Life In 19x19

Bill Spight wrote:

Polama wrote:Here's my take:

I would call this a basic:

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$$ . . . X . .
$$ . . X . W .
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . .

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$B
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . X . .
$$ . . X . W .
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the key point is marked (plus the 3 symmetrical points to it)

Why isn't it a silly move?

Yes, in a way that was my point =)

I don't think it's controversial that the marked stone is a vital point http://senseis.xmp.net/?DiagonalMove, http://senseis.xmp.net/?WeakPlayersDiagonal.

But you are correct that it's an odd place to play with no surrounding context. Totally isolated, you wouldn't play there. But how many tsumego come down to some variation on playing here in a complicated shape? Just like a hane at the head of two stones. Great advice. Not something to do automatically. As I see the linked articles uses of the terms, the basics points out generally useful things to do (e.g., punch somebody in martial arts), and the fundamentals refines that into something actually useful (knowing when to play there, knowing how to punch)

Polama wrote:

Bill Spight wrote:

Polama wrote:Here's my take:

I would call this a basic:

$$B
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . X . .
$$ . . X . W .
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . .

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$B
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . X . .
$$ . . X . W .
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . .[/go]

the key point is marked (plus the 3 symmetrical points to it)

Why isn't it a silly move?

Yes, in a way that was my point =)

I don't think it's controversial that the marked stone is a vital point http://senseis.xmp.net/?DiagonalMove, http://senseis.xmp.net/?WeakPlayersDiagonal.

If that's not controversial, it ought to be.

But you are correct that it's an odd place to play with no surrounding context.

Context is everything. In a similar vein, an amateur student of Lin Haifeng's (Rin Kaiho's) defended a mistake as merely being played out of order. Lin replied, "Go is the order of play."

But how many tsumego come down to some variation on playing here in a complicated shape?

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$B
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . X . .
$$ . . X a W .
$$ . . . . . .
$$ . . . . . .[/go]

Yes, it is fundamental that prevents Black from making an eye at "a".

Just like a hane at the head of two stones. Great advice. Not something to do automatically.

Actually, the proverb in Japanese says to hane at the head of two stones "without looking". OC, there are exceptions, but the hane is almost always a good move.

By contrast, in the diagram is good only in certain contexts.

I liked the article very much.

• To recap, taking a punch as an example, the 'basics' would be the actual movement of punching, while the 'fundamentals' would be how to utilize this movement to actually hurt the other guy. Right? Because if all you know is the movement, you are more likely to break your own wrist than to make the other guy cry. I have seen it happen. So teaching should go in tandem - basics and fundamentals together.

In terms of Go - I have been thinking of a similar distinction for a long time, except I have been calling it a *move* on one side and an *idea* on the other. So, a *move* would be a technique you can apply, like a geta or the already mentioned 'hane at the head of two stones' or the toothpaste technique. The *idea* would be what makes the move effective. Capturing stones in geta blindly is not effective and it will more likely do more harm than good in your game, even if you have the technique down to a perfection - if you don't know the wider idea behind it, in particular that some stones are worth capturing and some are not, and which, and why.

One example I run into recently was the concept of connecting.

• A beginner got fixated on making connecting moves, he got really good at it, so all his groups are nicely connected into one global blob... but he was still losing games terribly all the time. The problem was that even when all his groups were independently alive - he was still wasting many moves to connect them. The *move* or the technique was there, but the *idea* was missing. Nobody told him that there are groups worth connecting and ones which are not, and how to tell them apart. Eventually, he learned, but it was a long and thorny road, hard to watch.

The example of 'pull out of atari' vs 'don't save junk stones' of jts is a good one, i think.

• I often put myself in the shoes of the beginner, and can feel how exasperating this can be. You are told those two things, shown the moves, but never explained why or which stones are junk and which are not. In one game - this is the move, period. In another game - that is the move, period. What the heck?!? Learning these two seemingly contradictory things actually leads to more confusion than good.

Same can be said for most other 'techniques' we learn.

• Even a blind monkey can learn the most complex joseki if given enough bananas, but this does not mean it would ever beat a human player even if the human does not know that particular joseki. Because he monkey will never have the *idea* behind the joseki. And this, the *idea*, is where the real strength in Go lies. Of course, technique is important too, but I think secondary.

So - in general - I think that an *idea* is much stronger than a *move*. Knowing a move and applying is without understanding makes you a very weak player, even if the move itself is perfect. Knowing an idea, even when you don't always find the best move to go with it, makes you a much stronger player - and much better equipped to go over your game afterwards and find a better move.

Its because Go is not really about moves themselves, but about sequences and shapes - so basically it is about how to make moves work together - which can never be taught just by showing 'a move', its the ideas that bind stones together.

This is one of the reasons I am basically against just teaching *moves* without the *ideas* behind them. I much rather teach ideas without the moves - if we have to leave some part for the student to discover independently, let them discover the moves which best fit into the ideas they know rather than the other way around. Also - ideas are much more general than moves, so it also makes for more efficient teaching and learning, and once you get the ideas down and assimilated, it is not really that hard to find good moves that match them.

PS>
Sorry of all this is a little chaotic... I am still on my first coffee.

I suppose I'm vering off topic here, but I don't think it's strictly a question of eye space. Normally the two point extension down or right are very effective from the diagonal. Down, the point the diagonal protects is now peeped. To the right, the extension is peeped. If I want to stop progress down and right, it's the first place I'd look, and if I want to extend down and right, I'd hesitate to form the diagonal if this location is already occupied. Besides stopping the eye where you marked, it also makes it easier to take one of the corners in the eye on the other side, so it lightly attacks that one as well.

