reviewing SL articles using LZ and criticism

[Knotwilg]

Let's borrow an idea from Alan Turing here, now that we're talking AI.

Suppose you could at all times ask Go Seigen's opinion and he would still be able to tell you if a move is good or bad, and by how much, but not "why". Would you ask him?

Now suppose Go Seigen and an AI are in the same room and you ask them the same questions. You don't know who's answering and by the quality of their answers you are unable to distinguish who says what. Would you still ask?

Now Go Seigen dies and the room is left with only AI. Would you still ask?

In any of these stages, people would probably stop asking. Maybe the first stage is already deterring you.

Personally, I would ask, ask, ask. Not because I want to become 13 dan - I will never. But I like finding out the truth, or getting as close to the truth as I can. The same reasons why I'd read pro opinions apply to why I'm feeding positions to AI. The answers are different but I find that rather enlightening than frightening.

[John Fairbairn]

I think there is an abiding problem with L19 for people like me: there are too many mathematicians and computer scientists, who all each reinforce each other's way of thinking. There are people, apparently in a minority, who are interested in viewing the world in different ways.

So, to answer one of your questions:

Suppose you could at all times ask Go Seigen's opinion and he would still be able to tell you if a move is good or bad, and by how much, but not "why". Would you ask him?

Probably not. First, I would assume that his explanation would be over my head. As confirmation of that, he tries to explain why particular moves are good or bad in his books on 21st century go and I don't really understand that. Superficially it feels like I understand, but it's not in a useful way. Furthermore, I assume even top pros didn't really understand what he says either, because that's why they couldn't beat him. He inspired top pros, but I don't really think he taught them any principles. The only way they learnt, I feel, was by another 10,000 hours of practice. Or, to unquote Gomoto: consciousness > intuition.

Second, what I would be most interested in from GSG is not why move A is allegedly better than B, but why he played it. Was it psychology? Was it because he'd had a bad night's sleep? Was it because he played too fast and boobed? If so, why did he play too fast. Or did he just see more than the opponent? And in Go Seigen's case it's also essentially how I wrote my books about him, and as they have been popular books, I feel safe in claiming that this is how many fans view the game.

The search for the ultimate truth sounds very noble and all that. But most of us prefer a bit of gossip, and human frailty to gossip about too.

I infer the hard-boiled AI fans and I are on completely wavelengths. Fine. I'm comfortable with that. I even toy around with a bit of AI myself. But I wouldn't feel comfortable with my wavelength being shut down, or being drowned out by propaganda loudspeakers. That would seem a very North Korean way of doing things to me.

[ez4u]

I think I am more on JF's side. What is truth? You are part way through a game. You have the opportunity to ask for LZ's choice for the next move. However, you are not allowed to see any of the variations and will not have any further recourse to LZ throughout the rest of the game. LZ returns a move. Should you play this move or an alternative that you choose based on the heuristics that you have previously studied and utilized up to now?

If you play LZ's recommendation, how do you plan to continue to choose your future moves in the game?

Note that I am not trying to attack you. My question is serious. I have great difficulty in using the ideas from AI games. It is easy to sit passively and watch LZ generate variations and moves in Lizzie. It is a very different challenge to take those ideas and turn them into consistent and successful play in real life.

And on Gomoto's saying, Consciousness becomes intuition (through the 10,000 hours).

[Bill Spight]

Here's another example. Many years ago I learned this sequence from 38 Basic Joseki:

$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . b a . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X 1 . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . b a . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X 1 . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

I already knew that black ''a'' or ''b'' instead of were the "real" joseki moves. But is a way of staying away from the complications of the avalanche. I remember the first time a dan player tried to "avalanche" me in a handicap game, and how disappointed he was when I didn't play along! (But I still spent time studying some variations of the avalanche, even if I wasn't brave enough yet to try them in a serious game.)

Well, now the bots tell you to play below, instead.

$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . b a . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . b a . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

Do you say, Oh, no! I couldn't? Or do you say, Thanks?

[Uberdude]

I think John's point about people enjoying Go as fans rather than (or as well as) players answers ez4u's point about the difficulty of how to apply LZ's lessons when you are playing a game yourself. You simply don't need to! Exploring pro games, problems, exploring variations etc with LZ, such as I did here on book by Fujisawa Shuko, is an interesting and enjoyable activity for me (and I hope other readers too) without requiring validation that I can play as well as LZ in my own games. Just look at that f12 attachment, it's so cool! And by exploring the variations I can see its purpose and followups depending how the opponent answers. If I can imagine such moves in my own games then that's a bonus, but it's already a positive without me playing.

