What is Go Theory?

Go theory exists independently of a carrier (teacher). Do you ask whether teachers with higher levels of a) 'playing strengths' or b) 'understanding of go theory' use such go theory that lower levels use or understand?



It is an ambiguous phrase, which can have in particular one of these meanings:
- the world go population's combined knowledge
- the whole of all formally described theory
- specific subsets of either (then, different players can have different understandings of specific go theory)

A couple of points:

First, learning styles differ, not just from culture to culture, but from person to person. An outside observer does not know what it takes for another person to understand something.

Second, while it is important in go to think for oneself -- nobody is going to play your moves or you --, doing so during a lecture from a pro whom you may not see again for months or years, or ever, may not be the best use of time. Children are fantastic learners. They also ask a hell of a lot of questions. You characterize the behavior of those who ask "nonsense" questions as childlike. Precisely!

Third, there are no stupid questions, especially at a lecture with an audience including a lot of kyu players. (Edit: Not to mention the broad youtube audience! ) Working something out at home will not help other audience members, while asking even a stupid question is likely to do so. There is a Japanese saying: To ask is a moment's embarrassment; not to ask is a lifetime's shame.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

On its own there is nothing wrong with this, but in the context of real life 'go theory' most often is just a translation of the Japanese kiri, and so is usually intended to mean whatever they use it to mean. Their usual definition is simply "basic principles of go" or "fundamentals of go". Either phrase is likewise a bit woolly, but the important thing to note, for a westerner already exposed to chess, is that it does not include encyclopaedic knowledge of the openings. Nor is it ever (in my experience) used for anything to do with go rules.

If you end up excelling in the Japanese kind of go theory, you will not make a good tournament arbiter nor will you necessarily know the latest trends in the 4-4 joseki. Instead you will have good suji (tactical nous) and be able to make the right strategic decisions in positions you have never seen before. Indeed, the usual way to say you are good or bad at go theory in Japanese is to use the adjectives akarui or kurai, which basically mean bright and dark. In other words you acquire, or lack, insight.

Fundamentals and shape are very often brought up in professional go. A word I would consider equivalent to theory I rarely see discussed.

I don't know what I would consider 'theory' to be and just discuss fundamentals. Theory implies something is attempted to be proven, and I don't think strong players are trying to prove a theory when they play (or teach). They are trying to become better players.

No, I meant something different. Let me try to explain, however best I can.

Theory is a collection of more or less general statements, each of which can be applied to more than one position or pattern. If we want to have a hierarchical approach, we can say that many of these statements are based on simpler statements and derived from them by a set of laws or whatever, logic based on the actual rules of play, which are the bottom tier. This might be an oversimplification, but in practice this is, I think, what it boils down to. A collection of 'proverbs', so make it even simpler.

Now, since by the above 'definition' the statements apply generally and to more than one position - the more deeply into any given position you look the less exact the rules will/might become. If we finally split the whole game tree into a series of discrete position, with sufficient attention to detail would we have to conclude that each position would have to be treated separately, and any kind of approximation or generalization runs the risk of losing something which is particular to this position? In other words - with sufficiently deep reading and granularity in position evaluation, will the general 'statements' we call theory be useful?

You are the expert here, much more so than me, so I am not sure if this makes much sense, let me try to construct an example.
Lets start with a general statements, something like "play away from strength." It seems to be a solid advice and a general strategic principle which is good to know and to follow. But, at higher level, can you afford to simply apply it, or do you have to read it all out anyways and then apply it or not - but not because of this principle and your knowledge thereof, but because you have read out that in this particular position it is good or bad. So, if you have to read it all out anyways, as much as you can, is there a sense in knowing the principle anyways, and is there a sense in striving in refining it even deeper if you still will have to just read it out? Do you even bother to learn it, and if not (waste of time?) can you explain your moves based on such principles?

I think it might be easier to find examples in chess, where more western literature exists and players tend to learn/teach with much more of a scientific/western approach than it is generally apparent in Go. In chess, like in Go, strategy is composed of a set of 'statements' which are generally accepted as a good 'common sense' approach to playing the game. You can make an enumerated list of those 'statements' any way you like... but I am pretty sure that I know pretty much all of these statements, regardless of the fact that I am not a strong player by any flight of imagination. In other words, I do not believe that the top-class world players know much more of this 'theory' than I do - and yet they all can beat me easily, not even a contest.

