Life In 19x19

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:07 am**

It is true that Robert can be very opaque when writing on this forum, but rest assured the books are not like that.

Yes, he is stubborn about listening to corrections of his English, and the message some of us get from that may be that he can be as closed-minded about go. Also, as I've said, I'm certain he's also talking out of his donkey when he says pros can become stronger from his books, though that's a matter of opinion. Robert also way overestimates the newness of his discoveries. That's not opinion. E.g. he claims to have something new to say about the difference between sente and initiative. On the very day I read that I had an old Kido on my desk with an article on "The Three Kinds of Sente" (admittedly it was only written by a pro

). But we can still give Robert credit for working hard to discover them for himself. He is not as complete as he claims, e.g. his forcing moves section missed the chance for a list: the difference between kikashi, kiki, kikashidoku and uchidoku). But who ever is complete?

Yet all that has nothing to do directly with the book, which you must judge as if you knew nothing at all about the author. (Mind you, what flows from that is that Robert could usefully desist from justifying his book here and let it talk for itself.)

I still claim his Joseki Vol. 2 is a valuable and accessible addition to the western go library and well worth buying if you are in go for the long haul.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:17 am**

Magicwand wrote:i am sure you wouldnt purchase a book written by 1 kyu claiming that they have something you can learn.

I have bought Mathematical Go Endgames, which is written by a 10 kyu, and I would buy any book written by weak players provided it teaches me enough to justify the price. Some 5 kyu to 2 dan players have taught me more than a lot of such professionals up to 9p having spent more time teaching me.

i want a book that is clear and correct.

My book is both. (Eh, except apparently for the pronunciation of haengma.)

from what i see in this forum i have a feeling that your book i nither.

Forum discussion is not book quality standard.

you are claiming that you teach better than professionals who studied go all their life.

I claim that I do teach SOME things much better than what I have seen from professionals so far.

if your are not strong enough to start with how can you write a book that will teach professionals?

By first gaining knowledge, understanding and (in some cases) doing research to raise my level to a point sufficient for teaching. Let me emphasise again: Being able to teach stronger players about SOME aspects does not imply that would have their level at OTHER aspects or the great speed with which they read and calculate.

i have seen your ko theory paper which has nothing to do with getting stronger and tedious as hell.

This is more or less right. It is a research result paper written in a style suitable for other researchers.

i am really surprised that there are postive reviews on some of your book.

You make the mistake to equate book teaching with research texts, rules texts or with playing strength. Not surprisingly, you are very surprised. A book is written for a different readership: players wishing to become stronger.

IMO only book you are qualifed to write is for ddk players at best.

Would you say that all other authors (especially the stronger players) who fail to or hardly explain strategy and analysis methods in their joseki books are better qualified?

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:20 am**

I still claim his Joseki Vol. 2 is a valuable and accessible addition to the western go library

but not volume 1?

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:35 am**

but not volume 1?

I did a favourable review of it, so I'd tend to include it. But I'd be surprised if many people who just bought Vol. 2 were seriously handicapped by lack of Vol. 1, since Robert helpfully recapitulates the essential information. Get both if you can afford them. Get Vol. 2 if only one is affordable. If you already have Vol. 1 and were disappointed at its (deliberately) low level, don't let that put you off Vol. 2, which is a big step forward.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:38 am**

Tryphon wrote:I suspect RJasiek to be a mathematician

I am a hobby mathematician in go rules theory and sometimes go theory. My annotations do not always follow strict maths annotations because I prefer an annotation style for which some interested players without strict maths education have at least a reasonable chance to follow the contents and because I can understand my own research faster if using a semi-formal annotation style.

and likely an algebrist

I consider rules maths to be a field of its own.

