Debunking Michael Redmond's Positional Judgement

[bayu]

bayu, you speak about putting myself on the same level as Cho Chikun. I do not.

Just because you don't, doesn't mean that your writing evokes the same. I believe you that you don't put yourself on the same level as Cho. It would indeed be silly. But your posts speak a different language. It is unintended by you. Other posters might be forgiven due to the benefit of doubt. You made many bold and, arguably arrogant posts elsewhere that you don't get the benefit of doubt.

Is takes you seconds to request from me a study of a Redmond game.

It took you seconds to insult Redmond.

So I need not prove again my skill in making positional judgements.

I never asked for that. I believe in your great skills in making positional judgements. I asked you to change the strategy when claiming that Redmond has bad skills making positional judgements.

I do not wish to discuss off-topic parts of your message.

That's good style. I oblige.

[Sennahoj]

He made enough "cannot judge" comments etc. in positions, which I could have judged in a live commentary, to know that his PJ is unimpressive.

Is takes you seconds to request from me a study of a Redmond game. Writing, editing and posting such a study would take me ca. 7 hours.

This seems inconsistent --- if it's like you say, you should be able to take one of those positions Redmond couldn't judge live, and do it in seconds.

[RobertJasiek]

bayu, please notice the difference between criticising someone's application of go theory and criticising someone as a person. I have criticised Redmond's application of go theory - I have not criticised him as a person (i.e., I have not insulted him). [FYI, it has been very kind of him to spend many hours of commenting live.]

Sennahoj, doing the positional judgement takes ca. 5% of the time. Writing, editing, posting the positional judgement takes ca. 95% of the time. Verbally stating / demonstrating a made PJ is very much faster than providing it in written form.

[topazg]

He made enough "cannot judge" comments etc. in positions, which I could have judged in a live commentary, to know that his PJ is unimpressive.

http://www.nscblog.com/miscellaneous/in ... l-modesty/

I think if you and Michael took a position in which he made this sort of comment and faced each other on the board from there in a real game, his appreciation of the nuances of the position might be rather better than you give him credit for.

Sometimes people saying "cannot judge" doesn't mean they cannot actually make a judgement. You would rather lay claim to a precise judgement that may prove false. Michael perhaps would rather not make such a concrete judgement until he feels it is beyond doubt. Rightly or wrongly, I find the latter attitude a lot more reasonable - I find false certainty irritating.

[RobertJasiek]

During opening and middle game, every method involves some approximation. Nevertheless, one need not assess a region as undefined if a consistent method can assess plus-minus 1 point.

[Knotwilg]

bayu, please notice the difference between criticising someone's application of go theory and criticising someone as a person. I have criticised Redmond's application of go theory - I have not criticised him as a person (i.e., I have not insulted him).

We're getting very close to philosophical questions here but you cannot dissociate people's personality from what they're doing in life. I can call you a poor author without attacking you as a person, your wife can call you a poor lover, your opponent can call you a poor player, etc etc all of this not insulting you per your definition, but altogether quite painful.

Redmond is a professional go player. Calling his positional judgment unimpressive is, if not insulting, derogatory. It might be true. What people here are trying to say is that we shouldn't infer his positional judgment from a live broadcast. And other people think that an amateur calling a pro's PJ unimpressive is preposterous.

Maybe he knows the score but he wants to keep the suspense (I don't think this is true, but it could be true). Being kept in suspense might not be what you want to get from a pro commentary. That would be a valid, subjective criticism. You didn't like the commentary for that aspect. You think a pro should provide more facts and not as much uncertainty and this would be useful to you. That's fair. You had an expectation towards Redmond: that he would show off his famous positional judgment by calling out the score very earlty, very precise. That personal expectation was not met. Fair enough. You did not do that though: you rush to call Redmond's PJ unimpressive, which is a one directional judgment call, and you call it "debunking a myth" while the myth seems to live more in your head than anywhere else.

[Kirby]

Although I think that my positional judgement until the micro-endgame is superior, how can you say that this alone would give me good winning chances?

You think your positional judgement is better than Michael Redmond 9d's? Seriously?

[uPWarrior]

During opening and middle game, every method involves some approximation. Nevertheless, one need not assess a region as undefined if a consistent method can assess plus-minus 1 point.

I'll call your bluff: just pick one of these games and a move number and give us a +-1 point estimate. Preferably in a position that Redmond "had trouble" doing a positional judgement.

Please don't feed us some crap like "it takes too long". You said yourself that 95% of the time is for editing, and I'm only asking you for a number. No editing required. Plus, you repeatedly said that you could do it if you were in Michael's position. In a live broadcast. That must mean that it only takes you 20-30 seconds.

