I share your pain. I`m a Magpie too. But originally I`m from Burton-upon-Trent. I was drafted into the Toon Army as an undergrad at Newcastle University in the early 90s. Supporting the Lads has been excellent training in enduring disappointments, but whenever I feel sad I recall listening on the radio to the October 1996 match versus the evil ones from Manchester while on the channel train. That was pure bliss (or "blip" as a certain Scotsman had it).

Of course I knew the term "zone press" was from football. It`s hard not to see the picture of the footballers on the goban in the gowizardry link I simply didn`t see much point in mentioning it here, as it`s easy to find out from elsewhere.

Do you think O actually writes this stuff himself? I wondered if it was the work of his wife, acting as ghost. It`s hard enough for me to understand the Japanese, let alone discern whether the writing is of high literary standard. As my colleague said, he goes on just a bit too long about food. She said he was trying to be cool. (First law of cool, there is no try.)

To Robert:

I like to compare principles and knowledge to stabilisers on a kid`s bike (training wheels). They`re useful to get you thinking in a balanced way, but you need to rely on them less and less as you progress. (This is not my original idea - but I cannot say it comes from Rowson until my copy of his book arrives and I have chance to verify.)

Maybe I have misunderstood your project, but I believe your attempt to formulate a complete system is going to be overwhelmed by the sheer complexity of go. Perhaps, however, there should be a separate thread for discussing Jasiekian theory.

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Awaji Shuzo`s book on Countermeasures to Invasions, likewise, is more knowledge-biased.

I`d recommend Mimura`s Fuseki Bible (三村流布石の虎の巻) to you. It goes together with the Ishida fuseki book very nicely. Mimura does a great job of explaining how to think about late-fuseki issues, and of how to use and counter large-scale strategies.

There is a MyCom book on how to use joseki, 基本定石 使い方事典 ~全35型徹底解説 (Dictionary of How to Use Basic Joseki: 35 Patterns Explained in Detail). It looks quite encyclopedic in its scope, but basically takes the training through problems+detailed explanations of success/failure route. I`ve only held off from buying it because I`ve been a bit berserk on the book-purchasing front recently. Do you have it? Does anybody else have it? What do you think?

Now, if only I could get more free time for doing some immersive reading...

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I recently purchased 実戦的な定石の使い方―序盤戦で優位に立つ and 一手で局面を変える 布石、その後の攻防 for some opening theory. This is by the same author of the middle game book I mentioned earlier, so I'm looking forward to it. Much more "skill side".

I'm waiting for amazon to ship 攻め合い力養成トレーニング. It's a Mycom book on capturing races that I can't review yet. I also got all of Lee Sedol's commented games in Japanese. I enjoyed the first enough in English that I wanted the rest immediately.

Another book in the last batch I got was 山下流戦いの感覚 which goes over the lines of play from his recent Meijin and Honinbo matches as problems to solve. It's somewhere in between game reviews and more in depth positional analysis.

It would always help to have more time to go over all of them.

Until research proves equal applicability of chess research for go, I do not share your premature conclusion that it would be like that. (It is much easier to draw other relations such as applicability of alpha-beta search to both and other games.)



1) I disagree; the smaller chess board makes chess a relatively tactically denser game than go and go a relatively strategically broader game than chess.

2) Teaching and learning in the chess world can have an impact. Before one tries to identify similarities in chess and go learning, one must first describe carefully whether the actual study conditions have been comparable.

I have different aims:
1) solve go completely (an aim, not a real expectation)
2) write books on all topics of go theory
3) solve parts of a few topics of go theory completely

Do not confuse the three aims! WRT (2), a rough estimate is to describe theory by ca. 10,000 principles. If you are afraid of this being an overwhelming magnitude, compare it to the magnitude of 1,000,000 moves of examples needed for (subconscious?) learning by examples only. Besides, improved research allows replacement of specialised principles by more general principles ("Play away from your own thickness." + "Play away from opposing thickness" -> "Play away from thickness.").

