Vishwanathan Anand vs Magnus Carlsen: 5 Reasons to watch the 2013 World Chess Championship

5. Human and computer integration at its finest

Actress Liv Tyler,chess player Magnus Carlsen and chess icon Garry Kasparov attend the G-Star RAW World Chess Challenge at The Cooper Square Hotel on September 10, 2010 in New York City. (Getty Images)

Earlier this year, Carlsen broke Garry Kasparov’s record by gaining the highest Elo rating of all time—2,872 (Anand is fourth on the all-time list, with 2,817). In 2009, at the age of 19, Carlsen became the youngest World No.1, breaking the record previously held by Vladimir Kramnik. “He conserves the mystique of chess,” Kasparov has said about Carlsen. Carlsen has gone where no chess player has gone before. Both Anand and Carlsen are known to have trained with computers. Lots of chess players feel that computer learning has ruined the art of chess. Before the coming generations of chess players increase their dependence on computers, this would be the moment when we witness the best integration between man and machine in chess.