It´s impossible to know who is the best chess player in history.

Paul Morphy: He had no rivals of his level in his time.

Capablanca: The player with the most innate talent for chess (it's an opinion).

Bobby Fischer: The most charismatic player in history.

Kasparov: An impressive curriculum.

And now Carlsen.

Everybody knows in chess there are many components to analyze in a player:

-concentration
-memory
-calculation capacity
-space vision
-logic reasoning
-scientific thought
-amplitude: number of variants considered
-depth: number of anticipated movements
-creativity
.......and we could go on until we reach a hundred of aspects.

I've seen an interview where a boy in the audience was asking Carlsen "Who do you think is the best player in history?".
Answer: "Kasparov and Fischer (between 1970-1972)".
The question that this guy asked is normal, but it is already tiresome.

Now with the advances in computing, I can´t compare current players with those of other times.

It is not an absolute truth to say that "x" player is the best in history.

Sometimes I think Carlsen could break Lasker's record of 27 years of reign.

Carlsen has more information than all the previous world champions (it's another opinion).

No matter how many times someone makes the famous question "Who is the best chess player in history?". To me there is no exact answer.

An American is the best player of the XIX century, also another American (Fischer) is the best of the XX century. Personal opinion. It´s not a fact.
The best of the XXI century I will not know because I will not be alive in 2100. Unfortunately :(

if you want the best player out of the set of all players with lichess username fpvbmct, then that would be me.

i think i have a method which may work, it involves tying players together not by direct competition but by their results against other players. for example you say that morphy had no rivals to fight against. thats simply false, there was steinitz. since they never fought directly we cannot resolve who is better in that way we have to find another way. the easiest method would be to compare the results of morphy and steinitz against a player they both played against a moderate amount of times. using this method you can potentially connect every single chess players rating up to the modern time without needing direct competition.

for example bobby fischer never faced garry kasparov. but you have a plethora of players whom they both faced several times, just compare the results and see how they did. such as spassky or the other russian players

#3 Your method is better than nothing but still inaccurate, can you compare Boris Spassky of 70's to 80's, 90's or later? Even Boris and any person compared to himself is a hard task to do.

i agree, players strengths do change over time, if you look at this website http://www.chessmetrics.com/cm/CM2/PlayerProfile.asp?Params=199510SSSSS3S124734000000111000000000027910100

you will find there boris spassky's rating over time, of course we can see that his strength had faded in the 90's but if you look at the graph he is fairly consistent between 1956-1989. you would agree that that time frame is fairly consistent right? no erratic movements.

if you look at kasparovs ratings http://www.chessmetrics.com/cm/CM2/PlayerProfile.asp?Params=199510SSSSS3S062926000000111000000000027910100

you will find here that his ratings are very consistent between 1983-2003.
again no erratic movements.

i think the method could work, you just have to find all the games played between kasparov and spassky between 1983-1989. as this is the period of relative stability in both their ratings

now we just have to solve the fischer problem

The players will always try to be the best, but the geniality is shown when someone is too good to be reached coming from the most unexpected place, so I'd say that Fischer was the best of all time. He was way too much better than Spassky which applauded his own loss with the spectators, no one were match to Fischer actually. Kasparov and Carlsen are always the favourites to win too, they were/are superior to the opponents, but Fischer came from a not so strong place in terms of chess at the time compared to the opponents he had to overcome, the very most of his opponents were being trained in the soviet machine, it wasn't enough to stop the underdog. Kasparov was part of that, and Carlsen appeared in a different circumstance where the world is more balanced plus the help of computers.
Considering that, Bobby Fischer is the best of all time to me due the circumstances, he would shine anyway, just imagine Fischer with computers in the soviet era? That would be ridiculous. Maybe Carlsen would be a monster in Fischer's era, but would he be the best? Fischer - Carlsen - Kasparov, my top 3

@ChicagoDragon

really dood

i knew fischer
there was no charisma there at all

@zombiemaster22

what fischer problem
he is RIP and buried in iceland

@ChicagoDragon

there is no best player

a beats b beats c beats a

who is best??

unless somebody is never beaten the question is meaningless