What is the analysis about?

It is a book that covers positional analysis and lines taken from portions of Yamashita Keigo's games during the Honinbo and Meijin tournaments he recently won.

I have tried to ask what the nature of the positional analysis is: territory, options, influence etc. and more specifically which aspects of territory, options, influence etc. and how are such aspects analysed in the book and how is the analysis presented (diagrams showing the territory intersections, sequences to explain them etc.)? I.e., why do you describe the positional analysis as being "in depth"?

It seems you have skewed impressions about the MyCom books and about the approach of teaching through examples. It`s not simply right answer/wrong answer, next!

A typical book provides a number of principles and the problems provide the training. The emphasis is on improving understanding rather than on memorising maxims and applying them in an obvious way. If you like reasons for things, each solution or failure diagram is copiously explained with respect to the ideas being taught and, en passant, others as appropriate.

The difference, possibly, is in the aim.

First Way: you can use principles to guide your thinking, but with the aim of improving your ability to think in productive way.

Other Way: you can use principles instead of thinking, turning yourself into a human computer executing a program. You choose any one of the 1,000,000 principles in your memory bank according to the situation, and play your move accordingly. Indeed, it is hardly you that is playing; rather, it is the System. If nothing else, this would take the sting out of defeat.

I have not read your books yet, so I cannot tell if you really are pointing to the Other Way. In any case, life is short, so on balance I have decided to follow the First Way.

Also, I think you misapprehend what I`ve been saying about the subconscious. I do not mean learning things without being aware of what you are learning, but only that according to psychology it is the subconscious mind that sorts and organises the innumerous ideas and pieces of information that we encounter into a working system. Dreaming plays a large part in this process. Have you ever attempted to do something one day, become frustrated with it and left it, and then found it was somehow much easier when you tried again several days later? That is what I have been talking about. (I`m half-expecting you to deny having had such an experience, but it seems common enough with everybody else I have ever known.)

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You cite my statement, which has not been meant to characterise the MyCom books.



Thanks for the description!



Third Way: Principles that are proven truths are applied as such (the human player should do the same as the computer and vice versa). Among the other principles, there are different types: a) rough guidlines, b) principles suggesting themselves as almost correct in almost all cases: the player should apply them pretty much like a computer, but be aware that exceptions are possible and therefore not treat these principles as proven truths but as allowing for exception handling, c) principles suggesting dynamical input or output (such as information derived from reading (counting, etc.) or information requiring further processing by reading): the player must use such principles in the context of dynamical input or output.

The First Way can be a by-product of the Third Way (in particular, you need not fear to lose your freedom of thinking creatively if you apply the Third Way, but you also should not take the freedom to make unnecessary mistakes of violating proven truths or excessively without good reason doubting (b) principles). The Other Way is a mistake as long as go is not completely solved. Implicitly, my books use the Third Way, but I have not stated that in the books yet. I use the Third Way.



(It does not always sort but can sometimes create chaos or dispose of information.)

I do not doubt that the subconscious mind does what you mention. I say that it is not the basis for my conscious go decision making (it is my conscious mind's sorting and organisation of the innumerous ideas and pieces of go information that I encounter into a working go system). As I have said, my conscious mind overrides my subconscious mind, regardless of whether both agree or don't.



Yes. I do not doubt to have a subconscious mind as a "co-processor". I doubt that, in go, I let it have the last word.

Robert Jasiek said:

This seems fatuous logic. You can just as easily say the larger go board makes go tactically richer. Indeed, the typical length of lines quoted in analyses in go seems greater than in chess. And since you claim not to have played chess anyway, your claim apparently rests on nothing more than a pile of gloop.

I can't pretend to be able to prove the strategy quotient of either game, but there are some indications that at least give pause for thought. First there's my own experience several decades ago as chess player. I think my level would have then been at least equivalent to your level as a go player. Although I have not played chess since, I have met several chess world champions and have been able to share time in press rooms with many chess grandmasters as they dissected games. Both these experiences convince me that chess is in no way inferior to go strategically.

