I Can’t Sleep - Chess | Gentle Bedtime Reading for Sleep

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

Relax with this calm bedtime reading about the game of chess, crafted to help ease insomnia and bring a sense of quiet to restless nights. In this soothing episode, Benjamin shares the history, strategies, and cultural significance of chess, turning fact-filled narration into a peaceful journey. His steady, reassuring cadence makes learning both relaxing and engaging, helping you release stress and drift into sleep. There’s no whispering or hypnosis—just calm, educational storytelling designed to ease anxiety and sleeplessness. Press play and let your mind rest as the story of chess unfolds. Want More? Request a topic: https://www.icantsleeppodcast.com/request-a-topic Listen ad-free & support the show: https://icantsleep.supportingcast.fm/ Shop sleep-friendly products: https://www.icantsleeppodcast.com/sponsors Join the discussion on Discord: https://discord.gg/myhGhVUhn7 This content is derived from the Wikipedia article on Chess, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) license. Read the full article: Wikipedia - Chess. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to a Glassbox media podcast. What if I told you that most of the modern day self-help advice you've been hearing could actually make you worse? The key to a better life isn't about feel-good gimmicks that sound catchy. The Mentally Stronger Podcast gives you access to a licensed therapist who shares science-backed tools that will actually change your life. Hi, I'm Amy Morin, psychotherapist, mental strength trainer, and international best-selling author. In each episode, we cover research-back strategies, like how to stop relying on willpower and start creating habits for lasting change. And the five mental strength-building exercises you can do from your couch.

I also speak to world-class experts like Dr. Nicole Kane, who shares how to permanently heal anxiety by addressing the root cause. With over 200 episodes in our catalog, this podcast is for you if you're ready to crush self-doubt, conquer challenges, and become stronger than ever with therapist-approved strategies that can change your life. Listen to Mentally Stronger with therapist Amy Morin, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast, where I help you learn a little and sleep a lot. I'm your host, Benjamin Boster. And tonight, let's fall asleep learning about chess. Chess is a board game for two players.

It is an abstract strategy game that involves no hidden information and no elements of chance. It is played on a square board, consisting of 64 squares arranged in an 8-by-8 grid. The players referred to as white and black, each controls 16 pieces, one king, one queen, two rooks, two bishops, two knights, and eight ponds, with each type of piece having a different pattern of movement. An enemy piece may be captured, removed from the board, by moving one's own piece onto the square it occupies.

The object of the game is to checkmate, threaten with inescapable capture, the enemy king. There are also several ways a game can end in a draw. The recorded history of chess goes back to at least the emergence of the Chaturanga, also sought to be an ancestor to similar games like Chiangchi and Shogi in 7th century India. After its introduction in Persia, it spread to the Arab world and then to Europe. The modern rules of chess emerged in Europe at the end of the 15th century, with standardization and universal acceptance by the end of the 19th century. Today, chess is one of the world's most popular games with millions of players worldwide.

Organized chess arose in the world's most popular games, with millions of players worldwide. Organized chess arose in the 19th century. Chess competition today is governed internationally by F-I-D-E, the International Chess Federation. The first universally recognized world chess champion, Wilhelm Steinitz claimed his title in 1886. Gukesh Domaradu is the current world champion, having won the title in 2024. A huge body of chess theory has developed since the game's inception. Aspects of art are found in chess composition, and chess in its turn influenced Western culture and the arts, and has connections with other fields such as mathematics, computer science, and psychology. One of the goals of early computer scientist,

was to create a chess-playing machine. In 1997, Deep Blue became the first computer to beat a reigning world champion in a match when it defeated Gary Kasparov. Today's chess engines are significantly stronger than the best human players and have deeply influenced the development of chess theory. However, chess is not a solved game.

The rules of chess are published by F-I-D-E, chess's world-governing body in its handbook. Rules published by national governing bodies or by unaffiliated chess organizations, commercial publishers, etc., may differ in some details. Fide's rules were most recently revised in 2023. Chess sets come in a wide variety of styles. The Staunton pattern is the most common and is usually required for competition.