Bantari wrote:I liked the article very much.

• To recap, taking a punch as an example, the 'basics' would be the actual movement of punching, while the 'fundamentals' would be how to utilize this movement to actually hurt the other guy. Right? Because if all you know is the movement, you are more likely to break your own wrist than to make the other guy cry. I have seen it happen. So teaching should go in tandem - basics and fundamentals together.

I think making a fist would be considered a rudiment or tesuji. I am no expert in marital arts but it seems like more along the lines, that if a martial arts student didn't learn the purpose of the foot work while doing the dance, the strike has no power, and if they didn't learn to keep their opponent off balance, when they get hit, it hurts.

The analogy I have in my mind, is why people don't learn Fuseki. Why don't people learn Fuseki? Because if their opponent doesn't play along with the basic moves, they don't know how to respond, why don't they know how to respond? Because they didn't learn the fundamentals of the Fuseki, they just learned the basic moves...

I read the link before anyone replies were posted here, and I thought it was excellent. Being very familiar with taiji I recognised every aspect the author wrote about and agreed with him completely. The only caveat I had was that he was maybe asking for trouble by using both "basics" and "fundamentals", even though he himself carefully distinguished them in a sensible way.

When I returned to this thread I was astonished. I honestly thought most posters had either not read the article carefully or had read something else. I also thought some people were wilfully imposing their own definitions of basic and fundamental, even reversing the original author's intended meaning. I also thought some posters were perhaps trying too hard to make the connection with go, and were getting confused by counting what the martial artist calls "applications" as basics or fundamentals.

I think there is a connection with go, but possibly the use of "basics" and "fundamentals" is obscuring it.

When you learn a martial art of the oriental type, you will first learn what is called a "form" (or kata). This would be the "basics" in the OP. All you will learning is to put your body and limbs in more or less the right positions. You will not be able to use these moves in a fight.

Under an oriental teacher, you will then re-learn that form (or, more usually, part of it) repeatedly with different twists. This would be the "fundamentals". In taiji, you would learn to make the moves with the right breathing, then in another cycle with the right yin-yang, then in yet another cycle with the right waist movements, and so on. Most of your time is spent on this. At first you will still not be able to use these moves in a fight, but the teacher will occasionally show you how they might work in an application. You will then start to understand the reason for adding each fundamental idea to each basic shape. Eventually you may learn the fundamentals so well that you can apply them to an application instantly in a fight situation.

If you get that far you may be allowed to do weapon forms with e.g. a sword. Here the idea is not so much to learn to be a fencer, but rather to do the hands-only form with an extra weight added. This strengthens your limbs but can also expose weaknesses in your posture or balance, in which case you go back and study the hands-only fundamentals again.

It is typical of western students to learn the basic shapes, then to want to skip the fundamentals and get straight into the applications, or better still the light sabres. As the original article says, there are too many McDojo "fast-food" teachers in the west who pander to that.

Returning to go, my take on the equivalence is this: visualise the joseki where black has a star stone, white approaches with a knight's move, Black plays kosumitsuke against it, White extends up to the fourth line and then Black plays a one-space jump on the other side of the star stone. Learning to parrot this sequence of moves is what is meant by "basics", or the initial form. But it is not very useful to you until you also learn the fundamentals. Among the fundamentals are that this shape is not meant to defend the corner, because it is riddled with weaknesses - e.g. the 3-3 point, the 5-3 point, the 8-3 point. Once you learn these fundamentals you start to understand that this Black shape is for attack not defence, and eventually you become able to use powerfully it as an application.

I am not aware of any special terms in go that cover each aspect of this, but what is meant by the fundamentals is usually covered by what the Japanese call the "meaning" of a move (or shape). Also, the emphasis on handicap games and handicap josekis is part of this process of passing on the fundamentals.

For those not familiar with martial arts, there's an easy demonstration that will probably work for you. Stand up straight (the basic shape), and get somebody to push you gently from the side. If you have mastered the fundamentals (feet slightly apart and parallel, head erect, etc) and so are standing with good posture, he will not move you. But if you stand straight except for tilting your head to one side (bad posture), you should find that you an easy pushover. If you practise all the fundamentals enough, you will be able to stand in a room in such a way that your presence is felt without you moving, as well as breathing better and avoiding back problems, etc.

Bantari wrote:So, a *move* would be a technique you can apply, like a geta or the already mentioned 'hane at the head of two stones' or the toothpaste technique.

What is this toothpaste technique you speak of?

wineandgolover, perhaps this one.

Basic: a broken shape is when you allow your opponent to push through a small gap separating your groups.

Fundamental: Broken shapes hamper you ability to fight effectively, and while planning one's moves, one should look for sequences that don't give your opponent the opportunity to break your shape.

John Fairbairn wrote: , the emphasis on handicap games and handicap josekis is part of this process of passing on the fundamentals.

Handicaps... Look ma I'm playing the pink fluffy bunny Fuseki!

I think the best part of the article is the term "McDojo," which I hadn't heard before. People complain a lot about lack of popularity of go in the West, but if it were very popular, it would be profitable to create McDojos. There seems to be less mystique in go. I've never run into a go teacher that pretended that they could become invisible, for example. (Maybe if you pay ahead of time for lessons they will try, though. )