Which brings me to the question: is there a point where theory stops and something else begins? Not sure what, experience, intuition, patter database, reading ability, whatever... all of that together? Not necessarily because no 'theory' can be derived at those higher levels (and in chess they tried, very hard they tried, for many decades or even longer) - but because this kind of conscious and theory-based thinking is not very efficient? You simply have to consider each position separately - or you are running the risk of losing a tiny bit because of the necessary generalization within any 'theory', and at that level losing even a tiny bit will probably mean losing the game itself, which is unacceptable.

So, basically, at higher levels players cannot afford any little bit of generalization, which 'theory' by definition, must be.

I guess this is what I mean, if it makes any sense to you. At lower levels, theory is a good thing, and we certainly do not care all that much if we lose a point here and there because of the generalization - because this generalized 'rules' allow us to avoid larger errors at the same time, so the balance is in our favor. At higher levels, they do not make the mistakes which could be corrected by generalized 'theory' and the loss of even a fraction of a point due to any generalization is not acceptable.

_________________
- Bantari
______________________________________________
WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

@tekesta:

At high levels, you must always read and analyze. Not doing this is like walking through a minefield blind.

tekesta, see also Shaddy's reply.

Theory per se is not only a distillation of the most central bits of knowledge accumulated over the centuries, because also new theory is added to the knowledge pool.

Which are the "few prior observations" that let you "understand the[?] theory at all"?

Certainly this.

When I was four years old, my family moved to Kerala, Southern India, and I immediately began to learn two foreign languages (Malayalam and English) just because I was confronted with them … no conscious thoughts about grammar and whatever AT ALL.

All other attempts of learning another language (Latin and Russian at school), and delving deeper into German, my mother tongue, involved meta-thinking: conscious thought about the language, and often also about language in general.

_________________
“The only difference between me and a madman is that I’m not mad.” — Salvador Dali ★ Play a slooooow correspondence game with me on OGS?

Sorry for replying very late to this post. I was out of town until a couple of Mondays ago.

It is true what you stated. Seasoned players have so much experience with reading and analysis that they they can do it rather quickly, almost as if by instinct. Even so, every now and then there arises a board position that challenges even a top pro's analysis. Which is why it is usually good practice to analyze a position for a few minutes before playing a stone, even at the highest levels of play.

I apologize for the late reply.

Our knowledge and understanding of Go is changing all the time, but there are some things about the game that have remained the same throughout the centuries. I believe its playing philosophy is well summarized in Wang Jixin's Ten Golden Rules.

I play the game and study it, but by no means am I an expert. Also, I noticed that "theory" only points us in the right direction. Experience, I believe, is the decisive factor in the kind of understanding that a student develops regarding Go. Not absolute understanding, mind you, but a personal one.

I have only been able to make sense of Go theory after playing (and losing) and few games and practicing some. After doing so enough times, I am beginning to understand the reasons behind its concepts. It's like when, for example, my professor tells me that plants with small, leathery leaves tend to grow in hot, dry places and plants with large, tender leaves tend to grow in cool, moist places. At first, if I have not spent time looking at plants, I would not know what he was talking about. I might even say that he speaks nonsense! After a few initial observations of plants in their natural habitat, a seed of understanding is planted. After some more observation and thinking I learn what my professor had known all along; small, leathery leaves help to reduce evaporation loss of water in hot, dry climates, while large, tender leaves are best for reduced sunlight conditions that occur in cool, moist climates. (Tender leaves help promote evapotranspiration in conditions that would normally impede it.)

I know next to nothing about jōseki (so you may have to correct me on the following ) but I've observed the taisha jōseki, which has been obsolete since at least the early 20th century, and deduced some things. After the first 3 moves, White and Black try to separate each other, then reinforce and extend. The result is a group large enough to have influence over a very large part of the board. There are hundreds of variations, but, in the latter half of the 19th century, as Japanese Go players began to seek more developmental flexibility in the opening, the taisha was perceived to decide developmental possibilities too early in the game. Thus, the taisha slowly became obsolete and simpler jōseki, such as attach and extend, became more popular. By the time Go Seigen arrived on the Japanese pro scene, the taisha was largely obsolete. Of course not all large-scale jōseki became obsolete; the avalanche jōseki continues to be played even today, apparently because it creates a group with good outward influence, while avoiding the extensive ramification characteristic of the taisha. Also, 5-3 is not a common opening move in recent times, whereas 5-4 with a 3-4 shimari is common and avalanche jōsekis arise from it.