Chess sets come with pieces in two colors, referred to as white and black, regardless of their actual color. The players controlling the color sets are referred to as white and black respectively. Each set comes with at least the last. following 16 pieces in both colors, one king, one queen, two rooks, two bishops, two knights, and eight ponds. The game is played on a square board of eight rows called rinks and eight columns called files. Although it does not affect gameplay, by convention the 64 squares alternate in color, and referred to as light and dark squares. To start the game, White's pieces are placed on the first

rank in the following order from left to right. Rook, Knight, Bishop, Queen, King, Bishop, Knight, Rook. Ponds are placed on each square of the second rank. Black's position mirrors whites, with equivalent pieces on every file. The board is orienting. so that the right-hand corner nearest each player is a light square. As a result, the white queen always starts on a light square, while the black queen starts on a dark square. This may be remembered by the phrases, white on the right and queen on her color.

In competition, the piece colors are allocated to players by the organizers. In informal games, colors may be decided either by mutual agreement or randomly, for example by a coin toss, or by one player concealing a white pawn in one hand and a black pawn in the other and having the opponent choose. White moves first, after which players alternate turns. One piece is moved per turn, except when castling, during which two two people are moved. pieces are moved. In the diagrams in this article, dots mark the squares in which each type of piece can move if unoccupied by friendly pieces, and there are no intervening pieces of either

color, except the night which leaps over any intervening pieces. While the sole exception of en passant, a piece captures an enemy piece by moving to the square it occupies, removing it from play and taking its place. The pawn is the only piece that does not capture the way it moves, and it is the only piece that moves and captures in only one direction, forwards from the player's perspective. A piece is said to control empty squares on which it could capture, attack squares, with enemy pieces it could capture, and defend squares with the with pieces of the same color on which it could recapture.

Moving is compulsory. The player may not skip a turn, even when having a move is detrimental. The king moves one square in any direction. There is also a special move called, which moves a king and a rook. The king is the most valuable piece. It is illegal to play any move that puts one's king under attack by an opponent peace. A move that attacks the king must be parried immediately. If this cannot be done, the game is lost. A rook can move any number of squares along a rank or file.

A rook is involved in the king's castling move. A bishop can move any number of squares diagonally. A queen combines the power of a rook and bishop and can move. move any number of squares along a rank, file, or diagonal. A knight moves to any of the closest squares that are not in the same rank, file, or diagonal. Thus, the move forms an L-shape, two squares vertically and one square horizontally, or two squares horizontally, and one square vertically. The knight is the only piece that can leap over other pieces. A pond can move forward to the unoccupied square immediately in front of it on the same file. Or in its first move, it can optionally advance two squares along the same file, provided both squares are unoccupied.

A pond can capture an opponent's piece on a square diagonally in front of it by moving to that square. It cannot capture a piece while advancing along the same file, nor can it move to either square diagonally in front without capturing. Pons have two special moves, the en-pasant capture and promotion. When a king is under immediate attack, it is in check. A move in response to a check is legal only if it results in a position in which the king is no longer in check. There are three ways to counter a check. Capture the checking piece. Interpose a piece between the checking piece and the king.

Possible only if the attacking piece is a queen, rook, or bishop, and there is a square between it and the king. Move the king to a square where it is not under attack. The object of the game is to checkmate the opponent. This occurs when the opponent's king is in check, and there is no legal way to get it out of check. In casual games, it is common to announce check when putting the opponent's king in check,

but this is not required by the rules of chess and is usually not done in tournaments. Kings can castle once per game. Castling can castling can set up. Castling consists of moving the king two squares toward either rook of the same color, and then replacing the rook on the square that the king crossed. Castling is possible only if the following conditions are met. Neither the king nor the rook has previously moved during the game.

There are no pieces between the king and the rook. The king is not in check and does not pass through or finish on a square, controlled by an enemy peace. Castling is still permitted if the rook is under a tag, or if the rook crosses an attacked square. Ponds have two special moves, en passant, when a pawn makes a two square advance to the same rank as an opponent's pawn on an adjacent file, that pawn can capture it en passant in passing, moving to one square behind the captured pawn. A pond can only be captured en passant on the turn after it makes a two-square advance. There's an animated diagram in this article where the black pawn advances two

squares from G7 to G5, and the white pawn on F5 takes it on Paisant, landing on G6. Promotion. When a pawn advances to its last rank. It is promoted and replaced with the player's choice of a queen, rook, bishop, or knight. Usually ponds are promoted to queens. Choosing another piece is called under promotion. In the animated diagram in this article, the C-7 pawn is advanced to C-8 and promoted to a queen. If the required piece is not available, e.g. a second queen. An inverted rook is sometimes used as a substitute, but this is not recognized in fide-sanctioned games. A game can be won in the following ways. Checkmate. The opposing king is in check and the opponent has no legal move. Resignation. A player may resign, conceding the game to the opponent.

