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Comment by conanbatt | Hacker News Reader

I cant speak much for lee sedol's mind :)

I dont think he wants to play alphago again. Go is a game that relies a lot on confidence: professional players almost never play amateur players casually, for example. Thats because if they lose to an amateur player, it will affect their mindset, their confidence, and they could then perform worse in the real professional tournament.

An argentinian amateur beat 2 strong professionals back then in 2001 in a major professional tournament: it was a huge sensation. Those two professionals basically disappeared from high ranking tournaments forever. It was said that the setback was so severe it affected them permanently(purely hearsay).

Its not good for a professional to play a game he thinks he will lose.

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>Its not good for a professional to play a game he thinks he will lose.

That's interesting, any ideas where this attitude comes from? I feel like that's the opposite of a lot of other sports and games, where the ability to take a bad loss and come back improved is seen as an important skill.

I have no idea how to play Go but reading his responses are quite and interesting and insightful into the realm. Go does seem very different from other kinds of sport. I guess this stems from the fact that it can't be brute forced so it's very much a game that goes by feel, intuition and experience?

Go is also seen as a martial art and much of its underpinnings are spiritual in nature. It's a much different beast than chess from a cultural standpoint, hence the somewhat strange replies.

I feel like defeat in Go is much more intense, even at an amateur level. In Sport you get all these hormones throughout the game that you kind of feel good even if you lose. In Go if you lose it's a direct attack to your intelligence. Losing a Go game is really stressful (imo). But then I get really stressed when I play starcraft too.

Hm, i dont think this is it.

To play go well you need balance. It requires intense emotional training. Any feeling you have during a game must be reigned in immediately because it will cloud your judgemnet and it does so in a way you cant understand.

Think of Go as a conversation. Lets stay you are having a civil conversation about a topic with someone, and the other person throws an insult in the middle. Will your next messages look the same as the ones before? Of course not, because you will be rattled, or offended, or something, and thus the tone and content of your messages will change immediately.

If that happens to you in Go, you are on a path of self destruction.

So losing a game to an amateur could be something in your mind, as an insult, that just modifies you a bit, even just temporary. But it does, so you feel contaminated.

As a relatively new player I do find losses extremely upsetting very often, unless I've only lost by a few points against someone at the same level as me; I guess I have some learning to do :)

Not really, I've seen amateur 1-2 Dan insulting the other player before leaving a game (online), or just trolling to piss off the other player. People get really childish in Go because it's hard to accept defeat in this game.

Sounds like this behaviour would limit new ideas. Doesn't that produce a culture where the top pros try to execute the old ideas against a known opponent better, rather than be great overall?

There is something related to effort as well. When i was studying in korea at a point, there was a small 9x9 board tournament in the school.

After playing move 2, i realized that i had become strong enugh to read the game until the outcome was decided. Its not like i was 9x9 perfect player, but i had enough reading power to count the score with an empty board.

It would take me 20-30 minutes to finish the game. I won that small tournament knowing exactly the score of each game and when i was losing and turned around games. After that, i never played 9x9 again. I dont like it, becuase i know i can lplay very well, but its a tremendous effort that i dont want to do.

A professional has to save face against an amateur, because losing would affect his reputation, his mindset etc. So a pro would be more reluctant to play a strong player than a weak player, where he might be able to use less effort.

A short way of putting it: professionals dont play for fun, so why would they play for free for anyone?

> A short way of putting it: professionals dont play for fun, so why would they play for free for anyone?

But fun is probably what got you guys into this game, right?

I got what you meant but for a lot of people it will probably read like it's not a pleasurable activity for you guys anymore.

A counter-example would be a pro Soccer playing saying he never plays casual matches with his friends anymore because he earns to do it. That does not happen and I believe it's the same with you guys in Go, right?

Thank you for answering all the questions and doubts, I've been reading everything and it's been a blast :)

> A counter-example would be a pro Soccer playing saying he never plays casual matches with his friends anymore because he earns to do it. That does not happen and I believe it's the same with you guys in Go, right?

OTOH, I know collegiate soccer players that can't handle "stepping down" to local rec leagues. They learn an aggressiveness appropriate to the one domain, and can't turn it off in the other. I consider that a maturity issue, but it is an issue for people accustomed to one level of performance and competition trying to step into another.

Do you know what Pro Go players play for fun? Catan :)

Once you step into the professional aspect, you do not enjoy the game anymore. Its a passion thing. If you wanted to spend more time on the board at any point, it would be studying, not goofing around playing.

> But fun is probably what got you guys into this game, right?

Hardly. Almsot all professional players were exposed to the game at 4 years old, more like indoctrination. And as a grown up, if you start late (like I did, at 16), when you dream of professionality, the joy goes away, its more like a passionate driven goal of self sacrifice.

>I dont think he wants to play alphago again. Go is a game that relies a lot on confidence: professional players almost never play amateur players casually, for example. Thats because if they lose to an amateur player, it will affect their mindset, their confidence, and they could then perform worse in the real professional tournament.

Sheesh, are their ego's really so brittle?

Confidence and ego are different things. Self-doubt can affect your play, as in any sport. Doesn't mean that you're butthurt.

Theres a famous anecdote by Kitani Minoru, a famous Go player from the early 1900's that made a go school where every major 70's japanese player came from.

He would scout talent in the country and once found a couple of brothers that played go. He played a game with the eldest, and he beat the eldest. He accepted his defeat quickly and offered Kitani to play again, that he wanted revenge.

Kitani politely refused and played his younger brother. Kitan wins again, but the youngest bursts into crying. He was deeply upset at the loss and could not play another game even if he wanted to.

Who do you think Kitani recommended to follow the path of a professional Go Player?

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