Disgusting. These shows are just a couple years old. Anyone raised on them is probably too young to drive. Back in my day, an old fart who wanted to complain would pay attention and and reference television shows that today's young adults watched growing up, like Beavis and Butthead or South Park.

_________________
Occupy Babel!

It is unfortunate that these days "celeb reality TV" programs are very popular in the US, but then again it is difficult to drive a national economy just on mindless consumption if the masses were to be encouraged to think for themselves. Thus, it is better to distract them from the realities of life by showing a life of glittering fantasy. I fear that this will be the prevailing cultural consensus in North America for some time to come.

I remember Beavis & Butthead on MTV and South Park, not to mention children's cartoons such as Rugrats and The Wild Thornberrys, but those shows seem wholesome when compared to what appears on TV these days. At the same time that the two aforementioned programs were on the air, on the US TV network ABC sitcoms such as Family Matters, Step by Step, and Boy Meets World were being played as part of the network's Friday night program lineup. By 2000, though, it appears that a new era in TV programming had dawned.

Not all that is on America TV is bad, but often it's the lousier programs that get more airtime and exposure.

Chess and Go are of similar levels of difficulty. As with Go, there is so much to learn in Chess that unless one has learned the game from his/her childhood or adolescence, it is very difficult to reach grandmaster status. In fact, I think that even in the 20th century not many Americans or Canadians followed Chess games by top professionals. Only those familiar with the game would be able to keep up at all.

One factor that has helped Go to be popular in East Asia is constant exposure to the game from birth for just about everyone in that part of the world. I believe that more public exposure is needed for Go to really take root in North America.

However, unlike East Asian cultures that promote a positive attitude towards hard work, US culture on the whole is more commercial than agrarian. The attitude that hard work is ultimately rewarding is very much a characteristic of agrarian societies, as hard work is needed to ensure a good harvest and therefore a prosperous present and future. However, in a commercial society hard work can actually lead to lost dollars. So practical approaches are favored almost unilaterally, even when they ultimately promote intellectual retardation among the masses. Betimes I even think that America's top government officials think more like merchants than statesmen.

In North America Go has only very light cultural penetration. Go would have to be presented as a sort of practical necessity, rather than as just a pastime for the intellectually gifted. Even though this alone will not cause public interest in the game to explode overnight, this will at least get it out of its "egghead box".

Or perhaps Go is so powerful and its lessons so coveted that it is better for everyone to remain ignorant of it, lest a few learn it well and teach it to others, by which time the social climate in North America will have changed substantially as a result.

If US citizens want to see an increase in employment, they will have to embrace a learning-friendly culture. Countries like China and Canada have labour pools consisting mainly of citizens with a good command of math, sciences, English, and other school subjects. Hopefully those of my generation and after that recognize the value of constant practice and refinement, and act accordingly.
---------------------------------
Those who are skilled in combat do not become angered. Those who are skilled at winning do not become afraid. Thus the wise win before they fight, while the ignorant fight to win.
Zhuge Liang

What is a commercial society and how are the highly developed economies of Korea and Japan (ok, maybe not China in general but some of it) not commercial as well?

Most of the best people I know in maths and physics were from a young age learning about these things outside of school. Either from their parents or through someone their parents knew. Not formal tutoring, just someone to ask questions of and get interesting answers from or even just good books on the shelf to read (I know at least one Physics lecturer who is in the job because someone handed him a Feynman book when he was a teenager and he got to see a glimpse of what they weren't mentioning in school).

I think a bit of scholarly opinion is in order, since I am not a sociologist. Here is an excerpt from an article published by a University of California scholar on the distinction between a commercial society and an agrarian one.

http://www.des.ucdavis.edu/faculty/Richerson/BooksOnline/He7-95.pdf

I'll begin by saying that, even though Korea, Japan, and (increasingly) China rely very much on international trade nowadays, for much of their history their economy has been agrarian for the most part; most of the population engaged in agriculture. This gave rise to the cultural values normally associated with agricultural societies, especially in areas with dramatic seasonal changes, such as long-term planning (to anticipate seasonal and environmental changes than can affect the harvest), hard work (to ensure that the harvest meets expectations and that weeds do not proliferate), and punctuality (to ensure that all necessary steps are executed in a timely manner).

