Shadowing Practice: The Robot Chess Player Scam - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
B2
This is The Turk a mechanical chess-playing robot from the 1700s that was basically unbeatable.
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This is The Turk a mechanical chess-playing robot from the 1700s that was basically unbeatable.
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It made its own moves, called checkmate, and even laughed in its opponent's face.
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For almost 90 years it toured the world facing some of the best chess players and historical figures and beating them all.
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Hundreds of articles were written trying to expose its secrets but no one ever figured out how it worked or if it was actually real or not.
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Amazingly, the real secret behind this mysterious machine remained unknown for almost 90 years and was almost lost completely when The Turk eventually parished in a fire.
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We modeled the entire thing to show you how this incredible machine worked and how it managed to trick the entire world for almost a century.
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The story begins in Vienna in 1769 where a special event was being held by the Empress of Austria.
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At the event the audience were being treated to a show by a famous French magician who performed illusions using magnets.
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While the audience was blown away, one man was less than impressed.
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Hungarian inventor Wolf Gang Von Kempelen He worked for the Empress and promised that he would come back next year with a much more impressive creation of his own.
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And so over the next 6 months in the secrecy of his own home, he constructed The Turk.
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Kempelen revealed his creation at the next event and it was an absolute hit.
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The audience watched on in amazement as this mysterious serous looking mannequin came to life moving around the chess pieces and destroying his opponent.
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Word spread quickly about The Turk and soon hundreds of people around Europe wanted to take on the machine 10 years went by, but the demand to see The Turk was higher than ever and so Kempelen took the machine out on the road starting its first European tour in 1783.
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This is how a typical show would go.
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At the beginning, Kempelen would go around opening the cabinet doors and inviting people to look inside the machine starting with the left door.
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It would reveal a compartment full of complex machinery.
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To show that there was nothing hiding behind the machinery he opened the door at the back and lit a candle so that the audience could see right through the machine, then he closed the rear door and opened up the main compartment which was mostly empty.
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With all the doors open, Kempelen pulled out a set of chess pieces from the drawer at the bottom.
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The Turk was now ready to play.
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Kempelen would challenge the most intelligent member of the audience to try and beat The Turk and almost always The Turk would come out on top.
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Kempelen and his machine continued traveling across Europe playing some of the most skilled Chess Masters of the time.
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For the final game in France The Turk went up against Benjamin Franklin Despite being a chess fanatic, The Turk quickly defeated him with ease.
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After this, speculation behind the machine's authenticity started to ramp up.
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While many believed it really was a completely automated machine some thought it was also being controlled by magnets and some thought there was a small child operating The Turk from inside but Kempelen was determined to take the secret to his grave and in 1804 he passed away at the age of 70.
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The Turk was eventually sold to a German inventor called Johann Maelzel for around $300,000.
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Over the course of several years he figured out The Turk's secrets and took it back out on the road.
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This time finding even more success in America.
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But one day, after performing in Baltimore, an article was written in the local newspaper that appeared to give away The Turk's secret.
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Two young boys had climbed onto The Turk's storage shed and saw Maelzel opening the cabinet and a man climbing out of it.
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A few days later the newspaper retracted the article because the boy's story couldn't be verified.
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This is still a problem in today's world that's why we're working with Ground News again for this video.
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Invented by a former NASA engineer Ground News is a news app and website that allows you to compare articles from a wide range of sources to verify information and see the full picture.
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Every story comes with a quick visual breakdown of the political bias reliability, ownership and headlines all backed by ratings from three Independent News monitoring organizations.
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Take this story about Boeing Starliner More than 150 news outlets reported on the story most of which are from the left.
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You can also see a breakdown of the reliability and ownership as well as headlines to see how this bias can affect framing.
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With their bias comparison feature which highlights specific differences in reporting we can see that the left and center outlets tended to focus on the number of helium leaks and the affected valves while right-leaning outlets framed these leaks as a crucial test for Boeing's competition with SpaceX.
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One of our favorite features is their blind spot feed which highlights stories underreported by one side of the political spectrum.
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For example, if you lean left you probably missed this story on Boeing being blocked from increasing production of their airplane .
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for a more faithful and objective way to keep up with current events click the link in the video description or scan the QR code to get 40% off the unlimited access plan.
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After figuring out the secrets behind his new machine, Maelzel took The Turk back out on the road.
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One of his first opponents was none other than Napoleon Bonaparte, who he defeated with ease.
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Maelzel and The Turk spent the next 20 years touring all the way from Boston to the Mississippi River and everywhere in between.
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The Turk was more popular than ever, but still nobody knew if it was real or not.
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Famous Poet Edgar Alan Poe was invited to inspect the machine and ended up writing an essay on how he thought it worked.
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He thought that there was simply a man underneath The Turk's clothing that could see the chessboard and was making all of the moves.
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Maelzel spent most of the 1830s touring America and Cuba with great success but while sailing back to the US, Maelzel suddenly died at sea and The Turk and all of its secrets were now just waiting to be uncovered once it arrived back.