Second, looking at what chess players write about, there is, for example, a highly regarded book called "Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy - Advances since Nimzowitsch" by John Watson, which is almost 300 large pages long. I haven't read it, but a flip through confirms all of it is about strategy, not tactics. There is a book called "The Amateur's Mind - Turning Chess Misconceptions into Chess Mastery". Again I haven't read it, but the author, Jeremy Silman, was praised by topazq here, and the cover of the book contains part of a list of its topics: Imbalances, Passed Pawns, Material, Territory, Initiative, Development, Strategy, Open Files, Openings, Endgames, Tactics. Both the title and this list suggest a categorising approach not too dissimilar to your own, and also suggest a strong parallel to go. They clearly show that chess is not seen as a purely tactical game. In that regard, Rowson makes the point (in "Chess for Zebras") that chess computers have been mislabelled as material and tactical monsters. In fact, material is just one of many elements in a computer's evaluation and, in that numbers are attached to all the elements, it is no different from any other factor, such as open files, more commonly seen as strategic.

There is also a book called "Bobby Fischer: His Approach to Chess" which is devoted to an analysis of Fischer's style. I only read a couple of chapters, but even from that it is evident that the stylistic differences between Fischer and other players (as discerned by Elie Agur) are based on strategic choices, not tactical ones, and that these differences are what mattered in his rise to world champion.

Chess and chess thinking cannot be dismissed by go players. Not least because there is so much of it. It is your own grievous loss if you choose to ignore it. As I have repeatedly indicated, you don't need to be a chess player to extract huge value. Luckily, at this stage, panhandling is just as good as trying to mount a major mining operation. You claim to want to shorten the learning curve for go players. So why not shorten it by filching what we can from chess?

You cited a few book and have probably more that you left out of the list - which of those would you consider most beneficial for a go player (a sdk as myself if that matters) to read? There are so many, and it hard to choose. Also I have so many go books to be read.

Congratulations on your 1000th like btw

This misses the point. Chess is a game, where whole board tactics is always an issue. Go is a game, where whole board considerations are dominated by strategy while small local considerations are dominated by tactics. For this reason, psychological findings are not necessarily applicable equally to both games.



I have said not to play chess. (Maybe I play a game per decade or so.) I have played it a bit at age 4 - 16, i.e., before I could play go.



Therefore, your conclusion about the foundations of my claim does not apply.



It is not just a matter of forming a quotient. Rather it is a matter of how strategy and tactics are integrated in the overall decision making.



Maybe you are right about that, but that does not change the different nature of both games WRT to the interdependence of strategy and tactics.



The psychological research you have mentioned elsewhere, IIUYC, relies on inquiring current top chess players. I.e., players having become stong earlier. Therefore, regardless of apparently interesting literature today, the related question must be: did they have enough of such literature available during the major period of their strength improvement?



Believed. But... do such books cover all chess topics now or are they in a similar position as currently still Attack and Defense or my books, i.e., exceptionally methodical treatments of only particular topics?



Believed, but... is Fischer's example representative for top chess players?



You have mentioned some similarities to go thinking, but what is really new from a go player's perspective?



I cannot do all alone. Let it be somebody else's joy of doing that for us go players. My joy of writing down my decision making, researching in go theory and explaining all that in books is already more than a lifetime's work.

I've tried to do this, but either I'm looking at the wrong books or I'm losing patience with them too quickly. The chess books I've seen are very specific to chess. They say almost nothing in general without referring to a chess position. I think there were few pages in Kotov's "Think like Grandmaster" that started to break through for me, but that is lost in time---I'm not sure I could regain the mental state when I thought there something important there. My chess level is slightly above knowing the basic rules and having played a few games---no more. I might check out some of the books you mention.

