Life In 19x19

Awesome, trout. Obviously, I should just learn Korean, Japanese and Chinese (talk to me in twenty years...), but if you're feeling super magnanimous, there was an attempt to track down times for the preliminaries that was a lot harder because we're all monolingual.

@Emeraldemon Where times for the finals are different from times for the preliminaries, the preliminaries are probably more important. There are more games played there.

John Fairbairn wrote:

Even in the international events, the BC Card Cup is 1 hour each and the Samsung 2h. The Nongshim is 1 hour. Only the LG is 3h.

I'm pretty sure the BC Card cup allows 2 hours of play + three periods of 1-minute byo-yomi.

I also think that it's obviously difficult to compare the new generation of playeres with old playeres. That because new players learn to play the game studying the style of older players. For example, like it happened with Cho Chikun and the Korean insei. The boy had probably studied some of Cho Chikun's games and knew how to respond to his style. Nowadays, probably there would be some low ranked pros who could beat (or at least have a good game) against Shusaku. That's because probably 99% of them has studied his games an know how to play against it. I think historical players are so well considered because they have changed the game somehow, like Shusaku did with the fuseki that wasn't his invention, but that he certainly improved. And also with Go Seigen's New Fuseki Theory (along with Kitani Minoru). That doesn't mean old players are weak compared to the new generation. But you would certainly have to give them a time to adapt to new joseki, komi rule, and other recent changes of the game.

RobertJasiek wrote:There are researchers who have redefined go theory significantly.

Having been away for the weekend, I am only now catching up with various threads, so my apologies for coming in late. Could we have the names of two of these researchers, please? Their theoretical achievements should be celebrated as much, at least, as those of the professionals who were putting the ideas into practice.

Best wishes.

TMark wrote:

RobertJasiek wrote:Could we have the names of two of these researchers, please? Their theoretical achievements should be celebrated as much, at least, as those of the professionals who were putting the ideas into practice.

John Conway. Start by reading his On Numbers and Games. (Warning: pure maths!) The book is ground-breaking for two reasons: Numbers are defined more elegantly than by previous attempts still taught at many schools and universities. Combinatorial games (number-like things that can be added and subtracted) are defined in general so that CGT numbers in Go are just a special case of combinatorial game theory.

Contless names of people having contributed to computer go research. Random example: Tristan Cazenave, who, among many other things, studied proof-play.

Researchers around Elwyn Berlekamp. Random example: Bill Spight. It is difficult to access his findings though. Example: He has explained values of approach kos.

Researchers in the rules theory camp: Random example: Ing Chang-ki. He demonstrated the possibility to classify and define objects and terms of Go strategy (although, in most cases, he could not define well by himself).

Experimenting amateurs: They have shown (before programs did the same) that any 3rd line move or above is possible in the opening. Prominent example: the KGS player sum.

Other Go theory research: Random example: Richard Hunter explained how to assess liberties and play basic semeais without kos and without approach defects.

Experimenting amateurs: They have shown (before programs did the same) that any 3rd line move or above is possible in the opening. Prominent example: the KGS player sum.

Coy. sum is RJ is it not? But more to the point, how does this differ from what pros were doing during the New Fuseki era?

And are we to be believe no pro knew what Richard Hunter wrote about liberties or what Bill Spight wrote about kos? The western presentations are new and valuable but that is not the same as discovering.

And, further, although it's debatable, of course, I think most of us make a useful distinction between go theory and go rules theory. One makes us significantly stronger at playing the game, the other does not.

John Fairbairn wrote:how does this differ from what pros were doing during the New Fuseki era?

New Fuseki and decades later amateurs like Zandveld and Colmez tried only a subset of the possible moves: 3-10, 4-10, 3-11, 5-5, 10-10, 9-10 and maybe a few more. KGS players during recent years and then MC programs have tried and justified empirically all first intersections!

And are we to be believe no pro knew what Richard Hunter wrote about liberties

I can't know because never have I seen anything big eyes principles other than the basic nakade liberty count. Hunter has described much more than that. If there was anything related in Asia, it is still hidden to non-Asian language readers.

or what Bill Spight wrote about kos?

All from him about kos was new, AFAIK. If you have access to earlier information from others, please tell us!

The western presentations are new and valuable but that is not the same as discovering.

Sure, and I do mean discovering. (I cannot be sure because I have not specifically searched for counter-proofs if they should exist. Only in case of terms defined by myself (like "ko [in general]"), I am sure.

a useful distinction between go theory and go rules theory. One makes us significantly stronger at playing the game, the other does not.

There is fluent space in between. Low level rules theory like a formal definition of hypothetical-strategy may be entirely useless for improving. High level definitions like of thickness are at the core of becoming stronger. Intermediate level definitions like of ko assist modest improvement provided one is willing to learn on that level of abstraction. (An immediate application of the ko definition is to play only such kos that, with good timing, are related to winning versus losing the game. It is not necessary to learn this advice from the definition - it is possible though. I did not learn that advice from others but had to work it out by myself around 3k-5k level. Now, thanks to the definition, the advice is available easily.)