In the past, the majority of those living in China, Korea, and Japan engaged in agriculture. Domestic and international trade did exist before the 20th century, but as coverage was limited and transport times were long only a small percentage of the population was able to benefit directly from it. Nowadays, thanks to vastly improved logistics and transportation infrastructure, global trade has greater penetration and scope than before. China, Korea, and Japan do have societies that are in our day largely commercial, but that is a very recent phenomenon in the history of these. Agriculture was the main occupation for the majority of the population in these countries for many centuries. Hence, the cultural values associated with agriculture have predominated among the masses to this day. Even if there are many more urbanites than farmers in the world today, a cultural heritage of many centuries of human experience does not disappear overnight.

Let us remember as well that until the 20th century, or at least until the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century, outside of those people practicing a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, most of those living in Europe and North America were farmers. Commerce arose as a way to compensate for the deficiencies arising from an agrarian lifestyle; not everything could be produced on site, so there was always the need to trade. Of course, with improvements in technology - such as motorized vehicles, mass harvesting equipment, and refrigeration - available food supply steadily increased, making it possible for large numbers of rural residents to move to the cities. Nowadays there are fewer people farming than before, but agriculture is largely mechanized these days, thus reducing the need for human labor - at least in developed countries. This series of developments is what allowed previously agricultural societies to shift towards an economy of mostly commerce and industry.

Most of the history of Go occurs in China, Japan, and Korea, countries that had large populations engaging in agriculture and even had much government involvement in the same, as it was the foundation of their national economies. I believe that the picture of Go as a game depicting a protracted war of settlement and colonization arose from the historical experience of these societies.

Not really, no. Unless you think rural farming communities could magic up the metals they needed for essential goods or something, or mining communities the foods. Local and national trade has been the lifeblood of communities since prehistory, it's the only way specialisation of labour can happen on a grand scale.

I learned more from books, internet, and personal playtime than I did from school lectures. I regret to say that public schools serve as a form of compartmentalization - almost like a prison. Not exactly the most natural way for a child to learn, is it? Yet many parents would disagree with me, as they have been duped into believing that academic schooling in a compartmentalized environment is best for their children.

As well, not many in the US are aware of the origins of its public education system.

The US system of public education as we know it today has its origins in the Prussian academic education system under King Frederick William III. Here are two articles on that.

http://www.stgeorgeutah.com/news/archive/2012/03/14/our-prussian-model-of-public-schooling-controlling-the-masses/

http://school.namaya.com/newamericanacademy/images/the-prussian-industrial-history-of-public-schooling1.pdf

Go has more than once been under threat due to its image as an idle pastime, even though what it really does is promote a highly sophisticated form of critical thinking in those who play it. Below is an article (in Spanish) of how Go in Japan went on the decline for a time under the military government of the early Shōwa Era. Its title, El heroísmo de la continuidad (The Heroism of Continuity).

http://lasindias.com/el-heroismo-de-la-continuidad

Even chess, a game much more deeply rooted in Western culture than Go ever was, does not have a very big presence in US public schools. Even though it does help students to increase their academic performance, its tendency to foster a sophisticated form of critical thinking doesn't always sit well with those who believe that promoting uniformity of thought and obedience to one's social betters is the goal of public education. Go is a bit easier to learn, but it might suffer the same stigma because it also fosters a sophisticated form of critical thinking.

You are right. Trade has always existed, even in agrarian societies. Not on the grand scale we see today, but, in some places, enough to sustain a rate of exchange of goods and services that would make a high level of civilization possible. Ancient China had, for the most part, efficient systems of agriculture that allowed for large national populations, which in turn allowed for a large volume of exchange of goods, services, and ideas.

Even so, countries like China, Korea, and Japan would've had a plethora or local trade networks, instead of a single large national hub-and-spoke one. Terrestrial trade was often greatly influenced by geography, such as mountains and deserts. Hence, it was not always possible to carry very large amounts of goods over land unless one had a caravan of pack animals or good road infrastructure. Most large-volume trade occurred along rivers and coastlines, which is why most of the world's earliest civilizations arose near rivers.

What I was aiming at is how the agrarian character of East Asian societies in the past gave rise to the cultural values of the same and that Go developed in this cultural milieu. Once a country, such as Japan in the 17th and 18th centuries, started developing a large merchant class, the sewing of seeds that typified the farmer became the "sewing" of commercial outlets in different locations. Just as a farmer observes environmental conditions to know whether a good crop can be harvested, a merchant would observe market conditions to know whether any substantial amount of money can be made. As well, just as the farmer knows that a big harvest does not occur right away, the merchant knows that the road to riches is long.

Betimes I think of how the mix of agrarian and pastoral economies in Europe influenced Western views on commerce. In some places hunting was part of the national economy, so this may have exerted influence as well. Perhaps it's from this historical experience that comes the Western penchant for short-term profit.