In any case, the go literature available in English is filling out and that helps. But I haven't seen much yet on the process of reading or how to practice. That's why I when I see post of the quality of this one in the thread on depth of reading, I'm simultaneously thrilled to have a peep into what I'm missing and frustrated to that I don't have direct access to original languages. I'm therefore more likely to learn an Asian language to get access to more go books than to try to learn enough chess to understand what the chess players are saying. I'm not sure which is more effort, but probably having the additional language would be more rewarding.

Robert Jasiek said:

I find fault with this and will say precisely why in a moment, but part of the reason is it appears to make the quest for good go a quest for the ultimate principle. Follow that road and you just end up with an overriding and even more general but hardly useful principle of "Play the most efficient move". In fact, specialised principles have great value as Tami pointed out in her initial post:



This matches exactly the latest conclusions in the cognitive sciences and chess players' interpretation of them.

But to revert to "Play away from thickness". There are two problems here. Sloppy English and weak translation.

The sloppy English is that 'play away' can imply making a sequence of plays move away, i.e. thickness is in the west so you must travel east. That is not what is meant at all. The other common way to express this proverb in English is "Don't approach thickness". That's much better, but not perfect. At least it implies staying put instead of travelling away. But it doesn't tell you how far to stay away. The original Japanese is better in this respect because it says more specifically "Don't go near thickness". Of course, it doesn't specify how near is near, but common sense now has a little more to go on. And you can still approach, just don't go too near.

But how do you reconcile the fact that you are supposed to attack an impertitent opponent who does go near your thickness, or his own. In the latter case you need to go to a less general principle, not a more general one, and consider proverbs such as "You can't win a game with thickness alone" and so, for example, you may try to make him overconcentrated. In the former case, however, you may follow advice which seems to tell you to drive him towards your thickness. So has the proverb done a flip-flop? Not really. The Japanese says you have to try not to go near "atsumi". That word alone contains very valuable information that "thickness" lacks, because "thickness" is also used for "atsusa". Atsumi is most associated with the early part of the game, so the Japanese form of the proverb tells you this is advice mainly for that stage. That's very useful to know. Further, a reasonably strong Japanese player would know that, to be useful (see proverb just mentioned) atsumi has to be converted to something, sometimes to more atsumi but ultimately to atsusa (e.g. a wall has to be turned into a stable group) and from there to territory. One thing that weaker players do a lot is to chase a group repeatedly towards a wall (atsumi) only to find that the wall itself comes under attack. This is because atsumi is fundamentally weak (eyeless). At some point in the chase you usually need to add moves on the atsumi side so as to make it more solid (i.e. atsusa). But then, by subsequently chasing the opponent in that direction, you are not contravening the proverb in Japanese (it can be ok to go near atsusa) whereas English lacks the distinction and so the proverb wrongly appears to be contradictory.

In this second scenario, once you decide it's a good idea to chase a group, there are several less general proverbs you might want to apply: for example, "chase with knight's moves, run with straight jumps" or the various nuggets of advice that tell you to make a honte, watch the aji or to avoid making your stones work against each other. In other words, you are being guided ever closer to making the necessary and more specific "case-by-case decision".

I would suggest that a more fruitful avenue for research would be to establish a hierarchy of principles and not worry about how bushy the tree becomes. This was done around 1980 by a Japanese university team as part of an early attempt to program go. It didn't appear to work for them, but it might help humans who currently are puzzled by proverbs that appear to compete with each other. They probably only compete if they are on the same level in the decision tree. Establishing a hierarchy (an L19 project?) would likely sort out the confusion.

Apart from allowing us to re-assert the value of specific advice, I think this way of looking at things points up the dangers yet again of criticising Japanese go wisdom on the basis of English renderings. In the present case, the so-called proverbs "Play away from your own thickness" and "Play away from opposing thickness" don't even exist in Japanese, as far as I know. The Japanese is already a "higher" principle, to the extent that Japanese beginners' books often have to remind readers that the proverb can apply to your own thickness as well as the opponent's. In other words, more specific is good.

