A question for the history experts:

Many years ago an article was posted postulating that prisoner counting may have been a method used to determine the result of a game using stone scoring:

http://senseis.xmp.net/?PrisonerCountingForStoneScoring

Just wondering if anyone (Mr. Fairbairn, or others) could point to any evidence that this method had indeed been used to determine the score?

Thanks

An afterthought:

Mr. Jasiek,

In the prisoner countng method that you postulate, wouldn't a player be penalized a point for each stone they play into an opponent's territory that cannot live? In other words:

1. Opponent plays a stone in my territory
2. I fill one stone in my own territory.

Wouldn't this give me an extra point? In the end I'll remove his stone as a point for me whereas the stone I played in my territory doesnt affect the prisoner count.

I understand that at the end of the game I would give a pass stone (like AGA rules) but earlier in the game couldn't I just fill in my own territory since we are not counting that anyways?

In other words, is the idea of 'prisoner counting' really equal to stone scoring?

For the history, you have already seen The History of Go Rules, Chen Zuyuan, in which he describes Tang Rules.

Concerning filling of territory, if the players make an equal number of plays in a territory region, or plays are compensated by pass stones and the global number of plays is equal, the score is not changed. I did a proof for the equal number of plays in a territory region many years ago (also Elwyn Berlekamp mentioned the related proposition). For "plays are compensated by pass stones and the global number of plays is equal", see a proof such as for the AGA Rules' equivalence. For the prisoner count being equal to the stone score, see my proof on rec.games.go, which is copied on Sensei's Library. - So the answer to your question is: no. Note that prisoner counting for stone scoring uses the rule "White makes the last pass; this is 1 extra pass if necessary".

Yes, it is. The easy way to see that is to imagine the board filled with all stones except for the eyes necessary for scoring plus enough prisoners for each player so that the total number of Black stones is equal to the total number of White stones. That means that the number of Black stones on the board minus the number of White stones on the board equals the number of White prisoners minus the number of Black prisoners. It does not matter how you get to that result, whether your opponent plays a stone in your territory, so that it eventually adds to the prisoner count, or instead plays inside his own territory, so that it adds to the number of stones on the board. All same same.

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Ahh, ok - maybe I wrongly assumed one thing:

In prisoner counting for stone scoring, stones are not removed at the end JUST becuase it is agreed they are dead (like Japanese rules)? They would need to be captured out using my stones to capture them? If that is the case I understand.

It is not like Japanese rules where playing unnecessarily in the opponent's territory would be a loss of a point?

Chen Zuyuan doesnt mention the idea of prisoner counting as a method of stone scoring- is it still at this point a matter of speculation whether or not they would have used this method centuries ago?

Finally, am I right to say that when using stone scoring with no special counting method (just literally counting all stones on the board after filling all possible points (leaving eyes spaces / applying group tax, as it was originally), that it doesnt matter if equal moves are played? In fact, the simple fact of filling up the board will determine who is the last to play and that if black plays first and last it wouldnt 'change' the score? In other words is it most likely that original go players just played to fill and did not need 'equal moved played'?

Do Chinese rules / Area scoring require equal moves? (I do not think so, right?) Don't they just play out the dame and whoever gets the last moves gets it, no need for equal moves?

Is it just territory counting (a la AGA) that requires it in order to be equal to area scoring?

Sorry for the barrage of questions! I'd love to be sure I have all of this finally sorted out in my head!

correct (not required) and correct (for AGA territory counting).

Yes.



Yes.



Yes.



Yes.



Presumably.

The oldest known rules text does not specifically mention stones on the board, so the stones used for scoring could be interpreted as captured stones. Still, that seems highly unlikely.



Yes, and the fact that some ancient texts suggest that each player played the same number of stones raises the question of whether stone scoring was used in such cases. The oldest known scored game records used territory scoring. It is quite possible that both territory and stone scoring coexisted in China in very ancient times. Territory scoring did not originate in Japan. (John Fairbairn has suggested coexistence, but I do not know how far back he thinks that was.)

If the oldest form of go scoring was the number of captured stones, that could explain both stone scoring and counting territory plus captives as later variants.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.