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The machine eventually fell into the hands of Edgar Alan Poe's physician who had always been interested in the machine, but by then The Turk was 70 years old and without a charismatic owner to put on the show, it was eventually donated to a museum in Philadelphia.
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He remained here for over a decade until one day, a fire swept through and completely destroyed The Turk.
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It was no doubt one of the best-kept secrets in the world.
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It traveled everywhere, constantly under scrutiny from the world's brightest minds and yet, even through multiple owners it managed to take its secrets all the way to the end.
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It seemed like the secrets behind The Turk would remain unknown forever but a year later the son of The Turk's last owner published an article that would finally reveal the truth.
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These are the secrets behind The Turk.
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As it turned out, The Turk wasn't automated at all and was in fact operated by a Chessmaster hidden inside the machine at all times.
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The fake machinery and the bottom drawer didn't extend all the way to the back of the cabinet and so there was space for the operator to sit with his legs stretched out under a fake floor.
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Before the left door was opened the operator would slide forward on a movable chair into the main compartment, closing behind him a secret door.
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The presenter would then open the rear door and show the audience that there was nothing but machinery inside.
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as the presenter closed the rear door the operator would slide back into his original position closing another door behind him and in front of him.
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The presenter would then open up the front and rear doors to the main compartment to allow the audience to see inside .
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Having seen right through the whole machine the audience would now have full belief that no one could be hidden inside the machine.
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the doors were then locked and The Turk was ready to come to life.
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The operator would slide back into the main compartment and open a hidden door inside The Turk's body revealing a candle, a chessboard, and a mechanical lever which would control The Turk's arm.
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The lever was in fact a clever pantograph mechanism using strings that would mimic the exact movements of The Turk's arm.
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It had a pointer which the operator could lift to raise the arm and twist to close The Turk's fingers.
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By moving the pointer over the chessboard it would move The Turk's hand over the exact same square on the real chessboard.
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But how did the operator see the moves his opponent was making?
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Above the operator was a fake ceiling that could be taken down to reveal the bottom of the real chessboard.
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under each square was a small magnet dangling from a copper wire.
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The chess pieces themselves also had magnets in their base and so the magnets would get pulled up wherever there was a chess piece.
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As his opponent picked up a chess piece the corresponding magnet would drop and wobble for about 30 seconds allowing the operator to see what piece had moved and replicate it on his own chessboard.
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To this day, the original operator of The Turk is unknown but during Maelzel's tours the machine was operated by an impressive list of chess masters all of whom kept their part of the secret.
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Over the course of its 90-year career, The Turk played hundreds, if not thousands of games and won almost all of them.
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Amazingly, the story of these young boys seeing an operator climb out of the machine was almost certainly true, but The Turk went on to keep it secret for another 30 years.
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And now for the Primal Space giveaway.
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The winner of the previous giveaway is Marco. Congratulations.
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In the next video, we'll be giving away this awesome Mechanical Turk poster.
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All you need to do is sign up at the link below like the video, and leave a comment saying how you thought The Turk actually worked.
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Thank you very much for watching and I'll see you in the next video!
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About This Lesson
In this lesson, you will delve into the intriguing story of "The Turk," a mechanical chess-playing robot from the 1700s that captivated audiences for nearly a century. As you explore the narrative, you will practice your English listening skills by following along with the transcript of the video "The Robot Chess Player Scam." This lesson will help you improve your English pronunciation and enhance your speaking abilities through engaging historical content. By learning how to pronounce key phrases and vocabulary effectively, you can apply the shadowing technique to enhance your overall fluency.
Key Vocabulary & Phrases
- The Turk: The name of the mechanical chess-playing robot.
- Checkmate: A chess term that signifies the end of the game when a player cannot escape being captured.
- Vienna: The capital city of Austria where The Turk was first revealed.
- Inventor: A person who creates something new; in this case, Wolfgang von Kempelen.
- Illusions: Tricks that deceive the eye or mind; related to the magician’s performance.
- Audience: The spectators who watch The Turk perform.
- Secrets: Hidden aspects that explain how The Turk functioned.
- Tour: A journey or series of performances by The Turk across Europe and America.
Practice Tips
To maximize your learning experience, practice your English speaking skills through shadowing, a technique that involves mimicking the speech patterns of native speakers. Since the video features speak at a moderately engaging tempo, pay close attention to the rhythm and intonation of the narrator. Here are some specific tips:
- Listen Carefully: Watch the video and listen to how phrases are pronounced, focusing on the articulation of key vocabulary phrases.
- Pause and Repeat: Use the video’s pauses to repeat sentences or phrases aloud. This will help you refine your pronunciation and improve your confidence in speaking.
- Practice Regularly: Incorporate this lesson as part of your daily English speaking practice. The more you engage with the material, the more fluent you will become.
- Record Yourself: After shadowing, record your voice to listen back. Compare your pronunciation to the original to identify areas for improvement.
By integrating these tips, you will find that you can improve your English pronunciation and speaking skills. Using this shadowing site provides an excellent avenue to learn English with YouTube and significantly boosts your fluency in English conversation.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.
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