No. More than one principle is required.



This is hardly useful because it is over-generalised.



Sure, if they are not too specialised, i.e., unless several specialised principles can be summarised by a common principle.



This is not the same as a) the possible value for specialised principles nor b) the possible value for principles summarising similar, too specialised principles.



I have seen both English wordings of the principle or its variants. ("approach" has the same problem you are criticising; it can also imply movement, although in the opposite direction.)



Other principles are needed for specifying good distance.



Also common sense is too imprecise. Other principles are needed for specifying good distance.



Right, and later during the game distances become shorter. So the principle must be accompanied by other principles.



More go theory is needed for degrees of thickness, but only two degrees won't do.



What is the sense in letting degrees of thickness depend on early / later occurrence during a game? What matters is the nature of thickness and its surroundings. Usually later occurrence thickness can sometimes occur also early.



Other strategies are also possible.



m-connected and n-alive are more precise characterisations.



This is not just a matter of translation (although it explains in part why players learning from English sources had greater problems of understanding usage of thickness well). Quite some explanation of thickness related strategy is needed for using thickness well.



Fine, ALA as it does not become too specific.



Uh, I have been doing this, but much more research is necessary:)



Can you provide a few more details on that, please?



Then they must have been badly translated on various occasions.



This kind of more specific is not the need for more instead of fewer principles but is exemplifying how mighty the summarising principle is.

IMHO now, at the latest, is the moment to move this discussion to its own thread, if [we] don’t want to disrupt Tami’s journal totally.

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I kind of half-share Bonobo`s sentiments here. On the other hand, I am genuinely very interested in what both John and Robert have to say. Perhaps if they were to move their discussion, it would make it easier for other interested parties to find it. But, that said, it also belongs here because Robert is essentially taking issue with the ways of thinking that I have been describing.

I must stress that my POV is changing all the time, although I feel that I have been getting on to a good track recently.

It is a pity Robert does not read Japanese (or Chinese or Korean). He would surely find a lot to interest him in the better books.

I`m grateful to John for bringing to light such naunces as the distinction between "atsumi" and "atsusa".

There is a lot more information in the Japanese go theory than has been easily available in English up to now. For instance, Mimura addresses the issue Robert raised, about grades of thickness - he recognises that groups are not simply "strong" or "weak", but that you have to apply a finely grained judgement.

However, it seems to me that Robert is taking a good idea too far. Yes, you need to make subtle judgements, but can you really do this using formulas? The Japanese books teach ways of thinking, which you can practice and master as skills, but there is a distinction between a way of thinking and a formula; a way of thinking requires effort, but a formula could be executed by a machine.

Where I believe Robert will make important breakthroughs is in finding formulae for very limited and specific situations, but I seriously doubt whether these formulae will be of any great use in raising a player`s strength. I mean, if he discovers that "X always win the fight in a Z+2 Semeai with Chicken Wings" then the player who knows it might have an advantage in games with such situations, but that advantage might only be applicable in 0.001% of your his or her games. Still, that is not to belittle Robert - a definite discovery is a definite discovery, and ought be welcomed and applauded.

The trouble with a formulaic approach is that there are just too many variables. You might assess a group to be "59% thick" on move 101, but by 103 its status may have changed. It is simply impossible to foresee all possible fights that may affect your assessment (except in the very limited and very specific situations I mentioned above).

I treated myself to another MyCom book the other day - シノギの急所 (Vital Points of Shinogi) by O Rissei. No idea when I am going to have time to read it, as I am still 2/3 of the way through Mimura`s Fuseki Bible and about 45 pages deep into the Zone Press Park (just thinking about it makes me want to eat roast pork and drink spicy Chinese soup). Anyway, I bought the shinogi book because my bookshop inspection showed it to provide training in how to think when trying to make shinogi.