I'll buy immediately the 2 volumes, even if I'm afraid to face the Bourbaki's "Éléments de go" :)

You can skip the ca. 34 pages with rather abstract theory. The other parts do not become more difficult on the maths level than elementary school. Even the theory chapters are not an "Introduction to Linear Algebra" (books with that title are meant to be understood after 3 years ;) ) but still reasonably easy if the reader invests about as much effort as needed to do basic endgame calculations.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:58 am**

John Fairbairn wrote: he claims to have something new to say about the difference between sente and initiative

Of course, that is not new! Probably it is new to many kyu players though that there is such a difference at all. This is caused by many players' use of the two words as if both meant the same: sente. This excessive confusion has also hurt my related understanding until about last year, when I finally noticed the difference clearly for the first time. Before I had applied both concepts but with a nebulous, foggy view. (One of the Yutopian books, I forgot the title, explains a related thing: sente or gote of the next move considered together with sente or gote of the follow-up move.)

admittedly it was only written by a pro

LOL.

He is not as complete as he claims, e.g. his forcing moves section missed the chance for a list: the difference between kikashi, kiki, kikashidoku and uchidoku)

I hope I have not claimed to be the most complete in all chapters of the book! The Forcing chapter is not meant to be complete. Certainly I would like to see your explanations of kiki, kikashidoku and uchidoku (or possibly their msytery dissolved by a simple translation).

But who ever is complete?

It is actually impossible for such a broad topic. I had to drop some advanced and demanding chapters (like about the analysis method Iterative Averages) to avoid a delay of another year.

***

What I really wonder is whether Asian literature has made any (or even many?) previous efforts of relating influence to territorial values. The only piece I have seen so far is the few pages in Go World 41.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 3:15 am**

CnP wrote:but not volume 1?

Simplifying, Vol. 1 is for those still regularly making mistakes in choosing the right pincer, approach move or extension. This sounds trivially basic but I see low dans and sometimes 4 dans still making major mistakes there. It requires motivation to consider the global context and, e.g., choose a pincer that supprts also a weak group elsewhere.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 4:15 am**

Simplifying, Vol. 1 is for those still regularly making mistakes in choosing the right pincer, approach move or extension.

sounds very useful for me - 1&2 it is then.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 11:11 am**

What I really wonder is whether Asian literature has made any (or even many?) previous efforts of relating influence to territorial values. The only piece I have seen so far is the few pages in Go World 41.

I have two Japanese books devoted to the subject, and others which mention it in part. I have talked about them before on the forums, so I'm not going to go into it again.* But one book uses the technique of counting stones in a wall, giving tips for which stones to exclude, and it encompasses also walls that go round corners. From this you get a count that represents a territory equivalent, using a short equation. It uses specific phrases like "Black's thickness is worth 36 points."

As you say, it is very hard to re-invent the wheel. But not just because of the intellectual effort involved. It's usually hard to be original because someone, somewhere, has already found the wheel before you. And some pros have even added engines to theirs.

Although I'm not prepared to dig out the books again, I will mention one article, from Kido Vol. 38, No.9, August 1962, simply because it is within hand's reach of where I am sitting. It is called "The territory of thickness." It was by Sakauchi Junei.

I'm afraid even Robert Jasiek is not an original. Sakauchi was the Japanese Jasiek. He was an amateur 5-dan who wrote several papers on the mathematics of go, and indeed he is politely credited with "contributions" to miai theory (around 1955). But what this means specifically is not that he helped any pros to become stronger, just that he was apparently the first one to tease out the exact values of moves such as 4 and 11/16 and 6 and 3/32. Of course, pros - shock horror - still make do with "almost 5" and "a bit over 6". No doubt you'll claim they are making faulty "strategic" decisions, but I don't think they are losing any sleep over it. (This is reminiscent of a certain paper on ko dame, is it not?)

Sakauchi even sounds like Jasiek, with his love of definitions. His first sentence in the paper at hand is "Thickness is uncompleted territory." He likewise insists his way is "correct" (one heading is "Counting territory correctly"). This paper too has number-fixated phrases like "The thickness formed by Black's five stones is worth 10 points". He says things like: [of the prospective territory of a two-stone formation] "The territory is 22 or 23 points. Each stone is therefore worth 11 or 12 points". He talks about an evaluation in which "a 4.5 point territory cancels out an opponent's 4.5 point territory." The six-page article is also peppered with diagrams that use crosses to delineate prospective territory just as in Robert's book, but it also uses triangles and slashes to add a layer of meaning (as in p-territory, q-territory....).