[Bill Spight]

Also, a lot of "outdated" techniques still work just fine against human opponents. I know from firsthand experience that psychologically-motivated moves/styles often render an opponent weaker than they otherwise would be. It won't work on a bot, but I'm not playing bots, so who cares?

Now here's where we depart ways. Yes, some club players do things that they know aren't quite right, but it works against amateur opponents. And if you fight fire with fire, you might be able to match the other players in your club. But you'll never surpass them until you learn to stop setting fire to things!

Well, Applebaps, is your goal to improve your game, or to beat weak players? If the latter, then making plays that they do not understand can help you to do so. If the former, better to pretend that they are good players and still try to beat them.

[Knotwilg]

I think John's point about people enjoying Go as fans rather than (or as well as) players answers ez4u's point about the difficulty of how to apply LZ's lessons when you are playing a game yourself. You sinply don't need to! Exploring pro games, problems, exploring variations etc with LZ, such as I did here on book by Fujisawa Shuko, is an interesting and enjoyable activity for me (and I hope other readers too) without requiring validation that I can play as well as LZ here in my own games. Just look at that f12 attachment, it's so cool! And by exploring the follow ups I can see its purpose and followups depending how the opponent answers. If I can imagine such moves in my own games then that's a bonus, but it's already a positive without me playing.

This sums it up better than I could myself. I enjoy studying Go and I find it impossible to ignore the recent evolution due to AI. I was already quite inept at applying conventional wisdom to my game and that won't change much with AI generated ideas. I find these AI generated ideas not that much harder to understand than conventional wisdom. They are intriguing, for sure, unsettling, often, counterintuitive sometimes, but intuitive in nature, because of their probabilistic essence. They are not super weird moves which only work because of a tesuji 80 moves down the line. Uberdude's gospel of AI openings is a neat, well articulated example of what we can learn.

[Bill Spight]

I think I am more on JF's side. What is truth? You are part way through a game. You have the opportunity to ask for LZ's choice for the next move. However, you are not allowed to see any of the variations and will not have any further recourse to LZ throughout the rest of the game. LZ returns a move. Should you play this move or an alternative that you choose based on the heuristics that you have previously studied and utilized up to now?

If you play LZ's recommendation, how do you plan to continue to choose your future moves in the game?

I think that there is a parallel, here, with joseki. Do you play joseki or not? The saying goes, Learn joseki, lose two stones. I took that to heart, and did not learn joseki, except by picking them up, until I was a dan player. Before then, I did read a book about joseki mistakes, however. Playing by rote is not good. As John Fairbairn says, go is a mind sport. And, as Znosko-Borovsky says,

Do not make the opening moves automatically and without reflection.
Do not seek to memorise variations, try to understand them.

So my answer is, neither. I would not just play the LZ move, nor would I play the presumably inferior move that first occurred to me. (Let's not bias the choice by letting me invoke thought for one play but not the other.) Instead, I would apply reflection and try to understand LZ's move. Then I would make my choice.

[John Fairbairn]

I find the argument about being shown a new move by a bot as a reason to value bots spurious.

Yes, it's interesting, if you like that kind of thing. Yes, it probably is a better move.

But you get that kind of insight over and over again in playing over human pro games. With the humans you also, in many cases, get a useful human commentary as to why it is a good move.

In fact, over the years the one thing that has improved my game much more than anything else is playing over a pro game and seeing a move to which my reaction is: "Oh, I didn't know you could do that!"

I would then try that move in my own games, no doubt with a varying degree of understanding and success - but on the whole I felt I was understanding more and getting better results. Which is another way of recommending Bill's advice to try new moves. Yes, but note - you can do that with human moves, too. And, again, you get a human/pro commentary, not a bot/amateur commentary.

In my view of things, when we have a case where it can be shown that a pro recommendation is wrong according to a bot (as I have done myself a few times here), my reaction is not to worship the bot. I prefer to try to see if I can modify my understanding of the traditional wisdom so as to retain a grasp on the game. E.g. a valid question may be: is the pro's advice generally right but not in this particular case - and if so what is particular about this case? That seems likelier to lead to quicker improvement. That in fact, from what I read, is what the Japanese pros have done when they started speaking not just of overconcentration but bots making extra-early overconcentration.

Moderation in all things. It's long lane that has no loaf on the bread.

[Bill Spight]

But I think the real topic has revealed itself, here and in other threads, as 'old go wisdom is old wives' tales'.

I beg to differ. Some of it is, to be sure. Already some joseki have become obsolete. They would probably have become obsolete in a century or two without AI, but they are now. So what? Is that a bad thing?