If, however, the opponent has no way of checkmating the resigned player, this is a draw under the five laws. Most tournament players consider it good etiquette to resign in a hopeless position. Win on time. In games with a time control, a player wins if the opponent runs out of time, even if the opponent has a superior position. As long as the player has a theoretical point. possibility to checkmate the opponent were the game to continue. Forfeit. A player who cheats, violates the rules, or violates the rules of conduct specified for the particular tournament,

can be forfeited. Occasionally, both players are forfeited. There are several ways a game can end in a draw. Stalemate If the player to move has no legal move, but is not a player to move. in check, the position is a stalemate, and the game is drawn. Dead position. If neither player is able to checkmate the other by any legal sequence of moves, the game is drawn. For example, if only the kings are on the board, all other pieces have been captured, checkmate is impossible, and the game is drawn by this rule. On the other hand, if both plays play Players still have a night, there is a highly unlikely yet theoretical possibility of checkmate,

so this rule does not apply. The dead position rules supersedes an older rule, which referred to insufficient material, extending it to include other positions where checkmate is impossible, such as blocked pawn endings, where the ponds cannot be attacked. Drawn by agreement. In tournament chess, draws are most commonly reached by mutual agreement between the players. The correct procedure is to verbally offer the draw, make a move, then start the opponent's clock. Traditionally, players have been allowed to agree to a draw at any point in the game,

occasionally even without playing a move. More recently, efforts have been made to discourage early draws, for example, by forbidding draw offers before a certain number of moves have been completed, or even forbidding draw offers altogether. Threefold repetition. This most commonly occurs when neither side is able to avoid repeating moves without incurring a disadvantage. The three occurrence of the position need not occur on consecutive moves for a claim to be valid.

The addition of the five-fold repetition rule in 2014 requires the arbiter to intervene immediately and declare the game a draw after five occurrences of the same position, consecutive or otherwise, without requiring a claim by either player. Fide rules make no mention of perpetual check. This is merely a specific type of draw by three-fold repetition. 50-move rule. If during the previous 50 moves, no pawn has been moved and no capture has been made, either player can claim a draw.

The addition of the 75-move rule in 2014 requires the arbiter to intervene and immediately declare the game drawn after 75 moves without a pawn move or capture, without requiring a claim by either player. There are several known endgames where it is possible to force a mate, but it requires more than 50 moves before a pawn move or capture is made. Examples include some endgames with two knights against a pawn, and some pawn-less endgames, such as Queen against two bishops. Historically, Fide has sometimes revised the 50-move rule to make exceptions for these endgames, but these have since been repealed.

Some correspondence chess organizations do not enforce the 50-move rule. Draw on time. In games with a time control, the game is drawn if a player is out of time. and no sequence of legal moves would allow the opponent to checkmate the player. Draw by resignation. Under five laws, a game is drawn if a player resigns, and no sequence of legal moves would allow the opponent to checkmate that player. In competition, chess games are played with a time control.

Time controls are generally divided into categories, based on the amount of time given to each player, which range from classical time controls, which allot about two hours or more to each player, and which can take upwards of seven hours, even longer if adjournments are permitted, to bullet chess in which players receive less than three minutes each. Between these are rapid chess,

10 to 60 minutes per player, popular in amateur tournaments, and Blitz Chess 3 to 10 minutes, popular online. Non-classical chess is sometimes referred to as fast chess. Time is controlled using a chess clock with two displays, one for each player's remaining time. Analog chess clocks have been largely replaced by digital clocks, which allow for time with increments. There are some aspects unique to online chess. A pre-move allows a player to submit a move on the opponent's turn, which gets played automatically, if possible, using little to no time.

