Understanding

[schawipp]

(big question) How effective are words in this case?

I think words are effective in describing what has happened in an understandable manner. Example: You missed to protect that weakness in time, so white invaded and - while you were fixing the cut - turned the left side of your group into a ko.

However words seem not that effective in helping to find out what's going to happen in future. In the above example a beginner might understand the explanation and might avoid the very mistake in future. However there are almost never exactly the same situations recurring in Go.

• In the next game there might be another type of weakness to protect. The question is how do I identify all kinds of possible weaknesses in advance?
• There might be the same local situation but the board situation would allow sacrificing that "left side of your group" as the outside strength created during this process would allow to establish a big moyo etc., i.e. how can I foresee all the relevant variations and possible consequences of a local decision in advance?

These abilities cannot be teached just by "words", you need to encounter such situations, get experience with them and finally adjust your "pattern recognition", which is a rather lengthy process.

In short, words can describe things you are doing wrong over and over again but they can not show how to do it right.

[Bantari]

(big question) How effective are words in this case?

I think words are effective in describing what has happened in an understandable manner. Example: You missed to protect that weakness in time, so white invaded and - while you were fixing the cut - turned the left side of your group into a ko.

However words seem not that effective in helping to find out what's going to happen in future. In the above example a beginner might understand the explanation and might avoid the very mistake in future. However there are almost never exactly the same situations recurring in Go.

• In the next game there might be another type of weakness to protect. The question is how do I identify all kinds of possible weaknesses in advance?
• There might be the same local situation but the board situation would allow sacrificing that "left side of your group" as the outside strength created during this process would allow to establish a big moyo etc., i.e. how can I foresee all the relevant variations and possible consequences of a local decision in advance?

These abilities cannot be teached just by "words", you need to encounter such situations, get experience with them and finally adjust your "pattern recognition", which is a rather lengthy process.

In short, words can describe things you are doing wrong over and over again but they can not show how to do it right.

True.
However, contrasting the two methods we were discussing with Ed in the past, words can convey more meaning than no words.

Example, rather simplistic, but still...

Case 1.
Master slaps the stone on the board and says: "This is a good move. There is where you should have played in this position. Now you know."
Meaning: In this particular position, this exact move is best. In similar positions, who knows, maybe too.
Lesson learned: Hmm...

Case 2.
Master slaps the stone on the board and explains: "See, dude, you have a weak group there, and another one here, so you might want to do something about protecting at least one of them, but best to look hard for a move that protects both. A good strategy to consider is to defend by attacking - like here, he also has some bad shape, and by poking at it you can gain time to fix both your weak spots. This is why the move I just slapped on the board is so good."
Meaning: when you have weak groups, you need to pay attention to strengthening them, and sometimes you can do it by attacking, so keep an eye out for his weak spots too.
Lesson learned: In general, pay attention to weaknesses on both sides.
Or something like that...

I think you can extrapolate much more from the teaching method in Case 2 and it does help you react better to what happens in the future, although not really to predict it. Predicting the future is a risky business in general, and I am sort-of glad it does not work that well. Or Go would not be fun at all.

But I understand what you mean. It comes back to the taiji example we had in the other thread and the questions I posted (viewtopic.php?p=173742#p173742). The problem is, I think, that while you are right, you eventually *will* acquire the necessary pattern recognition skills, until then you will grapple in the dark, without a clue what is good and why is it good.

When more words are given and better explanation provided, this does not prevent you from acquiring the same pattern recognition skills. But you might be able to acquire them in a more focussed, and so faster way. And also, you will not be "blind and def" throughout the process, but will have some kind of idea what is going on and what are you looking for.

[EdLee]

Hi schawipp,

The original question in this case was about taiji, but here I use the Zen monk river example.
(I'll return to the taiji situation later.) To the question, "What's it like to jump into the river?"
Words are completely inadequate for someone who has never been in water.
To "understand" what it's like, one must do it -- jump into the river.

Your Go example brings up a good point, which is, you're actually referring to
different levels of understanding:

• We finish a game, we have not reviewed it yet. Let's call this understanding, (a).
• A good teacher reviews the game, and "explains" to us what we've done wrong,
  why certain moves are good, and why some are bad.
  We listen. Let's call this level of understanding, (b).
  Remember an understanding is a configuration of the neural system (plus other body parts).
  How different is (a) from (b) ? This is a big question.
• Luckily, Go is empirical. We have actual data and we can look at the statistics.
  In the future, if we continue to make similar mistakes reviewed in that game,
  then it turns out, maybe (a) is not very different from (b).
• Again, we see a continuum. For example, in one extreme case, we have a student
  who, after only one review, stops making the similar mistakes forever.
  At the other end of the extreme, maybe there is a student who,
  no matter how many reviews of the same mistakes over and over,
  never stops making them. Then we have students in between.
  Maybe after seeing these mistakes pointed out 10 times is enough, for someone.
  Maybe after seeing these mistakes pointed out 50 times is enough, for another person.
  It's another continuum.

