All he's said is that he thinks that his books are better than others. Geez. Is no one allowed to have an opinion around here? In this case, his opinion was relevant to the discussion, which is about the relative merits of Japanese vs Western go literature. He took the time to write a book and he's proud of the product. So what? It's just his opinion. So what if he states his claims repeatedly? He might boast about his books very often, but almost never unless books/tips for improvement comes up. This being a go forum, those topics come up very often. At the very least, I find his boasts (even if false) to be a thousand times more relevant than the posts that mock them without much explanation (or any of the half-dozen one-line in-thread jokes that you might see on a given day).
topazg wrote::D You do realise you just made magicwand's point for him?RobertJasiek wrote:So 48 cases are summarised in one formula.Magicwand wrote:languge related. His book makes simplething more complicated for no reason.
If we strip away the terms that would have been defined in his book, I see that, if Jasiek's claims are true, he has simplified (48 cases solved by one rule) information rather than complicating it. It might be more complicated-sounding due to the presence of terms that Jasiek has created that are not in our common go lexicon, but complicated-sounding does not equal complicated.
Also, Magicwand's suggestions that only books written by pros are worth reading is laughable. Many college textbooks are written by non-academics who don't do any research. There are different levels of knowledge. A pro's strength is so much greater than that of your typical amateur dan player. An analog of what Magicwand is claiming is this: Only math professors can write math books, including ones about addition, subtraction, and high school algebra. Pull-eze.
We also have to realize that most go professionals have much less formal education than regular people due to the amount of time and effort they devoted to go as youths. Lee Sedol is a high school dropout (as are many other top pros) for goodness sakes! Even though the pros are infinitely stronger than amateurs, it does not take a leap of faith to believe that they would be worse than well-educated amateurs at communicating knowledge to others (provided that it is knowledge that both possess, rather than knowledge possessed exclusively by one party).
From what I can gather from my reading of Jasiek's posts around here, his primary dissatisfaction with the existing go literature derives from the sparsity of clearly stated principles that amateurs can repeatedly and confidently apply once they have learned them. If I understand his thesis correctly, he is claiming that go theory, as organized by professionals, is a collection of principles that often contradict each other, and that the burden falls on the player to gain enough game experience and reading skills to decide which ones to apply (and ignore) in a given situation. He seems to think that his books present go theory in a way that reduces some of that burden. Whether that is true or not is for the readers to judge.
Why are we so often told to study pro games? A pro game contains a pro's judgment of which of the two dozen mutually contradictory go principles we should apply in a given position. By studying many pro games, we eventually get a good feel for how to do this. I don't think that this is a bad way to study. It's fun and enjoyable. If done enough times, it also leads to significant improvement. However, it also takes some time. From what I can see, Jasiek's desire is to provide some shortcuts where he can.
I think we can all agree that, whether he achieved those goals or not, his goals are worthy ones. To those who think that pursuing such goals is a pointless task because we already have good enough methods for learning: Basic socks have performed their function well for centuries. Was it pointless to develop socks that dry faster and don't slide down? Do those who spent time on such projects deserve our ridicule? Civilization as we know it might not exist if everyone had that sort of attitude.
Magicwand wrote:There were many amatures tried to sell books n all failed.
Because they woulnt wakeup and smell the coffee.
I saw samples of your writing and it wasnt goood.
and i am a math major.
So here, a poster who hasn't read Jasiek's book (other than a short sample) is disparaging both the writer and the book. He claims that all amateurs who have tried in the past have failed so Jasiek will fail as well. He also claims that he can tell that Jasiek's books are bad by reading three page samples from books that are almost 300 pages long. He also claims that he is a math major. Any good math major knows that inferences about the whole from the part are unsound. Yet he makes two such inferences here.
I haven't read any of Jasiek's books, but I've read John Fairbairn's review of some of them. John's reviews were generally favorable. Consider the excerpt from his review, which is quoted below:
John Fairbairn wrote:Robert Jasiek's two Joseki books probably have all you will ever need and he has probably done it as well as you will ever see in this niche market...In fact, I'd go further and say that every serious go player up to about 1-dan should buy at least Vol. 2.
That's a pretty strong endorsement from someone whose opinion most of us on this forum respect quite a bit. Granted, John's endorsement doesn't reach the heights suggested by Jasiek's sometimes grandiose language, but it's a pretty strong thumbs-up. John also criticizes what he considers a number of specific weaknesses in Robert's books. I wish people would follow John's example (read the books and criticize specifics with justification) instead of engaging in vague and snide side-swiping that reeks more of thinly veiled cyber-bullying than legitimacy.
I also find Jasiek's boasts to be a little bit too much at times, but guess what? I haven't read his books and I cannot counter his claims. Just leave him be unless you've read his books, and let's dispense with future repetitions of this illogical myth that only pros can write good go books, even if it turns out that Jasiek's books are no better than dog poo.
EDIT: Minor corrections
