Serious question - does chess ever make you feel depressed? Do you ever feel like quitting or that you are wasting your life?

Lazlo Polgar's "experiment" does in no way show that innate talent does not exist. The video mentions that the sisters could not have inherited any talent from their parents because they were not talented at chess, but one (of many) possible objection to this is that the parents' innate talent never came to fruition becasue they never studied chess seriously from an early age. It's entirely possible that various forms of intellectual talent is such that you need to develop your talent in your younger years for the talent to be realized. Of course, no one would say that hard work is not required in order to achieve greatness, but one might understand "talent" as the amount of practice required to reach a specific level.

You mention that genes might be in play when it comes to physical attributes, but genes are of course equally vital in the development of the brain as in our muscles, as evident for example in the multitude of genetically inheritable neurological diseases.

Note that I make no strong claim as to whether or to which degree innate talent exists, my main point is that the Polgar sisters is no "proof" for either side of the debate.

/r/chess Thread Parent