[schawipp]

Hi Bantari,

Words can convey more meaning than no words

I agree with that and like your examples. However the problems are often more "fundamental" than a teacher - who may be already plaing in the Dan levels himself - could imagine:

"See, dude, you have a weak group there, and another one here, so you might want to do something about protecting at least one of them, but best to look hard for a move that protects both. A good strategy to consider is to defend by attacking - like here, he also has some bad shape, and by poking at it you can gain time to fix both your weak spots. This is why the move I just slapped on the board is so good."

I think the relation "a move which protects two of my weak groups and at the same time harrasses a third weak group of my opponent is a good move" should be very obvious - even to an almost complete beginner. The more fundamental problem is that - during an actual game - there is no one telling me that these two groups still have weaknesses which are now becoming urgent enough to take care of. A dan-level teacher may find it pretty obvious that these groups are weak and can not imagine that a beginner still struggles in recognizing that obvious fact.

In an actual game I tend to follow rather "my own plans" , i. e. spending much time by reading out in detail if a complicated invasion sequence at upper right side may still work or not or if I can cut off these nice and juicy looking center stones. I might try getting the initiative by such doubtful actions, the opponent defends in sente and then - BOOOM - plays on my severe weakness (which I didn't recognize at all up to that moment...).

That's what is actually happening in many of my games.

Your teaching example above is good but would not really help to overcome my blind spots. However I agree that the teacher can help to bring some more structure into the thinking process (I am actually thinking of writing down a 'thinking sequence recipy' on a paper and follow it move by move, which may be cumbersome but probably helpful...). Also, if obvious mistakes are pointed out over and over again, it may have some positive effect on the long run.

IMHO the most positive effect a teacher can have occurs in following situation:

• I lose a game, make a review on my own and blame my loss to one or more specific mistakes (wherof I mostly think, that they could have been easily avoided...).
• I discuss my review with a teacher.
• The teacher puts the focus of attention on some complete different sequences in the game, where I thought I played quite ok, while they turn out to be the really decisive mistakes.

In these situations I think it will take a very long time to find these issues without a stronger teacher by myself (if possible at all). Thus, again, I would say that words can be very effective in describing what went wrong, however this can be invaluably important to initiate new thinking processes for the student.

[wineandgolover]

Great thread Ed. And I like the monk/river analogy.

Personally, I remember joseki much better after mis-playing them, getting punished, then either looking up or being taught the proper sequence. I can't think of many joseki I learned just by reading a book.

So, the experience of playing the joseki ("how did I get in this river?") plus the pain of misplaying ("Damn, that was a sharp rock on the bottom!"), plus the education ("this is how you elementary back stroke") combine to help me remember.

I look forward to seeing where this thread goes.

[EdLee]

A dan-level teacher may find it pretty obvious that these groups are weak
and can not imagine that a beginner still struggles in recognizing that obvious fact.

Hi schawipp,

Remember understanding is a continuum.

Examples:

• ~20k - 10k -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• SDK's -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• Low dans -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• Mid dans -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• High dans to pros -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.

Understanding of strong and weak groups is not digital; it is not an either-or situation;
it is not either "I understand weak groups" or "I don't understand weak groups".

It's a continuum. For example, a mid-dan person can fail to recognize a group is in danger,
but it's "obvious" to a high-dan or pro -- this is how a 3-stone game is possible between them.

Teaching level is also a continuum.

When you mention a "dan-level teacher," that is a huge spectrum.
I take it that you mean the teacher's Go playing skill is dan level, which is
in itself a very big continuum (from 1 dan to pro).

The teacher's Go teaching level is another matter all together.

A teacher who "understands" a student's understanding of weak groups is one level.
A second teacher who does not understand it is another level.

In these situations I think it will take a very long time to find these issues without a stronger teacher by myself (if possible at all).

I think you're right.

[John Fairbairn]

So, the experience of playing the joseki ("how did I get in this river?") plus the pain of misplaying ("Damn, that was a sharp rock on the bottom!"), plus the education ("this is how you elementary back stroke") combine to help me remember.

I don't think this is quite what Ed is implying. Because he is referring to taiji and because he put "understanding" in quotes, I suspect he means there is no goal of understanding. By following the correct path you just end up "doing" something (but because this is oriental, mystic, hippy, enlightened or however you want to describe it, you achieve that by wuwei - "not doing"). It seems to follow that if you define an explicit goal ("remembering") you are already on the wrong path.

An example I like is from my student days. A fellow student, doing a PhD and so obviously bright, had a great and, I thought, irrational grudge against society because he was born a year or two earlier than the rest of us. He therefore missed out on a welfare innovation introduced for toddlers just after the war. This was orange juice in a bottle. He blamed missing this for the fact he was very short.

Now I have no idea whether free orange juice makes you grow, but I am quite prepared to accept that it does you some good, and that it definitely can be very handy to have it in a bottle, especially in post-war conditions. There was an explicit goal (health) and this was a rational way of achieving it. I consider this an RJ approach.

Yet, despite the rationality, I and, I'm sure, nearly all of my generation gave up drinking orange juice from bottles and even as children went through the tedious, difficult, messy operation of learning to peel an orange. We didn't even get much practice, since an orange was usually only an annual treat in the bottom of the Christmas stocking. I can still remember the awe we children felt at the way some adults (the 9-dans) could peel an orange so that the peel came away as a single strip.