On page 10, O provides a kind of "work flow" diagram:

Procedure for when you are considering an intrusion

1: First of all, assess the [opponent`s] prospects/overall shape [形勢]. Think about whether it is good or bad.
2: If the shape is good, go in shallowly - keshi. If the shape is bad, raze it - 荒らし(arashi), invasion.
3: When you cannot decide about the strength of shape, think again whether to go for sabaki or shinogi
4: When trying for sabaki, refer to [my book] Vital Points of Sabaki [this sounds like Robert`s writing!!]. If you opt for shinogi, please follow the steps below.

Procedure when considering [attempting] shinogi

1: Look for forcing moves [利きを探す」
2: Consider whether or not you can escape or connect up. If that is impossible...
3: Ask if you can make two eyes, and if that is not possible...
4: Consider if you can sacrifice some stones.

For me, this workflow seems like a practical way to think. You can recall these procedures and, ideally, train yourself in them so that they become a natural part of your thinking. I don`t know yet what further specific details O adds to this platform, but I do bet that anybody who reads even this quick and dirty translation of one page will become a bit more adept with reduction and invasion if they take the trouble to practice O`s advice.

In essense, I am leaning to the view that it is NOT the number of principles you know that makes you strong, but rather that is how well you can think, and principles (even the occasional formula) can be part of this.

Caveat: I repeat and emphasise that the translation above is quick and dirty.
Caveat 2, for Robert: I have read precisely one page of O Rissei`s book, so please don`t ask me lots of detailed questions about it for now. Also, please don`t raise too many arguments with an amateur translation, into what is for you a second language, of one page of a possibly ghost-written book!

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Which aspects of thickness does he describe for the sake of finer characterisation?



In case of thickness / influence characterisation, it is not formulas but parameters. I think that one can often simplify by considering "at least 1-connected and at least 1-alive" (or maybe "at least 2-connected and at least 2-alive"; I need to do related research later), and one gets something similar (but more accurate) to atsusa.



The Japanese books? If only they did. Isn't it rather "the very few best Japanese books"?



A purpose of a formula is to replace the need for effort by very simple execution.



I do not provide only formulae, but also values, principles, methods, procedures etc. To discuss their improvement potential, please specify whether you mean only formulae or also the other means.



The New Semeai Formula is applicable to all semeais that are basic or are related to a basic kind. Maybe such a semeai occurs in every 10th game?



Oh, one variable (as in the New Semeai Formula) is already too many? Sorry, but fewer become uninteresting:)



Gulp. Why not appreciate the numerical simplicity of m-connected and n-alive? Usually, the values -2 (or smaller), -1, 0, 1, 2 (or greater) or * suffice!



Yes, dynamic status of thickness is as much possible as dynamic status of life-and-death.



Who cares? For the small values, you do NOT NEED TO ASSESS ALL POSSIBLE FIGHTS!



Thanks. (Looks a bit like what I like to write.)



Sheer number of knowledge bits is hardly ever a good measure. Knowing many mighty principles is better than knowing only a few. Good thinking is also important.

Obviously, one is always prone to a spot of confirmation bias, but in today`s Oza game, Cho U seemed to follow O Rissei`s "shinogi workflow" to the letter!



As you can see, on move 55 Cho invades, and has to manage two weak groups at the same time.

The workflow can be summarised like this: forcing moves - run or connect - live - sacrifice.

Moves 65, 67, 69, 71 and 73 are forcing moves. On 75 Cho runs out before forcing again with 77 and 79. With 86 it appears as if Iyama has contained him, but Cho manages to break free, and captures three stones for a good result.

On move 92 Iyama turns his attention to the other weak group, and we see a similar procedure. After maximising his space with 93, Cho plays a peek with 95. Its utility becomes apparent shortly. After another forcing play at 97 play follows a single line. With 103 Cho forces White to capture 97 and its partner, and this allows Cho to live with 105, with the help of the original forcing peek of 95.

I think this passage of play is a pretty instructive example of how to manage weak groups, and it was interesting to see how closely Cho`s moves followed the order suggested by O Rissei.

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