It is just over a week since Elon Musk’s company Neuralink livestreamed an interview with Noland Arbaugh, who was paralysed from the shoulders down in a diving accident eight years ago. Following the implanting by Neuralink of a chip in his brain, he is now able to control a mouse cursor on the screen by thought alone. The 29-year-old described his joy in being able to stay up all night playing the computer game Civilization VI, for which he would previously have needed human support. (As a former Civ fanatic, I know how fast those hours go by!)

Noland showed off his new ability by playing a game of online chess as he chatted. It was the perfect way to demonstrate the technology’s potential to enrich his life. And it was cheering to reflect on the game’s resonance, with countless instances of the game being deployed, in one form or another, to showcase some novel technology.

Chess is sometimes described as the Drosophila of artificial intelligence, i.e. the game was as fundamental an object of AI research as fruit flies are to biologists. In 1948, Alan Turing and David Champernowne devised a chess-playing computer program called ‘Turochamp’ as a proof of concept. They were not able to run it on the computers of that time, but did play a game by following the algorithm manually. In 1997, it was a major PR coup for IBM when their supercomputer Deep Blue defeated the reigning world champion Garry Kasparov. More than two decades later, AlphaZero’s chess skills showed the potential of neural network technology to simulate intelligent behaviour, just a few years before ChatGPT brought the AI frenzy into mainstream news.

But even absent a direct link with the technology, chess is a cultural touchstone. William Caxton’s The Game and Playe of the Chess, published in 1474, was one of the first books published in English. After the invention of the telegraph, the first long-distance line, between Baltimore and Washington DC, was completed in 1844. Soon after, apparently as part of a promotional effort for the new line, several games of chess were played between the two cities. In 1845, another cable-chess match took place, between Gosport and Vauxhall, where the involvement of Howard Staunton, perhaps the world’s strongest player at that time, attracted considerable interest.

In 1970, the Soviet Soyuz 9 astronauts played a game of chess against their associates at mission control. Fifty years on from the Soyuz game, the Russian cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner teamed up to play a match from the International Space Station in 2020. Their opponent on terra firma was Sergey Karjakin (nowadays widely censured for his cheerleading of the war against Ukraine). The game was perfect for a publicity stunt, with brevity, wit and a diplomatic conclusion, though I can’t help but wonder how much was choreographed in advance.

Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner-Sergey Karjakin

Space vs Earth match, 9 June 2020

1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Bxc6 dxc6 5 0–0 Be6 6 b3 c5 7 Nxe5 Qd4 8 Nc4 Bxc4 9 bxc4 Qxa1 10 Nc3 Karjakin has snatched a rook, but his queen is in grave danger. b5 11 Qh5 Nf6 12 Qf3 b4 13 e5 (see diagram) White’s 11th move was ostensibly a loss of time, but now this advance attacks both Ra8 and Nf6. 0–0–0 14 Ba3 Qxf1+ 15 Kxf1 bxc3 16 exf6 cxd2 17 Qa8+ Kd7 18 Qd5+ Kc8 19 Qa8+ Kd7 20 Qd5+ Ke8 21 Qe4+ Kd7 Draw agreed