“Nutrients are essential chemical compounds found in food that the body needs to function properly, grow, and maintain overall health. They provide energy, build and repair tissues, and regulate various bodily processes.”
I propose that playing go against an opponent can be metaphorically equivalent to eating him/her as food (or playing them in Pong) and thus through correspondence of Go and biology can we gain practical mechanical advice.
“Eating (also known as consuming) is the ingestion of food. In biology, this is typically done to provide a heterotrophic organism [an organism that cannot produce food on its own, thus taking nutrition from other sources of organic carbon, mainly plant or animal matter] with energy and nutrients and to allow for growth.”
Let’s start with some parameters.
Go as a system can be modeled by equations. We can take our self-determined measures of efficiency, gain of influence, increased volume of surrounded territory, etc., and use them to determine our goals, level of skill, strategic ability, or whatever is deemed by the self necessary to be evaluated.
For example, a low kyu player may determine his identification/definition of “success” in a match along the lines of “Success equals applying effort in planning towards achieving a goal,” meaning that he/she is considering the match to be a success for them if they put in actual effort towards achieving a thought out goal (strategy), regardless of winning or losing. A stronger player may consider success along the lines of “Success is achieved upon the full realization of my strategically determined plan of action that has led to a victory over my opponent.” Success here being measured by victory achieved through thought out sequences of stone placement.
Now, the idea of us as two Minds “consuming” each other as we play is a model of the overall system of Go expressed through biological metaphor in order to gain practical knowledge of the underlying mechanics of the game.
For example, if we take the body’s metabolism function into consideration, we can compare our opponent to food that is broken down by chemical reactions into smaller molecules which releases energy to fuel our bodily processes. Energy is recognizable in the performance of work, which is defined as the energy transferred to or from an object via the application of force along a displacement. What is energy in go, as related to an “essential bodily function?”
It is the most elementary action, the placement of a stone. It is the playing of stones, one color after the other, that not only allows for any tactic or strategy to be implemented, but which on a fundamental level allows the game to be played at all.
The placing of a stone can be correlated to the unit of measurement of energy, the joule:
“One joule is equal to the amount of work done when a force of one newton displaces a body through a distance of one metre in the direction of that force.”
In Go this translates to "the game moves forward one turn (work done) by placing a stone (force displacing a body) on an unoccupied place on the board (distance of one metre) in a spot chosen by the player but dictated by the rules and previous placements of stones (direction of force).
You, my opponent, possess knowledge that is applied materially in the game we are playing. As we play, by using your knowledge you increase my own by my having to learn and adapt to the circumstances created by each stone played. The knowledge you turn into stone placement, your skill, is the nutrients I absorb to “function properly, grow, and maintain overall health.”
I can memorize passages in books, do practice tesuji problems, review my old games to locate errors, all of which might be considered food, but it is only in the playing of a game against an opponent that I can actually measure my ability to play well. The effective material application of my knowledge is measured against the opponent’s own and subsequently increased due to the adaptation required of competitive play. How can I know what I’ve learned and if I can apply any useful information if I don’t test it?
In summary, your skills maintain and increase my skills as we play. These are the nutrients that are essential for my growth and overall playing ability.
I look forward to devouring each and every one of you, as you devour me, so that we can grow as individuals and as a woldwide community of players.