Pre-moves, alongside the relative ease of digital inputs, make faster time controls feasible online. Time controls are also enforced in correspondence chess competitions. A typical time control is 50 days for every 10 moves. Time is usually allotted per move in online correspondence chess. Historically, many different notation systems have been used to record chess moves. The standard system today is short form algebraic notation. In this system, files are labeled A through H.

through H and ranks are labeled 1 through 8. Squares are identified by the file and rank they occur on. G3 is a square on the G file and the third rank. In English, the piece notations are K, King, Q, Queen, R, R, R, Rok, B, Bishop, and N, Knight, and is used to avoid confusion. with the king. Different initials are used in other languages. Moves are recorded as follows. Notation of piece moved, destination square. For example, QG5 means queen moves to G5. No letter initial is used for pawns, so E4 means pawn moves to E4. When multiple moves

could be rendered the same way, the file or rank from which the piece moved is added to resolve ambiguity, e.g. NG.F3 means Knight from the G-file moves to the square F3. R1E2 means Rook on the first rank moves to E2. If a move may be disambiguated by rank or file, it is done by file, and in the rare case that both are needed, squares are listed normally, e.g. QH4 XE1. If the move is a capture, X is usually inserted before the destination square. Thus, BXF3 means Bishop captures on F3. When a pawn makes a capture, the file from which the The pond departed is often listed even when no disambiguation is necessary. For example, EXD5.

If a pawn moves to its last rank, achieving promotion, the piece chosen is indicated after the move. For example, E1 equals Q or E1Q. Castling is indicated by the special notations 0 to 0. kingside, castling is indicated by the special notations 0 to 0 for king's side castling and 0 to 0 for queen side castling. A move that places the opponent's king and check usually has the notation plus suffixed. Checkmate can be indicated by a suffixing hash sign.

At the end of a game, 1 to 0 means white 1, 0 to 1 means black one, and half to half indicates a draw. Chess moves can be annotated with punctuation marks and other symbols. For example, an exclamation point indicates a good move. Two exclamation points, an excellent move. Question mark, a mistake. Two question marks, a blunder. and an exclamation point followed by a question mark,

an interesting moves that may not be best. Or question mark to exclamation point, a dubious move not easily refuted. Scholars mate. Moves are written as white-black pairs, preceded by the move number in a period. Individual white moves are also recorded this way, while black moves are rendered with an ellipsis after the move number.

For example, one variation of a simple trap known as the Scholars Made can be recorded. 1. E4. E5. 2. QH5 question mark exclamation point. Nc6. 3. BC4 and F6, question mark, question mark. 4 QXF7 hashtag.

The move 3 NF6 question mark question mark is recorded as a blunder as it allows 4 QXF7 hashtag checkmate. Games or sequences may be recorded in portable game notation PGN. A text-based file format with support for annotative symbols. and background information, such as player names. It is based on short-form English algebraic notation, incorporating markup language. PGN transcripts stored digitally as pgn.g.n. files can be processed by most chess software and are easily readable by humans. Variants of algebraic notation include long algebraic, in which both the departure and destination square are indicated,

abbreviated algebraic, in which capture signs, check signs, and ranks of pawn captures may be omitted, and figurine algebraic notation, used in chess books and magazines, which uses graphic symbols instead of initials to indicate pieces for readability, regardless of language. Until about 1980, the majority of English language chess publications use descriptive notation,

in which files are identified by the initial letter of the piece that occupies the first rank at the beginning of the game. In descriptive notation, the common opening move 1E4 is rendered as 1P to K4, P, to King 4. Another system is ICCF numeric notation, recognized by the International Correspondence Chess Federation, though its use is in decline. In tournament games, players are normally required to keep a score, which is a written record of the game. This is a requirement in all five sanctioned games played at classical time controls. For this purpose, only algebraic notation is recognized by Fide, though variants, such as long algebraic, are acceptable. Game scores recorded in a different notation system may not be used as evidence in the event of a dispute. Chess has an extensive literature.

In 1913, the chess historian H.J.R. Murray estimated the total number of books, magazines, and chess columns in newspapers to be about 5,000. B.H. Wood estimated the number as of 1949 to be about 20,000. David Hooper and Kenneth Wilde write that, since then there has been a steady increase year by year of the number of new chess publications. No one knows how many have been printed. Significant public chess libraries include the John G. White Chess and Checkers Collection at Cleveland Public Library, with over 32,000 chess books and over 6,000 bound volumes of chess periodicals. And the chess and drafts collection at the National Library of the Netherlands was about 30,000 books.