BQM 211/ Discussion

Dieter: I think posting these diagrams as food for thought for the library is just great. Myself I would not want to write a book aimed at kyu players: I think it is as rare for me as for kyu players to play a sequence of good moves. Think of yourself when you see a 15 kyu judge a position of a beginner's game. How often don't you think "Yeah, but that's not the problem here." If I take a look at the reviews I have written for the GTL, many of my comments I'm glad they never made it to hard copy.

Alex Weldon: I agree with you to a certain extent. You and I are not quite at the level usually considered competent to write a serious book or article - as far as amateurs go, 4-6 dan seems to be the norm, so we're a few stones off. However, I think it's easier to edit a book for content than for style. That is, I think I can write a book and have one or more of my high-dan acquaintances check my theory and correct my diagrams, and have the end result turn out as least as well as if the same high-dan wrote the book and I edited the writing. I'm certainly not planning on printing anything that hasn't been read over by someone a few stones stronger than me.

Velobici: Alex, I really dont understand your statement I think it's easier to edit a book for content than for style. Content requires knowledge of the material. Style requires knowledge of the style or styles acceptable or customary for that type of material (fiction vs news vs textbook vs academic journal). I would venture that anyone capable of achieving a liberal arts B.A. can be trained to edit for style or anyone of several styles. The same is not true regarding the content of books. Content is much harder.....I hate to say it given my own miserable rank, but 1 dan amateur seems to correspond to a B.A. degree and 1 dan professional to completion of an advanced degree (MA or PhD). (Perhaps these are to close and it should be high school diploma and PhD considering the number of years of training required to make professional).

That said, would you read a Physics book written by a person with a B.S. in Physics? While they might be able to explain the material better (questionable proposition), the simplication of material from the PhD level to the B.S. level creates numerous inaccuracies....just look at Electrical Engineers to Calculus....yeah, we are going to move this summation sign outside the integration...cause, well, it just works...mathematicians wail and gnash their teeth at this cavalier attitude...mostly it works...when it doesnt it can be rather spectacular.

Alex Weldon: I said it's easier to edit content than edit style, not to write it originally. That's another issue entirely. What I mean is, given a first draft of a manuscript, it is easier to fix factual errors than poor writing, as the factual errors will be discrete and (assuming the writer knows anything about the material - I think 2-3 dan is adequate, for Go) limited to one or two per page. Poor writing, on the other hand, would permeate the entire manuscript and require a complete rewrite.

Would I read a physics text written by a BSc and not looked over by a PhD? Probably not. But if you gave me two people - one with a BSc in physics and a talent for writing and the other a PhD with poor English skills - and told me to organise the two of them to write a book together, I would suggest to them than the BSc write the first draft, and the PhD read it over and comment, rather than the other way around.

Andy: At any rate, problems of the sort: "how did white get herself into this mess, and what can she do to fix it?" are useful for players of all skill levels.