Yourself?

4 stones from God.

There was PDP today which went pretty well. I thought the patient was really nice, and of course, I got over my jitters really quickly. It is a little like making friends with a total stranger, and talking about really personal questions in a really short time. There is this implicit trust in doctors, nurses and medical students alike, at least from this patient today. From my professors, and fellow students alike, I can see how we've earned it. But I also know that not all doctors are like that. Over the years, I'm sure some will get disillusioned. Will I be one of them?

Anyway the title is this whoa I got when I saw Prof Peter Huang's room. It is really filled up to the brim with books. I thought immediately of the Weiqi association, and of all the games that have taken place in the whole of Weiqi's history. That really, it takes alot of reading and a lot of hard work to get to where the profs are right now. Kinda like how those people in the overseas weiqi associations spend entire years devoted to reviewing and memorizing past games. When you become a pro, you know about 200 Weiqi books worth of games. To compete with the best in the world, you need to know about 6000 books worth.

Back when i was still taking lessons, I remember this other student telling me that Yang laoshi actually reviewed a game with him, one year after they played together, to show him his improvements over the year. I was pretty surprised to know of that. How many games are there actually in a professional's head? How vast is the human memory? I can barely remember 40 moves in a game. Maybe a full game of 200 moves if I play through it three times. But to remember a single game out of so many, when in a classroom situation the teacher plays 6 to 8 students, over a course of an hour, over the course of a year. How big is the human mind?

The top pro (not currently tho) Otake Hideo once said that he would need to take 3 or 4 stones from God.

(Go has handicap stones between players of different levels, the weaker player gets extra stones on the board at predefined locations at the start of the game. This can be converted into extra territory [one stone is worth about 10 points on the board], or used to exert influence in the hope of gaining more territory as the game progresses)

It's sobering that no matter how hard we try, we are always that bit short of perfection. Has the gap between our best Weiqi players and God always been that of 4 stones? How big is the gap between physicians and God? 4 stones by the way, is a lot. It means that if two players with a 4 stone difference play between each other, the better side is expected to win more than 80% of the time. After the handicap is given, this ratio should decrease to 50%, or slightly in favour of the weaker player.

Are doctors today 4 stones away from God? We've practiced medicine for as long as we have played Weiqi, for almost as long as we have documented ourselves living and dying. Can we save 20% of the patients at death's door?

Weiqi has an almost infinite number of moves sequences to fill the board. More atoms than the universe. Similarly with patients. Their diseases can have all sorts of causes. A genetic mutation, a new strain of virus, bacterial infection, inflammation, immunologic reactions. There are many ways to die (in both things). But luckily we also have professionals at the forefront, lookout out for us, explaining why this is good, why that is bad. And I'm happy to be part of this entire legacy I guess.

Receiving knowledge, and contributing to it if I can. Getting closer to God one stone at a time.

posted by Downhere. @ 12:04 am