[RobertJasiek]

Seriously (until the micro-endgame) because, when interrupting or not doing PJ, he occasionally hinted at reasons (or missing conceptual PJ knowledge) why he could not do it. Those reasons would not hinder me when doing a PJ because I can apply suitable theory then.

During his games, he would (I hope) less frequently have problems but his knowledge gaps would still prevent him from doing accurate PJ at times in quiet positions.

uPWarrior, territorial positional judgement is only part of the PJ I do. Stating its TPJ count can be insufficient to assess the leader. Redmond had difficulties in relatively simple and in demanding positions. Without having kept a count up-to-date from move 1 on, I cannot use incremental update but need to count the whole board. This takes more than the 20 or 30s you mention; 2 or 3 minutes is more realisric for a 1/2 point count of a quiet position without large gote endgames. Otherwise, reading is required.

Maybe I comment on the match games later. After a few months, my urgent job activities might give me more free time to spend a few days on written commentaries.

Stating just a count for one move's position does not take much time indeed, but today I have much urgent work to do, which has higher priority than meeting your curiosity. It might be that I find the nevessary time during the following days. An interesting position would be, e.g., just after the game 5 sacrifice squeeze. This position is quiet but requires much reading for boundary settling.

[uPWarrior]

If you can't do it now, then don't blame Michael for not doing it in 20 seconds in front of a live audience during a broadcast. Simple as that.

[Cassandra]

Stating just a count for one move's position does not take much time indeed, but ...

Having found the "ultimate tool" is of no practical use if it cannot be applied successfully under the time constraints of a real game.

[RobertJasiek]

If you can't do it now, then don't blame Michael for not doing it in 20 seconds in front of a live audience during a broadcast. Simple as that.

1) Please respect my jobs and duty to do the related work. In particular, I have delayed work due to the match, but now the match is over and I must work. Simple as that.

2) I could select an easy position just for the sake of doing it in "20s" but this is not the point of discussion. For such, see my KGS kibitz counts during the last dozen years when predicting the outcome of well played (not too many mistakes by the players altering the scores) games 150 moves before the end by +-1 point.

3) My claim is not one of being able to count or calculate as fast as a pocket calculator. I am none and do not belong to those super-humans that are so fast. PJ is not about greatest speed but about reasonable speed and best possible, meaningful accuracy.

4) I have not criticised Redmond for not doing it in 20s; this is an arbitrary, unrealistically short time invented by you and realistic only in simple, quiet positions without too large territory regions.

[RobertJasiek]

Having found the "ultimate tool" is of no practical use if it cannot be applied successfully under the time constraints of a real game.

Sure. (My methods are applicable for that in real games with usual thinking times; in lightning games, only occasionally and partially applicable, of course.)

[wineandgolover]

I am not an expert on PJ, but I would agree that Myungwan Kim was estimating score far earlier, and far more often than Michael Redmond.

I think there could be several reasons for this other than strength/weakness at PJ, including

1) cultural difference - Perhaps the Japanese are less likely than the Koreans to criticize a top pro, and would rather describe the board as uncertain, out of respect.

2) different boards - I find it harder to play on a demo board, rather than a standard board or online. Perhaps counting is also harder?

3) presentation style - Myungwan Kim was far more emotional and attached to Lee Sedol, and prone to despair at the score, or rejoice in a turn around. Redmond was more detached. Combine this with the fact that Kim seemed to count an awful lot, and Redmond had a different approach while presenting, it seems obvious that we'd see them differently.

Anyway, I agree with RJ, that Redmond provided viewers with far fiewer positional judgements. I just don't agree with his conclusion that this means he is poor at it.

[Kirby]

Anyway, I agree with RJ, that Redmond provided viewers with far fiewer positional judgements. I just don't agree with his conclusion that this means he is poor at it.

This is pretty much what I think. Michael Redmond didn't provide as much positional assessment as Kim Myungwan throughout his commentary.

That being said, positional judgement is one of the most important aspects of the game. For example, Robert admitted that "Redmond's tactics are superior", but tactics are also a part of positional judgement - how can you accurately assess the position without understanding the tactical subtleties of the board? Also, it's been said by some pros that evaluation is the most difficult part of the game. Reading ahead is one thing, but even if you see the board position, you must decide whether or not it is good for you.

I believe that positional judgement has a large impact on who will win or lose the game.

It stands to reason, therefore, that a 9d professional player will have superior positional judgement compared to a 5d amateur player.