What I am thinking is that many of the first merchants were at one time engaging in agriculture and, going from farming to selling, they took their agrarian cultural values with them. Would it be safe to say that Go is an expression - in form of a game - of a culture that has its origins in farming? The need to keep watch over what happens to one's own groups in a game of Go reminds me of a farmer keeping watch over his crops until harvest time.

I'm very confused to how anything above has to do with go. Or anything at all actually.

An excerpt from the article:[ My emphasis on the dates. ]

This may be off-topic, but a little trivia: the oldest known public school in the world is
a high school in Chengdu, China, founded between 143–141 BCE -- ( Oldest schools in the world ) --
which predates the above era by about 2,000 years.

This high school is still in operation today, and Mr. Maojie “Jeff” Xia, former insei,
went to this school.

I believe the article refers to the modern concept of a centralised school system rather than publicly funded schools.

Centralized schooling is a very recent phenomenon in the West; most schooling was on a private basis, even as far back as Ancient Greece.

By mentioning agriculture and trade I was intending to provide a context for the current topic. (I've often thought that China's agrarian past was the cultural background against which the game of Go developed, even though initially the game was played almost exclusively by the upper classes.) The bit on centralized schooling belongs to a different branch of the discussion, namely the branch of how Go would fit into a school environment were it to be used as a pedagogical tool.

It looks like I am digressing already, so perhaps I should drop agriculture and commerce for a while. Still, the pedagogical potential of Go is fascinating

You realize that the farmers would not be the ones playing in any culture and that Japan started spreading Go as Western influences and the industrial revolution in Japan started taking place? You can also argue Korea and China's rise to Go dominance came as they became much more industrial economies too.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention

I see what you are saying. For much of Japan's history, the farming class, despite making up a large percentage of that country's population, did not play any big role in its high culture. In fact, much of what in the West has long been considered Japanese culture, including the game of Go as it is played in Japan, actually has its origins in the Japanese imperial court. From there it spread to the rest of the population, albeit at a narrow trickle.

Even if for much of the history of Go farmers, for the most part, never played or even knew of the game, I still believe that the game is one expression of an ancient civilization based on agriculture.

Unfortunately for us Westerners, Japanese Go players did not go out into the world after the end of the Sea Restriction (better known in the West as the Closed Door Policy) and taught Go to Westerners directly. Rather, Westerners arrived in Japan, learned Go, and returned to their countries of origin with knowledge of the game, which they transmitted to other Western learners of the game (under a Western mindset, of course). I believe this is one reason why the level of Go in the West is yet well behind that of East Asia.

As well, it is said that Go in Japan became popularized across the board (pardon the pun) once the Japan Go Association was established.

In the Edo period anyone - even a rural peasant - could become a Go player, but gaining access to the game was seldom easy, since the Four Go Houses kept much of their knowledge secret. Thus, those who played Go - if they were not part of one of the Four Go Houses - tended to be at least from the merchant class or Buddhist clergy. Still, even with Go being very much a game of the ruling classes in Edo period Japan, some of the most notable players of the time came from a working class background; Yasui Chitoku was the son of a fisherman and Shuho was the son of a poor carpenter who just happened to live next door to the Hon'inbō residence.

Industrialization is indeed related to the rise in population of Go players in China and Korea; since fewer people had to work in the fields and factories to earn a living, those who chose to pursue a career in Go were free to do so.

Ditto here.

To return to the stated topic of this thread (and hopefully avoid sounding like a troll)... I'll begin by saying that the initial occurrence of Westerners teaching other Westerners the game of Go might be why Go in the West has not reached the level seen in East Asia; since Westerners and East Asians have different cultural outlooks, both look at the game differently. I ought to wonder if, instead of Westerners going to Japan in the late 1800s and bringing back Go with them to teach other Westerners, Japanese pros would've taught Westerners directly and on the same basis as the insei of the period, after which these Westerners would've taught the game to their fellow countrymen.

Much of what has been said on the topic up to now makes sense. Still, I believe that it is better for the student of Go to have a brief nugget of pertinent info on a particular theme, then struggle a bit to familiarize oneself with it. This would mean 10 percent theoretical discussions and 90 percent self-study.

In addition, has anyone here considered whether a Go curriculum should be instructor-directed or learner-directed?

------------------------------------
Those who are skilled in combat do not become angered. Those who are skilled at winning do not become afraid. Thus the wise win before they fight, while the ignorant fight to win.
Zhuge Liang