The first thing I don't properly understand is the very strong urge to debunk all old wives. In real life, those old wives were your mothers and grandmothers, and they did a pretty good job of getting you where you are today. Much of the time they used their intuition and not their consciousness, made plenty of mistakes, too. But, if you could live your life again, would you still like to be brought up at home, or would you prefer to be brought up in a germ-free isolation ward of a hospital?

I don't think that's a good analogy. I was brought up by parents who did not believe in caning their children, and I am glad of it. Several of my schoolmates were disciplined with belts and yardsticks, so that was still part of the culture.

By analogy with learning at mother's knee, Takagawa was my go mom. Now, thanks to AI, I have found out that some of what I learned from Takagawa, not all, must be discarded, particularly with regard to plays on the side. Plays which a few years ago were obvious, now are to be avoided. I have to learn new plays. So what? Old dogs can learn new tricks. Or die trying, anyway.

One thing the bots tell us is of little importance, at least as commonly understood, is direction of play. Amazing! Heresy! But what can you say? I certainly cannot base game reviews on it, anymore. Or recommend Kajiwara's book about it, even though he is entertaining and thought provoking. Phlogiston, anyone? Geocentric cosmology? Direction of play may become important late in the opening or in the middle game, but I don't know that yet.

The saying is that science marches on, funeral by funeral. Well, not over my dead body! At least not yet.

[Bill Spight]

Addendum to my response to xela about the solid connection below, which he learned from 38 Basic Joseki.

$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X 1 . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X 1 . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

I replied that the bots teach the sagari, instead.

$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

In that case, the following situation could arise.

$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . 4 . |
$$ . . . 2 3 . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . 4 . |
$$ . . . 2 3 . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . . O X . . |
$$ . O X . . . |
$$ . . 1 . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

Black is then faced with the following question, which she would not face after the solid connection for .

$$Bcm5
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . 3 . |
$$ . . . 1 O 5 |
$$ . . 2 O X . |
$$ . . O X 4 9 |
$$ . . O X 7 . |
$$ . O X 6 8 . |
$$ . 0 X . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bcm5
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . 3 . |
$$ . . . 1 O 5 |
$$ . . 2 O X . |
$$ . . O X 4 9 |
$$ . . O X 7 . |
$$ . O X 6 8 . |
$$ . 0 X . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$-------------+[/go]

Is this good for Black, or not? Good question. To quote my late wife:

At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?

[Gomoto]

We are not only watching a very interesting discussion about the old and new ways in go with very good arguments on both sides. We are also watching the eternal struggle between chaos and order near the battleline. Therefore we will not solve the question at hand if we choose one side or the other, or if we think of the question as only be related to the domain of go.

It is good advice to honour our predecessors and look for the new ways at the same time. And even if the only reason would be: Just to enjoy go even more.

[Uberdude]

I think I am more on JF's side. What is truth? You are part way through a game. You have the opportunity to ask for LZ's choice for the next move. However, you are not allowed to see any of the variations and will not have any further recourse to LZ throughout the rest of the game. LZ returns a move. Should you play this move or an alternative that you choose based on the heuristics that you have previously studied and utilized up to now?

If you play LZ's recommendation, how do you plan to continue to choose your future moves in the game?

Although I think this was directed at Knotwilg, I think my previous example explaining my thinking in a real game at viewtopic.php?p=251392#p251392 is relevant. I didn't ask LZ on my phone what to play for 19, but I had looked at 2-space high pincers to 4-4s a bit with LZ as AK loves that move so I expected some to happen. From playing around with variations with that and other pincers, I knew that LZ likes to activate the c14 stone pretty early when white makes the old fashioned c15 connection rather than b14 crawl (e.g. this LZ game I played on Fox a year ago viewtopic.php?p=238695#p238695); though b14 is unsatisfactory with 2-space high so is presumably why bots don't like that pincer but e.g. 1-space low or 3-space high are played. So I didn't know that LZ would approve of 19 as e14 jump, but I had a pretty good idea it would. Of course I hadn't studied this exact board position with the 2-space enclosure and white wedge on lower side, but I do now know that bots are happier to tenuki an approach to 4-4 that we used to think so 19 as tenuki was more worth considering. Using the e14 jump to make c9 more severe is my own thinking and planning and LZ generally approves of how I played so I think this was a successful synthesis of LZ and my own ideas. That I then made a mistake 20 moves later and spoilt the lead that I had built up doesn't invalidate that. I think LZ makes my best moves better, but doesn't much improve the level of my worst moves, and that tends to be what decides who wins games.

