Mikhail Botvinnik

Biography (1911–1994)

Mikhail Botvinnik (1911–1994) was the sixth World Chess Champion (1948–1957; 1958–1960; 1961–1963) and the founder, the "Patriarch," of the Soviet Chess School. He played for the Soviet Olympiad team from 1954 to 1964, and the team won gold medals each time.Botvinnik started playing chess during the Soviet “Chess fever” in 1924–25. He became a chess master at 16 and the Soviet chess champion at 20. In the mid to late 1930s, he entered the world chess elite by excelling in the strongest international tournaments. Simultaneously, he earned a degree in electrical engineering and defended his thesis.His challenges to Alekhine for a match failed twice: in 1939/40 due to WWII and in 1946 due to Alekhine’s death. However, in 1948, Botvinnik won the match-tournament against the five strongest players in the world, becoming the world champion. He briefly lost his title twice (to Smyslov in 1957 and Tal in 1960) but regained it in rematches (1958 and 1961).After losing to Petrosian in 1963, Botvinnik focused on the intersection of chess and computer science, aiming to create an "electronic grandmaster." Botvinnik's research focused on "selective searches" in chess, using general principles to determine worthy moves, a necessary approach given the limitations of early Soviet computers. Although initially promising, this method fell short as more powerful computers could later perform comprehensive searches. His PIONEER program, which aided in planning power station maintenance, earned him an honorary degree in mathematics from the University of Ferrara in 1991.