Through my experiences, I have come to realize that Go is a "way" - in the Oriental sense of the word. So it really does not make any sense for me to say I know this and that. I am even beginning to wonder if measuring progress is not as important as I thought, as I cannot hope to "master" the game. Of course measuring the progress of Go students can provide useful information about how people learn the game, but I believe measured progress towards a specific level of expertise should not define a Go player. Rather, the definitive factor should be how much time daily one spends on Go.

this might be construed as flamebait/troll language, but it really isn't

i have not found any "western" teacher that i would want to get taught by or is of a strength that i would benefit from getting taught by.

Great article. Thanks for sharing that.

One question was screaming at me, though, during reading about the "draw the cube" episode:
How would the teacher handle it if the pupil was still unable to draw proper cube at the end of the class/day/week? Would there be actual teaching involved at some point (teacher explaining or designing simpler but leading exercises?), or would the pupil just give up (with what consequences?), or would he continue to grind and struggle with that for the rest of his life? This was never even touched on, but i think this is very important.

_________________
- Bantari
______________________________________________
WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

Do you think that the second sentence follows from the first? You can struggle to formulate a generalization for something that can be memorized. (I do agree that a prioritization of perceived smarts over hard work is a huge problem that seems to plague American students, more that some other countries).

_________________
Occupy Babel!

That seems like a strange claim to me. When I was in middle school, more than one teacher emphasized that getting the right answer was not everything, that the process of finding out was important, especially later in life, when there is nobody to say what the right answer is. We also learned the story about Robert Bruce and the spider. "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again," is a Western saying.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

It may be a generational thing. For some time it seems like American schools and parents have been emphasizing self esteem over achievement. My teachers didn't care a fig about self esteem, and as a result taught a lot of students that they were not worth much and were not very capable. Maybe there has been an overcorrection.

I have been wondering about this prioritization of perceived smarts, given that America is still an anti-intellectual country. Perhaps there is an idea that some people are smart and some people are not, and if you are not, why beat yourself up? "E for effort" is another Western saying. If effort is not going to be rewarded, why bother?

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

that might not exactly be the right way to interpret his statement, although I'm subjecting it to my own interpretation.

Considering I learned on my own before getting a teacher, I can understand both sides.

The idea might be this for a lot of "western" people: "If i get it explained to me, then i will do it correct from here on out"
this is correct in stuff like mathematics, where there is typically only one way to solve a problem

this goes counter to a lot of asian thinking which sometimes is more "Here is the right answer/way to do this, and you'll eventually understand it naturally as time goes by"
(Again, this is my own interpretation)

i think the asian approach works better in go for many reasons:

1. moves the lesson along - you can cover more topics throughout the game(s) that you're having reviewed. if you spend too much time on just one situation on the board, you may not be getting full value of the different things you could be learning from the game

2. too precise of an answer is detrimental - go is a very flexible thing. what works in the situation of the game you're playing this time might be different the next time around. explaining a certain situation to death might be useful, but only for the precise situation. understanding all the whys might not be useful the next time something close to this happens

3. go is hard - some of these concepts are just hard. plain and simple. it will take a long time to really have it file into your brain and be something you can actively come back to

4. go is varied - for the same reason as #3, there is a good chance it might not even show up in the next 20 games you play. for that reason, its not worth sitting there learning it to death when it comes in

Before we proceed, do you refer to a student who just takes longer than usual to learn a new skill or one with a real learning disability (or different learning style)?

I cannot give a precise answer as I have never worked in Japanese public education, but probably the first choice would be likely - unless the teacher is vindictive with a penchant for stigmatizing failure. When Toru Kumon helped his eldest son to overcome his mathematics difficulties, he gave him a set of exercises that, while easy, where numerous and repetitive. The idea behind this is to develop a solid foundation in basic skills before moving on to more advanced ones. Perhaps the students in class observed how a proper cube is drawn, then attempted again and again until they got it right. Normally, in Oriental pedagogy the preferred approach is to give the student a slightly difficult skill to master, allowing the student to gain practice through repeated attempts until the skill has been mastered.

As well, given the group-oriented cultures of East Asia, students probably help each other out with their studies instead of each student being on his/her own. This would make it easier for them to master new skills at school.

Japanese and other East Asian schoolchildren usually spend long hours studying (and their parents often cajole and goad them on), so few are the children that would have a lot of difficulty doing the task mentioned in the article.