Good go books by amateurs

[John Fairbairn]

I am sure that there is a lot of additional Japanese written between these words.
Do you have an idea what the hidden meaning could be?
Perhaps "feeling" refers to the particular effect of the move (poor, brilliant, brilliant)?

I think the most useful comment I can make is to mention the little known fact that guzumi is a verb form (i.e. dynamic). Character forms are rare: I have seen 愚集む and 愚図む but these seem to be jukujikun or ateji renderings. The etymology is disputed but there seems to be general agreement that things like, stupidity, overconcentration and inefficiency come into the mix. There are also associated words that imply slowness, dawdling and the like. There are also more fanciful suggestions involving it being a pun on guzu (slow/lazy) and kosumi, i.e. meaning a diagonal move that is not on the expected diagonal!

It may be that "feeling" implied here was a nod towards all these associations.

A phrase I have used for guzumi in the past is "making deliberate bad shape."

[pwaldron]

Perhaps we could say that brute force is uncultured thinking. You haven't learnt such a solution before, nor how to solve it, so you have to start from scratch without and rules to guide you. I don't think that many of us use that approach.

In many respects you're right, but I have found brute force reading to be useful in building up mental stamina. The ability to study a position for a long time without losing concentration, reading and retaining a large number of variations in your head is a good skill to have, and not just for playing go. In the case of something like a life-and-death problem of medium complexity the number of variations is large but manageable and works quite well as practice.

[John Fairbairn]

I have found brute force reading to be useful in building up mental stamina. The ability to study a position for a long time without losing concentration, reading and retaining a large number of variations in your head is a good skill to have, and not just for playing go. In the case of something like a life-and-death problem of medium complexity the number of variations is large but manageable and works quite well as practice.

Fair point. Reading is always necessary somewhere along the line, but divorcing out known patterns can make such practice tricky. However, there is a good way to achieve this, and that is by doing Cho U's 5x5 problems. The board is small, and so the number of possible moves is very manageable. But what I think is more important is that the unusual size of the board normally precludes any formation of standard shapes, so that you rarely get side-tracked by shapes and can only rely on pure reading. But you do get thematic dynamic sequences, which of course, by their nature, have to be read out, but often only for verification purposes. Seems an ideal format.

The following two examples are his latest contributions in Go Weekly. He rates them as hard, especially the second one. The longest line is 11 moves. Black to play and "totally demolish White."

$$B
$$ +---------- +
$$ | . . X X . |
$$ | X X O X O |
$$ | X O . O . |
$$ | X O . . . |
$$ | O O . . . |
$$ +-----------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

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

$$B
$$ +---------- +
$$ | . O O O X |
$$ | X . . X X |
$$ | X . O . O |
$$ | X O . . X |
$$ | X . . X . |
$$ +-----------+

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

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

[RobertJasiek]

$$W White to move
$$. . . . . . . . . . .
$$. . . . . O O O O . .
$$. . O O O X . X X O .
$$. . O X O X . X . O .
$$. O . X X X X X . O .
$$. O . . . . . . . O .
$$. . . X X . X X . O .
$$. O . . O O O O O . .
$$. . O . . . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . . . . . .

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$W White to move
$$. . . . . . . . . . .
$$. . . . . O O O O . .
$$. . O O O X . X X O .
$$. . O X O X . X . O .
$$. O . X X X X X . O .
$$. O . . . . . . . O .
$$. . . X X . X X . O .
$$. O . . O O O O O . .
$$. . O . . . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . . . . . .[/go]

The answer is here: https://www.lifein19x19.com/viewtopic.p ... 79#p277779

[jlt]

Thanks, I totally missed the correct variation. I'd need to work more on endgame problems instead of only life-and-death.