+ murders in the span of a few years in a remote Island with 10k population? Sounds plausible
haha yeah, the murder rate is a bit steep. as someone else said who had pointed it out to me on lemmy, its like comfort food. you kinda know what youre getting, but the characters are well written.
Sounds like a Dexter type show.
I told y’all in 2020 - build a giant fence around there and nobody go in for 100 years. After that we’ll check on ‘em. But nooooo “it’s too expensive” pfffft. And now look - it’s . . . whatever this is!
We could have had Australia 2!
Once again, 105 comments and nothing about the actual article and it's information. Plenty of xenophobic comments against a population of a country (like the U.S. government is that great, so therefor I must be exactly like my political leaders). The Chess players had already competed against each other and the other player who was poisoned won by a default with a tie. There's some other reporting about a confrontation between the two and they've known each other for years apparently.
Definitely not ok either way and I hope that they get a sentencing that matches the crime. This is just a bitter crazy person it seems and has nothing to do about poisoning to win a match. Love the disconnect on the sports world and rampant cheating like it doesn't exist everywhere lol.
edit: some grammar
...guy fucking lemms.
There's a video of her putting the mercury on the board
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy1s1Q3knZA&t=36s
Am I seeing it right thats she's not wearing gloves?
yes, apparently you can touch it and the effects are pretty mild with short exposure if you wash your hands after, most of the toxicity is from the fumes.
so she touched it but she was only there briefly, while her opponent that she was trying to poison was sitting there breathing in the fumes for 5 hours.
it was all a result of a misunderstanding. his coach told him to focus on the H, G files of the chessboard and he heard that as something else.
*she
ah, so it was another misunderstanding, then. she was taught that the queen can do absolutely anything on the chess board and proceeded accordingly.
It took me way too long to realize this was supposed to be a joke because Hg is the chemical symbol for Mercury. Such an easy thing to mishear.
Should have used polonium instead, like the dear leader
Oooo, I heard putin like chess? Maybe he could play next?
Should have used vibrating anal beads imstead.
How would it have poisoned just his rival and not also him? Touching it doesn't do much unless you're submerging your skin in it for long periods. The fumes would affect everyone. And it's very unlikely his opponent would have licked the board to ingest the mercury.
Organic mercury compounds can look like water and absorb quickly through skin, they can be potent enough for just a drop on your skin being deadly, even if you have gloves as it can penetrate quickly through many different rubbers. Metallic doesn't kill you even if you ate it*. With metallic mercury highest risk is vapours but unless you heat it it will only become a problem in poorly ventalated areas.
*assuming you have no open wounds on your digestive tract and minor chronic damage might be still caused depending on amount and frequency.
The article says it’s safe to touch and even swallow, but inhaling it causes problems consistent with the victim’s symptoms.
Don't know, but both players were women.
Suicide chess player?
Season 2 of The Queen's Gambit sounds crazy.
Mad Max crossover confirmed
If you can't beat'em, kill'em.
Sounds Russian.
Seeing as mercury fumes are the real danger (you can fairly safely handle elemental mercury, it won't absorb into the skin) this seems like an exceptionally poor poisoning attempt. Maybe if you put a fan behind you so the fumes only waft into the opponents face...
Yeah I have so many questions. How would both players not get poisoned? Does mercury evaporate? I played with thermometer mercury as a child, does that explain things?
Intercepted message:
Self defenstration! Genius.
At least they didn't "fall out the window."
Ars
technica.Edit: for those not understanding the joke, arsenic (As) is another toxic metal.
Tankies: is this critical support?
she cute
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