So, Robert, please accept two things. (1) Your English is not as good as you think it is. (2) You are not as original as you think you are. I'm sure these two points apply to most of us, but most of us prefer to shy at the coconut, not be the coconut

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 12:39 pm**

Guys, speaking purely as a non-admin member who started this thread, could you please take the ad hominems someplace else? Also, perhaps another thread might be best for discussions about 11/16 of a point when this one is about advice for beginners.
This is probably the most serious ( for me ) thread that I have written on L19 in months, and I'm hoping to field some useful answers.
Thanks
JB

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:30 pm**

Joaz Banbeck wrote:Guys, speaking purely as a non-admin member who started this thread, could you please take the ad hominems someplace else? Also, perhaps another thread might be best for discussions about 11/16 of a point when this one is about advice for beginners.
This is probably the most serious ( for me ) thread that I have written on L19 in months, and I'm hoping to field some useful answers.
Thanks
JB

OK. Let's get down to cases.

Here is a game that was previously discussed here. Black's play in the top right corner is horrible. Black makes bad shape and reading errors. But that is not all that we can say. I have added some brief comments to stimulate discussion. It would be valuable to get some comments by DDKs about both the play and the comments. What makes sense to you? What doesn't? What do you agree with? What do you disagree with? The goal is to help us to help you.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 3:37 pm**

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 4:33 pm**

Move 14:

Mnem: Whenever I see this played I scream at the players that 33 is the vital point. I doubt that this is the correct method

IMO the 3-3 is overconcentrated here. Black's actual play is better. It either walls off the corner nicely, or cuts White in two.

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 5:24 pm**

RobertJasiek wrote:
Magicwand wrote:stronger than 19k? does that include 4dan or stronger?

It includes players of ALL ranks incl. 9 pro dan. While I think that most professionals and strong amateurs have a subconscious knowledge (or they might say "intuition") of most contents of the book, most could improve their decision making (and teaching) if they did learn the analytical side.

Some contents of the book reveals new research results. Anybody can learn something new from them simply because they are new.

...

Book quality is not proportional to playing strength.

It interesting to see that someone can create a different mental model of the game than is communicated through traditional teaching. From what I can tell, a lot of traditional teaching comes from experiences teaching inseis. But there are some problems with that:

1. Inseis usually start as children. So just from age alone, the way they learn and the options they have for learning are different than for adults.

2. They are both self-selected and selected by others, so pros teaching inseis are starting with students who appear to have some potential to begin with.

3. They have a lot of dedicated time to put into studying go. This can hide a lot of inefficiences; on the other hand, there could be some techniques that only work if some significant amount of time is available. Consider this anecdote from An Younggil 8p talking about Park Younghun:

"When he was an insei, his teacher commanded his students to play 300 game records a week, and all students thought it’s impossible except him. He said it’s easy because he can do 50 games each day, and he can even have a day off."

So for those of us who don't have the luxury of a) being a child b) having a lot of innate talent or c) having no other personal or professional responsibilites other than studying go, what is to be done? I'm not sure. I don't think there is any easy path, but if there are some heuristics that can capture the low-hanging fruit, that may help.

I wish the Robert the best of luck with his books, but the proof will come if and when a lot his students and/or readers credit these ideas for their own improvement, and it takes time for such evidence to accumulate...

Posted: **Wed Jun 01, 2011 5:49 pm**

Joaz Banbeck wrote:1) Try to stay connected
2) Separate him

Just this. I don't think it's practical to create a complete top-down decision procedure, but if you can teach a player to ask themselves before every move, "Is there a way for me to cut my opponent and stay connected?" they will already avoid lots of the DDK mistakes. Obviously this doesn't apply to every situation, but when you have a move that does both these things, it's usually a good move, I think.

Life In 19x19

The goals of joseki

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