John Fairbairn wrote:Kirby: Gowan's remarks about longer time suggesting higher quality are not pure speculation. There have been thousands upon thousands of commentaries. A simple survey will show that longer games tend to come with many more "brilliant move" type comments and far fewer "mistake" type comments than fast games. Even in Korean commentaries. I have done research on this field for ICOB papers.
Furthermore, extra time is not necessarily devoted to reading out fights. In fact, in my experience it is hardly devoted to direct reading at all. It is devoted to evaluation (including but not limited to counting). I have seen at first hand, many times, how pros see very deep lines instantly. Then at the end of each line they stop and think - is that stone really on the right spot given that group on the other side, and stuff like that. One example I recall was being in the pressroom with Ishida during a title match. A move was played in the middle game. By definition he had never seen that position before. Once the move was relayed in he slapped about 40 stones down on the board (no ladders). Paused briefly, picked up about 20 of the stones and slapped 20 more down, paused again, looked at Kato and asked whether A was better than B. (As it happens, I was not amazed by that, because I'd seen it all before. The reason I remember it vividly is because I've never seen anyone pick up so many stones so quickly, mostly in one hand).
This is well supported anecdotally. For example, Go Seigen commenting on why Kitani played so slow. He said it was nothing to do with seeing the moves, as Kitani could see instantly more moves than anyone else. He spent his time comparing the variations. Go's comment in turn is supported by examples of vast depth and complication (yose-kos and the like) that Kitani had apparently seen instantly and which made fellow pros gag.
In fact it is a truism that the strongest players tend to be strongest whatever speed they play at. In chess, Carlsen is the world's highest rated player in classical, rapid and blitz play. In go, the last 8 in the NHK Cup tends to reflect the slate of title winners in the slow major events. It's not the quality of the player that time affects; it is the quality of the game (I have argued that that quality loss is reflected not just in more countable mistakes and fewer countable brilliancies but in a change of style; that's a different debate but it doesn't affect the countability of the number of mistakes).
I am not alone in my views. Even in Korea. As you well know, but seem to choose to ignore, many Korean pros, led by Cho Hun-hyeon, have decried the impact of faster time limits in their domestic game. But too many modern tournaments everywhere are becoming a feeding frenzy instead of a banquet. My own grandchidren prefer KFC fast food over Michelin stars. Love then even more than I love you; so much so I've even been prepared to accept greasy fingers. But when it comes to a question of food alone, I prefer still to sit in a proper restaurant.
Sorin: Time limits in Japan have decreased markedly since the 1960s. Whether that explains the rise of young players fully or at all we can't be sure, because it has also been paralleled by reforms giving young players quicker access to the higher regions of tournaments. But personally I'm sure it's a factor because older players have not adapted to the change in style required. It's interesting to me that very many young Japanese players have visited China and Korea to seek improvement. They seem to feel that the new style cannot be acquired properly at home. You view that the quality of a 3h game is not much different from a 9h seems beside the point. At pro level a game is so finely balanced that one mistake can decide the outcome. So even a tiny difference assessible only in a longer game can have a catastrophic effect.
If I may go back to my point about commentaries. If you presented me with two pro games, one fast and one slow, and asked me to say which is which, I would be quite lost. I rely on the commentaries to tell me. But once I know, I prefer the higher quality game (normally the slower one) simply because it teaches good habits for me, and the game has greater internal consistency. It's not quite true to say that fast, mistake-laden games teach bad habits, because if that style of play is best for modern tournament play, maybe that should be your role model. But in my case I don't play in tournaments and I'm not looking for cheap thrills. In fact I don't find fast games exciting at all. I have watched countless late-night fast games on Baduk TV in Korean hotels as I struggle to overcome jet-lag. I find they are quite a good way of making my eyes glaze over.
I would like to hear what difference in style John sees between longer versus shorter time limits. Just basing my opinion only on the games I've watched or played through I see a difference but I can't quantify it. As for reading things out, I include such things as evaluation of variations and judging outcomes as "reading". I don't mean reading a fight out equals reading out the game result. Rather I mean smaller scale fights such as invasions, tenuki in a complicated position, results of new joseki moves, etc. In slower games top pros can accurately read 40 or more moves ahead in certain middle game whole board situations. If faced with a new move in a complicated joseki (e.g. in avalanche or taisha or some 5-4 joseki), even pro-level reading takes some time. In this kind of situation even a fast player like Takemiya has taken an hour to decide on a move.
In judging historical players versus modern players, of course modern players know more of go theory and tactics (joseki) than older players. How strong a player is is not determined by what he/she knows, rather what they do with what they know. If a modern 9p commentator says that an historical player such as Dosaku played a brilliant tesuji, can't we conclude that in at least a single case Dosaku was playing at a modern 9p level?