rank at which you can start to appreciate pro games?

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jts
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Re: rank at which you can start to appreciate pro games?

Post by jts »

It think it makes more sense to say that you can admire the result without understanding how someone accomplished something. Normally once you understand how they accomplished it, you can analyze the final result into sub-steps - and at each step, you can admire the result without yet understanding that preliminary accomplishment.

So for example, you can see that someone killed a healthy group and admire their marksmanship, without having the first idea how he did it. Later he'll understand the tesuji to kill, but not the initial attack that left the group vulnerable. Then he'll understand the attack, but not how the killer kept the game so tight that his opponent had no time to defend... and so on.

Why say that if you don't know exactly how some did something, you can only "appreciate" it? Sometimes the most intense admiration lies closest to the surface (you don't always want to know how the sausage is made), sometimes it lies hidden below the surface. Go has some of each. I used to think the crane's nest was really cool. :blackeye:

By the way, "it takes level to see level" is an awfully ugly phrase. Possibly because of the connection to the juvenile taunt, "It takes one to know one"? Combined with the use of a position in a hierarchy as a metonym for a human being? If it needs to be metonymy, I vote for something that can double as the verb as well, like "You need reading to read reading".
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Re:

Post by tj86430 »

EdLee wrote:TJ, it depends on what "appreciate" means to you. A quick search on its definitions:

(1) Recognize the full worth of.
(2) Be grateful for (something).
(3) To esteem or value highly.

Of course, for most of us who are not professionals at various fields --
we may not be a movie maker, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy a good movie;
we may not be a professional writer, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy a good book;
we may not be a professional carpenter, but we can "appreciate"/enjoy beautiful Go equipment;
etc. etc.

But, referring to (1). "What's the meaning of this move?"
"What exactly was Wiles' proof of Fermat's Last Theorem?"
"What exactly was Feynman's work in QED?"
"How exactly did Tiger Woods win all his championships -- what exactly did he do differently than others?"
"How exactly did Michael Schumacher win all his championships -- what exactly did he do differently than others?"
"How exactly did Lance Armstrong win all his Tour de France titles?" (Oh, wait, this one is different :))

If you pick any of those fields and ask me, my honest reply is, "I don't know."

That's why it's a continuum. If you think you can "appreciate" certain experts
in their respective fields, OK, that's one level of understanding.
But there are infinitely more levels.
I more or less got which meaning you meant originally, although I wouldn't emphasize the word "exactly".
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