Shashin theory

[Peter Berger]

I'd like to understand the Shashin theory and what it says.
There are some ressources on the internet and most are outright strange to say the least. I don't want to buy any books though.

Somehow authentic does sound the following:
https://www.bs-chess.com/latin/lectures/shashin1.html (there is also a part 2)

I am afraid I don't understand most of this stuff. Given that someone managed to implement this into a computer program: is there a better and clearer resource you can point me to? I would be most grateful.

Peter

PS: and please keep this one on topic, dear reader, if you find the strength in you.

[Viz]

Just make bad changes and claim (based on 50-100-200 games with 97% draw rates test at best) that they scale to longer time controls, this is the state of modern shashin theory.

[noobpwnftw]

Is it even funny for someone to make up stuff under someone else's name and spread lies everywhere?

Your search yielded nothing should ring a bell to you already. A few people here are very admant in defending this scam. You should hear them out.

[Graham Banks]

I'd like to understand the Shashin theory and what it says.
There are some ressources on the internet and most are outright strange to say the least. I don't want to buy any books though.

Somehow authentic does sound the following:
https://www.bs-chess.com/latin/lectures/shashin1.html (there is also a part 2)

I am afraid I don't understand most of this stuff. Given that someone managed to implement this into a computer program: is there a better and clearer resource you can point me to? I would be most grateful.

Peter

PS: and please keep this one on topic, dear reader, if you find the strength in you.

https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/1936277468 ... d_us_au_nz

[Graham Banks]

There are some interviews with Shashin you could read. Here is one:
https://www.bs-chess.com/latin/lectures ... shin3.html

[noobpwnftw]

Reading the actual OP is appearently too much to ask.

[Graham Banks]

Reading the actual OP is appearently too much to ask.

I blame old age.

[Werewolf]

I'd like to understand the Shashin theory and what it says.
There are some ressources on the internet and most are outright strange to say the least. I don't want to buy any books though.

Somehow authentic does sound the following:
https://www.bs-chess.com/latin/lectures/shashin1.html (there is also a part 2)

I am afraid I don't understand most of this stuff. Given that someone managed to implement this into a computer program: is there a better and clearer resource you can point me to? I would be most grateful.

Peter

PS: and please keep this one on topic, dear reader, if you find the strength in you.

The very short and simple answer is that it's a modal way of thinking about chess. I know one of the top trainers in the world uses a similar (but different) appraoch - not at all using Shashin's ideas, but using a modal approach of his own.

1) The whole thing depends on a correct and deep position evaluation.
2) This then throws you into one of several modes (3 in Shashin's case).
3) You then do a search based on this mode.

For humans the modal approach makes a lot of sense because it has been shown that if you tell someone there is a forced win (for example) in a position they are far more likely to find it. However, Shashin's own implimentation simply is not practical in over-board-games because the evaluation function he proposes is far too slow for a human since it requires a lot of counting. It could work at correspondence chess though.

For engines...I'm not sure. It seems a bit false / artificial if you ask me.

[noobpwnftw]

Knowledge like "if I'm down a pawn then I should look for draws" hardly qualifies as a "theory" to begin with, then if I let that one slide, say you do have a well-defined set of rules from some theory to apply, tweaking pruning conditions with just boolean toggles or into some code yoinked from Crystal is hardly an honest implementation.

It is in the state of saying "it is as smart as a donkey" would be an insult to a donkey situation.

[Peter Berger]

The very short and simple answer is that it's a modal way of thinking about chess. I know one of the top trainers in the world uses a similar (but different) appraoch - not at all using Shashin's ideas, but using a modal approach of his own.

1) The whole thing depends on a correct and deep position evaluation.
2) This then throws you into one of several modes (3 in Shashin's case).
3) You then do a search based on this mode.

For humans the modal approach makes a lot of sense because it has been shown that if you tell someone there is a forced win (for example) in a position they are far more likely to find it. However, Shashin's own implimentation simply is not practical in over-board-games because the evaluation function he proposes is far too slow for a human since it requires a lot of counting. It could work at correspondence chess though.

For engines...I'm not sure. It seems a bit false / artificial if you ask me.

Thank you very much, Mr Werewolf - you apparently read the book itself (sth I was not ready to do). I didn't find anything nearly as clear as your post on the internet.
(Also thank you to Mr noobpwnftw for describing what I may find when I looked at the actual implementation in a chessprogram if I'd spent a lot of time and effort to understand).
I have always been fascinated by purely human efforts from and for humans to explain chess in a mostly algorithmic way. When I was a young teenager, there was a German IM named Opfermann ( a name that is kind of funny in itself if you know German) who managed to get his very personal theory on chess published as a cheap paperback in supermarkets, so he definitely wasted the time of tens of thousands of German speakers. He was all about mobility and space control, you were supposed to put little thingies on the board during training and count them to find out who is better. And so I did for some time, until I realized that his theory was nonsense (this one really was, Shashin may be way better).