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My understanding is that the question was debated at that time. It was not just that Takahashi refused to capture the ko stone and fill the ko, as the referee, Iwasa Kei, directed him to do.
According to Iwasa's own account in Kido 1929-01 (i.e. very shortly after the game) there is no indication that he made a ruling. He did say he had expected Takahashi to connect and that he was surprised when they went on playing dame. But as the game was not agreed to be finished he evidently did not make a ruling. He may have done so eventually (and we can probably safely infer what he might have then said) but he was left betwattled by Kubomatsu who came over and claimed it was a void game.
Both players maintained their different viewpoints, which were published in the Oteai Bulletin immediately after the game. There was no talk of passes or obligation to play or other modern constructs. Segoe based his claim on custom. Takahashi relied more on a gut feeling that it was illogical.
Baron Okura made an
administrative ruling, not a go ruling. He was fed up with petty squabbles among players. And it wasn't just East-West politics, incidentally. Segoe and Shusai didn't get on, and Takahashi was the younger brother of Shusai's wife.
But Segoe didn't let it go. In the 1930-01 issue of Kido he presented a long article which he said was based on logical thought rather than trying to warm up cold ashes. I translated this in 2016 and have a note in my file that is headed: "Translation (copyright 2016) by John Fairbairn. Public use allowed only on the L19 go forum." That suggest to me that I may have posted it here already, if someone wants to try and find it.
If it's not here, I'm not going to post it now because there will be too much work creating diagrams, but the following introduction will indicate what Segoe's claimed intentions were.
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After last autumn’s problem arose, I tried giving some thought to various situations, and it was rather interesting. It may even be possible to create some sort of “constitution” [a pun on his name]for this but I just tried visualising actual scenarios. I am not venturing an attempt at special pleading on my own behalf. This is a disinterested opinion.
In go it is not possible to infer anything about the whole game on the basis of just one part of the board. The outcome of a problem in a corner of the board may be determined by the size of ko threats, and if neither side has any ko threats, a ten-thousand-year ko simply has to be regarded as seki.
He backed this up be demonstrating positions with double ko sekis, so he was at that stage not arguing about this particular game directly, but rather was trying to turn it into something theoretical. As with all logic, the destination depends where you start from, and his starting point included the assumption that a triple ko was a void game. He made no mention, thohgh, of passes or obligations.
As a practising pro, he was also mindful of real life:
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In other words, if White gives up the lower right corner, he loses by 3 points, but if he allows the seki in the lower left to break it is jigo. Because this is a problem of counting, which you can solve by calm reflection, although it is very easy to go astray as it involves giving up something large to rescue something small.
Hw as also a man of often strong opinions. They included this one:
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Filling in dame one by one is the height of stupidity.
That's one reason he's one of my favourites!