RobertJasiek wrote:High level definitions like of thickness are at the core of becoming stronger.

This implies something interesting. Either:

1. Professionals already have entirely adequate high level definitions of thickness, in which case the efforts of these 'go researchers' are at best matters of presenting existing material to Westerners, or

2. The work of Go researchers could seriously elevate the strength of professionals.

I think one is plausible enough, so long as we're relaxed about what we call a definition. However, it's your habit to take definition rather strictly.

hyperpape wrote: Either:

There are not just these two extremes.

it's your habit to take definition rather strictly.

Apart from this preference, I will raise the definition of thickness to a higher level of much greater accuracy than before. So, yes,...

The work of Go researchers could seriously elevate the strength of professionals.

...this is correct, although one definition of just one strategic concept alone does not imply "seriously [stronger]" for professionals.

RobertJasiek wrote:...this is correct, although one definition of just one strategic concept alone does not imply "seriously [stronger]" for professionals.

This is interesting. Are you of the opinion that thoroughly researched and carefully compiled literature on, for example, all of thickness, haengma, aji and miai by western mid-dan amateurs could increase the strength of top level professional players?

hyperpape wrote:Either:

1. Professionals already have entirely adequate high level definitions of thickness, in which case the efforts of these 'go researchers' are at best matters of presenting existing material to Westerners, or

2. The work of Go researchers could seriously elevate the strength of professionals.

I think one is plausible enough, so long as we're relaxed about what we call a definition. However, it's your habit to take definition rather strictly.

i am not sure the disjunction is appropriate here. I agree that 1. is plausible enough but this knowledge may not be written anywhere, existing only in fluent (not easily extractable and explainable) form in minds of strong players, spread partly in speech and partly by self study and self discovery

this may sound improbable but i think it is possible and in that case it would indeed be beneficial if someone would precisely define the concept and serve it for use of weaker players. however, i can't decide how much is it possible to define it to catch the essence and be understandable enough, ie. whether it will work as a shortcut to learn the concept compared to the present situation at all

topazg wrote:Are you of the opinion that thoroughly researched and carefully compiled literature on, for example, all of thickness, haengma, aji and miai by western mid-dan amateurs could increase the strength of top level professional players?

Of course. The only requirement is that they want to learn from such sources.

Laman: It may be that professionals have an understanding of thickness etc, but may not necesssarily have sharp definitions that they could write down. But I think that's inconsistent with Robert's position, so I didn't include it in the options.

If it's true that professionals understand the concepts without having to give definitions for them (understanding via examples, backed by reading and experience), then Robert is wrong that these definitions are a necessary condition of becoming strong.

Note also that I didn't even say that giving definitions like Robert wants to is a bad thing. Even if top players don't need to have definitions spelled out, the rest of us might benefit from them. Not everyone learns in the same way.

RobertJasiek wrote:

topazg wrote:Are you of the opinion that thoroughly researched and carefully compiled literature on, for example, all of thickness, haengma, aji and miai by western mid-dan amateurs could increase the strength of top level professional players?

Of course. The only requirement is that they want to learn from such sources.

Do you consider it unlikely / impossible that their understanding of the principles already exceeds that of the literature you are hoping to write / see written by others, but they simply haven't formulated their understanding in writing?

Laman wrote:i can't decide how much is it possible to define it to catch the essence and be understandable enough, ie. whether it will work as a shortcut to learn the concept compared to the present situation at all

A definition of, e.g., thickness is only half the necessary way. It already gives a lot of new insights (like, as mentioned, distinguishing better from worse moves in the neighbourhood). The other half is a collection and explanation of all possible uses of thickness, especially during the middle game. This is still mostly an open research topic. Maybe all important uses are floating around somewhere in the literature but nobody seems to have compiled them all at one place so far.

hyperpape wrote:If it's true that professionals understand the concepts without having to give definitions for them

They understand only part of the concepts - not all if them. Otherwise they could have explained better why good joseki follow-ups near thickness are the usually best moves.

Robert is wrong that these definitions are a necessary condition of becoming strong.

I do not say so. I think that everybody able to read and understand definitions (due to their text alone or due to the text together with applying examples) can improve much faster than from seeing nothing but examples, for which the probablity is great that they do not represent as much / completely as the general definition. To create the contents of such definitions, I had to see 10,000 examples for each topic and then do additional research. With the definitions, ca. 10 (sometimes 1, sometimes 100) examples for each suffice. Learning can be accelerated by a factor of 100 to 1,000 because the reader does not need to repeat the effort of finding the best possible generalisation and doing research.