I see, I just didn't get that before. I think the reason they are organized like that is half because it helps teach reading, and half because it helps with your intuition and knowledge.



I agree that it strong players didn't get strong by growing new nerves in their brain that lets them think faster, but I would argue that they have taught their brain to use computation power for reading that used to be distracted or unfocused when playing go.



intuition is important (as I have said a couple times already) I still do not believe it is the main point of life and death, or as important as good reading.

I agree with you that players should know these basic shapes, but you quickly (for some value of quickly) reach a point where you know all of them. I think this should be around AGA 5d, because I'm around AGA 5-6d on a good day and I know just about all of these shapes. I realize that some people who are so strong don't know those shapes, and I agree with you that they should learn them. But once you reach that point, it's really important to practice reading weird shapes, and if you haven't started doing it by then I suspect it will be hard to pick up.

Alright, while I was doing some life and death problems I came across some examples which I think will help demonstrate the point I was trying to make regarding recognizing common shapes.

Here are a few go problems that can be solved more or less immediately by someone who has a decent knowledge of basic life and death, that I think would take significantly longer to read out otherwise. Especially if these groups arise after several moves of reading, instantly recognizing the status is going to be very helpful.

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$W
$$ ---------------------------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X O O . . |
$$ | . . . . . X . X . X X X . O . X O . . |
$$ | . . . O . . . . O O O X X X . X . O . |
$$ | . . . . . . O . . . . O X O . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . O O . . X . X . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |[/go]

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$W
$$ -----------
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . X . O . |
$$ . . X O . O |
$$ . . X O . . |
$$ . . X O . . |
$$ . . X X X . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |[/go]

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$W
$$ -----------
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . |
$$ . . X O . . |
$$ . . X O . O |
$$ . . X X O . |
$$ . . . . X . |
$$ . . . X . . |
$$ . . . . . . |[/go]

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$W
$$ --------------
$$ . . . . . . . |
$$ . . . O X . . |
$$ . O . O X . . |
$$ . . . X X . . |
$$ . . O . O X . |
$$ . . . . O O . |
$$ . . . . . . . |
$$ . . . . . . . |[/go]

Sure, none of these are particularly difficult to read out when they're right in front of you, but what if one of these is the result of 6-7 moves worth of reading? Even if you can read it out in theory, saving 15 minutes of time on your clock is going to help quite a lot.

I don't think there's anything wrong with Time's premise that knowing raw information such as is presented in Davies' Life and Death is a valuable asset. Don't forget that the process of learning such shapes to the point of really knowing them necessarily involves reading. While it may be possible to memorize such information, what is being memorized is the result of one's reading. Knowing the results of shapes cold, as Shaddy puts it, is only possible with significant reading ability. Having such known results, allows one to use them as the end point of one's reading during a game. Seems like an advantage to me, both as a time-saver and because it shortens the tree allowing one possessing the knowledge to start reading earlier. Even beginners do something similar by learning things such as how a nakade works.

_________________
Patience, grasshopper.

This example proves my point better that I could ever hope to.
In the situation you described:
IF you can read but not recognize shapes, you can see those positions and try to read them out.
If you can recognize shapes but not read, you are majorly screwed.

This proves that reading is more important right?

In what world is someone going to memorize all these shapes and be unable to read them out when the answer is known? The fact is, knowing the answer is 90% of the battle. Knowing what moves are sente against various groups makes it infinitely easier to find double threats.

For example, I know that if I have a first line descent on the long side against an L+2 group, I know that it is a ko. Knowing this, if the descent also threatens to profit on the other side, I am in business. However, even if I can in theory read out and the descent threatens a ko, it's going to be pretty difficult for me to find that move over the board if I don't already know it. Given that you know the answer is ko, I think even a 5kyu or weaker could find the ko. Without knowing that the descent threatens the corner, though, I think one would have to be very strong to see the move as a double threat.

I was referring to the situation you described, where you needed to read 6-7 moves to get to the shape. Obviously if you are already at the shape on the board, either method of determination works fine.

I still can't see how you are reasonably arriving at this conclusion. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems from earlier in the thread that you even agree that that pruning branches removes substantially more time from how long it takes you to figure out the answer to a life and death problem on the board than calculating variations.

Assuming this observation is correct, then under what definition of "important" could calculation possibly be more important than pruning branches by simmple recognition?

Ultimately the two skills feed off of each other, but if you just want to boil it down to the absolute simplest case, then given a single hypothetical problem, if person A can solve the problem by considering 1 branch, and person B must consider more than 1 branch, then person A will always solve the problem faster. What other measure of importance is there really?


In the case of reading 6-7 moves to get to the shape, then it comes down to comparing the issue of reading 6-7 moves deep versus 14-16 moves deep. I'm pretty certain the 6-7 move reader will be more successful at solving the problem, even if it takes them longer to get to the 6th or 7th move.

My definition is "necessary or useful in the largest possible number of cases". I don't really understand what you are saying. reading is clearly more often necessary and more often useful.

Wrong. You can read out for hours if you like, but if you cannot judge the position correctly (i.e. know the shape) your result will be inferior. I remember that Magicwand told something like that he can smash SDK players easily with instant moves, regardless of how long the SDK ponders on reading out his moves.

We aren't talking about positional judgement at all. I recommend that you go back and read the rest of this thread.

this is becoming a bit silly. obviously, if there was one player who could not recognize any shape but could read, and another one without reading but recognizing shapes, the first would be better off. but that is an absurd model to judge usefulness of reading / shapes.

in reality, everyone uses both methods whether he likes it or not. reading move by move is the method for seeing ahead and deciding what to play. if this is what speedchase wants to hear, i hope it makes him a little more satisfied.

however, i believe that very soon one finds that he can read something, and before learning to read faster and deeper, it is more effective to learn to recognize basic shapes as a shortcut for reading. he doesn't need to do it consciously. but no one really reads out that the bent four in the corner or the bulky five are dead, that capturing three stones creates an eye or that the crane's nest tesuji captures. and all of this knowledge works as a great shortcut for your reading, allowing you to read faster, deeper, wider.

i don't know how much does solving tsumego improve one's shape recognition and i suppose it is not its primary goal. still, my favourite problems are those where my first candidate works.

(edit: English improved, typo fixed)

_________________
Spilling gasoline feels good.

I might be wrong, but probably not.

What Laman said.

At the end of each branch that you have read out, you need positional judgment for the decision whether the move that you have read out is good or not. So you cannot separate the reading process from the positional judgment.

That isn't what Laman said.

Laman: my thought experiment doesn't only work at the poles. I would take being able to read 20 moves ahead, and only understanding really basic shapes over reading 2 moves ahead and getting shapes perfectly.

I'm pretty sure that reading 20 moves ahead and "getting shapes perfectly" are still deep into the pole realm. Even professional players only read 20 moves ahead when it's a one way street.

Would you accept 10 moves, and getting shapes


And you know this because?

professionals all the time brag about how they can read 100 moves ahead. Sure they are exaggerating, but...

Simple combinatorics shows that you can't actually read 20 moves deep. You're going to need to either trim branches using positional judgement, or use some sort of intuition to restrict down the collection of moves to consider. Reading 100 moves deep may be possible in the endgame, but at that point the number of moves to consider is much lower, and positional judgement is much easier.

We weren't discussing intuition, we were discussing memorizing the status/ lines of groups (like the L+1)

Go to move 147.

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

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

The point still stands.