But we persevered, and the situation now is that we can unthinkingly (the real meaning of wuwei, I think) peel an orange and suck out the juice and - this is an important point - unthinkingly enjoy it and unthinkingly imbibe its health benefits.

Nowadays, of course, you can get your orange juice from a carton, and even get a choice of "with bits" and "without bits". But think of all the unintended benefits we got from learning to peel an orange that you miss with a carton: dexterity, biological insights, learning to peel other fruit, the sheer joy of making a mess we weren't punished for... And instead of orange DDKs we unthinkingly became orange pros.

I tend to rail against the contrasting RJ approach to go not because it fails but because it sets explicit sub-goals and makes achieving them the sole criterion. It's the go equivalent of putting orange juice in a bottle in grim post-war conditions - works (though only in the sense of achieving a sub-goal) but is no fun.

Peeling the orange of go is messy at first, but is fun. Managing eventually to do it is a more satisfying kind of fun. Being able to do it unthinkingly while focusing on something else is unthinkingly fun - the most sublime kind. Too much go teaching cuts out this fun element, except perhaps the kiddywinkle kind. In any case, the burden of expectations placed on western go teaching is far too high because too many people want go in cartons now.

In any case, learning to peel an orange is something you can properly only do by yourself.

[Uberdude]

I don't know if there is one for peeling an orange, but there is a TED talk for tieing your shoes .

http://www.ted.com/talks/terry_moore_ho ... anguage=en

[wineandgolover]

In any case, learning to peel an orange is something you can properly only do by yourself.

Is this what you mean, John?

Tangerine Man medium.jpg (43.96 KiB) Viewed 12908 times

[oca]

...

Remember understanding is a continuum.

Examples:

• ~20k - 10k -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• SDK's -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• Low dans -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• Mid dans -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.
• High dans to pros -- have their understanding of strong v. weak groups.

...

I remember the first time someone invaded my hoshi on a 3-3 point... that was a revelation...
With that new knowledge, I cannot resist to do invasion myself "as soon as possible".

After a few ( ) loses, I finally ... understood ... that it was not that great to invade hoshi immediatly,
so I went for another rule which was "if hoshi has two larges extensions, invade" and then I saw that a two spaces extension form hoshi can still be invaded successfuly, and then, saw that there is even possibilities with a small castle formation, with probs and so on...

It seems to me that we should do things "just before it's too late" but here again... every level has its own understanding on when it's still possible to do something on given board/position and when it's not possible anymore.

That's why I like this game so much... we never stop to (re)discover the game....

[skydyr]

Regarding "that guy trying to make pro in golf", it's not going so well is the general consensus.

His site is http://thedanplan.com/ and he's a bit more than halfway through, with 4500 or so hours left. He has conceded mistakes, like spending his first few months just doing short putts, but I'm not convinced he will make it. There is some discrepancy between what he claims as his handicap (sort of like a rank) and his tournament performance, and on the golfing forum I look at, most people seem to think he wont make it (http://thesandtrap.com/t/45853/the-dan-plan-10-000-hours-to-become-a-pro-golfer).

On a related note, there was this article on Slate recently about the fallacy of the 10,000 hours thing, stating that while it was helpful, it was far from the most important thing or the greatest predictor of success in a field: http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2014/09/malcolm_gladwell_s_10_000_hour_rule_for_deliberate_practice_is_wrong_genes.html

[Bill Spight]

On the 10,000 hours idea:

That idea has a long vintage, with some variations. When I first heard it, it was about becoming an expert. Now, there are many professions where experts can earn a good living, but sports is not one of them. To be a pro golfer you need to be a very good expert.

Edit: I see that the Slate article references a 1993 study. I first heard that it takes around 9,000 hours to become an expert in the late 1960s.

[Knotwilg]

I'm following expertinayear.com where a British table tennis coach tries to get a beginner friend into the top 250. While being less dependent than "making a living", becoming an expert in a competitive motoric skill in just one year still remains very tough. We're into october now and I remain skeptical (but sympathetic). In such a short time frame I believe one should concentrate on the things that make a difference in daily competition, rather than the big picture. Both coach and guinea pig are investing a year of their life into it, which is admirable.

[EdLee]

So, the experience of playing the joseki ("how did I get in this river?") plus the pain of misplaying ("Damn, that was a sharp rock on the bottom!"), plus the education ("this is how you elementary back stroke") combine to help me remember.

I don't think this is quite what Ed is implying. Because he is referring to taiji and because he put "understanding" in quotes, I suspect he means there is no goal of understanding.

The goals discussion is interesting, it's meta-,
and I was not (consciously) thinking about it at the start of this thread.
Of course, it's a very big and deep topic.

The river story has some connections to Putting oneself in someone's shoes .

[EdLee]

that was a revelation...
With that new knowledge, I cannot resist to...
After a few ( ) loses, I finally ... understood ...
so I went for another rule...
It seems to me that we should do things...
every level has its own understanding...

Hi oca, very nice.