I have great difficulty in using the ideas from AI games. It is easy to sit passively and watch LZ generate variations and moves in Lizzie. It is a very different challenge to take those ideas and turn them into consistent and successful play in real life.

Another position from that game where I played a good move which I'm sure I wouldn't have a few years ago in its own thread: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=17130. What made me think of this move? I wouldn't say it is a totally AI style move, pros have played this sort of one-point jump side reduction before AlphaGo (the dancing elephants of Lee Sedol and Mok Jinseok), and maybe I would have played it in the alternate universe of no AG and my spending the same amount of time replaying pro games as I do in this universe, but I think AI existing, both directly as I use myself and how it has influenced pro play increased the chances of me finding that move.

[Applebaps]

Too many good posts to quote them all! I'm enjoying this discussion, as it gets right to the root of why we play this game we (presumably) love. I think, on some level, the AI revolution has forced us (the last bastion of humanity's superiority to AI, in a way) to finally question ourselves in the way that Chess and other games have had to go through already many times. If no human can ever touch a computer at this game, does that mean we should continue, or not? What's the benefit we get? What's the point of it, ultimately?

Reactions vary widely, and I don't think there's a right answer, only how we feel and how we act on those feelings. In any case, I hope my intent comes across in my post that I'm not trying to yell at anyone or say that anyone posting in here is objectively wrong or anything. I don't think that at all.

RE: players and fans - I'm both a player and a fan of Go. I don't think the split is so clear, personally.

RE: the complications invited by AI play - this is the crux of why I tend to look askance at AI's advice, to be honest. At a fundamental biological level, our brains are built "to keep us alive", not "to play Go". AI's brains are built from the ground up "to play Go." Chess had this same problem, where computers would happily enter into "sharp" or complicated positions from which extensive calculations were required but which offered a lot of tactical flexibility. Our brains don't have nearly that level of calculation ability. We're never going to be able to emulate them. So why not just be true to ourselves? I'd rather play moves I understand, I'd rather play like myself, even if it means I get cut apart on the board. I want to play honestly. Here we get into a larger existential question, like, "what does it mean to play like myself, who am I exactly" haha. And I believe the self is both illusory and ever-changing. Who knows, maybe someday we'll see humans who can teach all these greedy bots not to turn the whole board into dame, by outclassing them and making them be more careful. But that day won't be in my lifetime, I don't think.

RE: obsoletion of joseki - It's true that some joseki are considered "obsolete", but others have also been revived (like attach and extend)! Can we really say any joseki is obsolete, then? What if AI in 10 years says it's fine now? Will we just dance around at their whims, always staunchly convinced of our own (their own) rightness from moment to moment? In any case, moves can be said to be good or bad for one player, but like, the board is still almost always playable. The finer gradations of the quality of moves by 1 or 2 percent are an interesting rabbit hole, but imo they're a rabbit hole nonetheless. I think we ought to play moves that feel natural and good, and see what happens.

Reducing the game of Go, a game with more possible board positions than there are visible protons in the known universe, to an equation to be solved... it should be a crime, haha. This is a beautiful, near-infinite game that ought to be approached with more respect and even a bit of awe. When we start just throwing down stones with numbers in mind rather than the art, I think we lose something essential to the experience. And I say this as someone with a bachelor's in mathematics, by the way. We don't HAVE to go down this road just because the tech exists.

[Applebaps]

Also, a lot of "outdated" techniques still work just fine against human opponents. I know from firsthand experience that psychologically-motivated moves/styles often render an opponent weaker than they otherwise would be. It won't work on a bot, but I'm not playing bots, so who cares?

Now here's where we depart ways. Yes, some club players do things that they know aren't quite right, but it works against amateur opponents. And if you fight fire with fire, you might be able to match the other players in your club. But you'll never surpass them until you learn to stop setting fire to things!

Well, Applebaps, is your goal to improve your game, or to beat weak players? If the latter, then making plays that they do not understand can help you to do so. If the former, better to pretend that they are good players and still try to beat them.

I would like to directly answer this and say that my goal is (partly) to improve my game and definitely not just to beat weak players. When I say a move would work on a human opponent that wouldn't work on a bot, I'm not talking about anything tricky or strange. I just mean that people aren't perfect calculating machines and you have a lot more leeway in your games against them than you do against something built specifically to tear you apart on a Go board.

As a side note, you can also chat with them, hang out with them, and there's great value to be had around and off the board from knowing and playing human Go players! As we all know from posting here

Basically my goal is threefold:
1. become stronger at Go
2. enjoy myself while playing, and help others enjoy themselves and get stronger
3. be a human being in the world, not just "a Go player"