Re: Me vs. Me

gnat <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> I just had an interesting experience.  I just got my first Go set 
> (woohoo) a folding board and some travel bowls with glass stones. 
>   Normally I just play on the KGS (automaton) server but because 
> I just got a new board and there was no one physically around to 
> play with I thought that I would play against myself...
> 
> I normally don't like to lose by more than 40 (I am still very 
> much a beginner) but when I played myself Black won (including 
> komi) by about 50 points.
> 
> I was surprised.  I thought that it would be a fairly even match. 
>   I tried hard for both sides.  It is the oddest feeling to make 
> a mistake on one side and then genuinely take advantage of it 
> with the next.
> 
> At any rate, I thought I would share that little story with you 
> and ask - is playing ones self a good way to practice?  Has 
> anyone else laughed at themselves for making a dumb move and then 
> mercilessly taken advantage of it?
> 
> It was fun anyways.

Very long ago, when I first learned about the game yet had nobody to
play with I tried playing against myself with a pensil on a sheet of
paper. Of course, I made a lot of mistakes and the games were shifted
one way or another very fast. This taught me a lot, I learned what
were loseing, what moves didn't keep balance.

Of course, there is a problem of blindness, you have no invent
everything yourself, nobody teaches you anything. Learning from your
opponents is a very good source. Unfortunately, your opponents tend to
teach of some moves and ideas that are good only at their level.

The post-mortem is also playing against yourself.