Sure. In case you’re not familiar with the bar, essays are most of the grade, and essay prompts tend to be elaborate fact patterns followed by questions like “What claims does Carol have against Dan?” You earn points by identifying legal issues, recalling the relevant principles, analyzing them in the given situation, and judging whether the claim is a winner or not, all within one hour each. Just about every part of this analogizes to Go:
Time management. This is obvious. You have to work within a limited time.
Identification. You have to identify the legal issues in play, similar to seeing candidate moves and possible continuations on the Go board.
Discernment. In essays and in Go, there’s important and non-important aspects. You have to identify what is important in the given situation and focus on that.
Knowledge. You have to remember pertinent legal principles, similar to remembering pertinent Go proverbs and principles. And you have to know what their limitations are, know how they relate to each other, and then apply the right ones to your particular situation.
Analysis. Legal analysis has the same branching factor as variations in Go. “So Dan threatened Carol with a chainsaw. Carol could say it was assault. Dan would answer that it was just threatening words. But Carol would argue that it still put her in apprehension of death. Dan might also say it was not accompanied by action. Carol would answer that Dan was holding the chainsaw, and that might be enough action to qualify. Next claim: maybe Dan inflicted emotional distress. Etc. Etc.”
Pattern recognition. You’ve seen this position before. You discussed it in torts class. It wasn’t a chainsaw then. It was a knife. How did the analysis go in that one? What were you supposed to think about in this kind of situation? What steps would you commonly apply?
Judgment. At the end of the day, you have to weigh the merits of everything you thought about and make a recommendation to Carol about whether to file the assault claim, or choose that move in Go.
I’m sure there’s other similarities I can’t think about now, but there’s a fly-by take.
No it doesn’t have to be. One can enjoy hobbies just for the pleasure they bring without any particular utility of course. But…
This was my impression also and so I got thinking about whether Go is really a “hobby with benefits” (if I can use such a phase!) or if the wider benefits are just some kind of illusion constructed by the enthusiasm of Go aficionados in a kind of self-justifying way.
I suppose if one could conduct some kind of scientifically rigorous long term studies then one might approach an answer but that seems unlikely. There are clearly some studies of certain aspects but so far they are not completely convincing to me. And then there are the more anecdotal accounts of benefits which seem to me to be problematic in that they don’t really help indicate causation even if they show correlation.
However, I’m becoming convinced that there are benefits to Go playing/study in the form of:
Mental health/staving off brain deterioration - not specific to Go but a benefit nevertheless that exercising ones brains is broadly equivalent to physical exercise in terms of general health and longevity benefits.
Providing a framework for thought - Go does seem useful as a tool that can be used by Go players who need to do some thinking in other fields. It seems like it can be helpful to draw analogies between lesser known areas (e.g. Law) and known ones (e.g. Go) to benefit studies in the new area. This is @mark5000’s example. Again, I don’t think this is unique to Go and clearly it’s not necessary to study Go to obtain these benefits but I find it an interesting one.
General philosophical ideas/“life lessons” - I like this one very much so am probably biased but as @lysnew said for those with more limited life experience it does seem that Go can provide a useful set of principles.
Finally, I must say that for me Go is not always fun. Sometimes it feels rather frustrating and even a chore. So thinking that there are wider benefits could be helpful for getting over those kind of hurdles.
The answer is none. When you play Go you use your brain. Unless Go stimulates a part of the brain that no other activity in existence does, then no skill, action, or benefit related to Go can be unique .
Well the problems are that anything general is necessarily not going to be specific to go. Maybe Chess does have all the useful things of go, that doesn’t make go any less useful.
“Why choose go over chess?” is a different question that “What general benefits does go have?” And it can come down to “This one teaches skill X more efficiently”, or “Do I just happen to like it more?”
About the question:
Go has started to work positively on my patience. It’s the single unique thing I decided to learn in my old age (I’m 37, don’t judge me ) that isn’t (in my understanding) similar to anything I’ve learned till now. So, the process of learning something for fun, that I am not talented in (it’s been relatively easy for me to learn things all my life and Go unveiled that, um, I’m not that great) and coming to terms that I will progress really slowly, is been great in calming my mind when I think about it.
And also on my self-esteem, since I’m apparently still capable of learning something new, unrelated to work and/ or building on things I already know.
So, although I can’t say wonderful things about Go making me supersmart or unlocking new dimensions in my brain, it has helped me mentally in other ways.
I am the same age and can also make this statement . I too feel that Go is teaching me many lessons, one of which is Humility. I excel at many things in life and Go is one of those equalizing hobbies that reminds me the value of patience and hard work.
I think the conversation about the benefits of Go seems to regularly center around what Go can achieve, in terms of helping you grow, that nothing else is really does as well. Which always devolves into a debate about if Go provides these benefits uniquely or at least to a greater degree than anything else might.
Which is unfortunate, because when the conversation focuses on “What Benefits I Personally Perceive Go Provides For Me”, I think the debate fades away and is replaced by a bunch of excited enthusiasts. I also agree with what some others have said, about once you play Go you can easily draw parallels between Go and many other aspects of life.
For me I find this exciting and a source of wonder. The way my brain so readily compares situations in life to Go or how I can use Go to easily explain a metaphorical concept to another Go player. Go really does have so much to offer and teach us.
I enjoy other abstract games but nothing really compares to it. My brain obsesses, day dreams, and plays with Go (away from the board) to a degree that nothing else even comes close to. I’m so happy that I began this journey and I hope it continues to enrich my life and the life of my family for the foreseeable future .
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. I too feel that Go is teaching me many lessons, one of which is Humility. I excel at many things in life and Go is one of those equalizing hobbies that reminds me the value of patience and hard work.
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