
Practice Doesn't Make Perfect - agarden
http://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/practice-doesnt-make-perfect
======
hal9000xp
I have my own theory. The idea is that there are lots, lots and lots of tiny
unspoken things which could make huge difference in long run. And those who
successful doesn't necessary know their own tiny things they got right.

Let's say there are two persons A and B who is training in chess. Person A
trained for X hours and became chess master. Person B trained for 10X hours
and didn't get even close to master level.

The truth is that person A got some tiny unspoken ideas right (may be he even
discovered them by coincidence). And person B got this tiny things wrong. No
matter how much person B is training, he or she won't improve in chess until B
find right way.

Sad story is that A couldn't even realize what exactly he got right and take
it for granted. So when A explains B how he train/play, he or she could say
very high level things (which you can find in any grandmaster book) skipping
huge unspoken context.

That's why many people who read books written by chess grandmasters, don't
become grandmasters. Chess grandmaster could try to explain you how he or she
plays but these words has very limited power since unspoken context matters
most.

So if you didn't progress much in chess after learning theory and practising
and reading grandmaster's book, it could mean that you just missed something
very fundamental tiny thing which nobody speaks about. May be your spatial
representation of how pieces move in the board is not suitable that's why for
you it requires more computational power to imagine whole dynamics of some
given chess position. May be if you play other similar games and then return
to chess, you fix your spatial representation of chess in your head. May be
even solving math geometric puzzles will help you with that.

My point is that if you don't progress don't give up but don't bang your head
against the wall. Instead think about more delicate things happen in your
brain. Your goal is to find tiny thing in your head and fix it. I do believe
if you find this needle in haystack, then you could make huge breakthrough.

I think true intellect lies in metacognition. I mean how you think about
thinking, how you think about learning.

~~~
djaychela
Absolutely. I'm a guitarist, and have been for over 30 years. I'm good, but
not REALLY good, and I hit a wall in terms of technical ability / speed a long
time ago - after about 5 years of playing. Nothing I did improved my speed and
I didn't have the accuracy of a Malmsteen or MacAlpine, despite practicing
religiously for hours at a time. I thought I had a speed limit and that was
that - everyone I consulted felt the same.

It's only been in the last few months and via complete luck on YouTube that I
appear to have discovered the missing piece of the jigsaw (two way pick
slanting) - had I known this when I was 18 I would have been of a much higher
level. Being 45, having old bad habits to overcome and the demands of a family
with 4 kids and a chronic bad back means I don't have the time to devote to
the improvements I'd love to make, but from my experience, I know that
"practice" is not enough, it needs to be the right practice, and sometimes
that means a subtle nuance which is not apparent to some, maybe for years.
I've helped some of the kids I teach in a similar way, with them then
"getting" an idea they've not understood for a long time, so there needs to be
more analysis than simply "practice", in my opinion.

~~~
WalterBright
This is why having a good coach can make all the difference. It does no good
practicing the wrong techniques.

~~~
kavalg
Indeed. I've been playing the kaval (an end blown flute) for more than 10
years and there have been many times when I'd hit the wall. I also play a bit
of guitar, but kaval has been much harder to master. I think that this is
because, when compared to guitar, kaval has a lot more independent variables,
such as breathing, embouchure(lip shape), throat, how hard you push the
instrument to your lips, how your hands take turns pushing the instrument to
your lips and also some special kinds of vibrato and articulation. With so
many independent variables to control it is really inevitable that you fall
victim into this "unspoken context". I realized this a couple of years ago
when I had the chance to spend time with some of the greatest masters of the
instrument. Since I already had some practice and skills behind me, I asked a
lot of questions and tried to get as deep as possible in every single nuance
of the techniques. I was really surprised to find out that those great masters
can't actually explain a lot of things that they do. As you guys said, maybe
they just got it right early enough (e.g. by chance). In the beginning I did
not believe it, but when I encountered this with several great performers I
changed my approach radically. First, I stopped playing for a few months in
order to get rid of some bad baggage that I may have accumulated and to start
fresh. Then I started watching videos of these masters with the audio turned
off and I would then practice in front of a mirror. At some point I discovered
that some of the movements that I do are the same as the ones I've seen on the
video and focused on them (recording your sessions also helps). This has
helped me progress much better. So how do you get as much of this "unspoken
context"? Well it depends on your own strengths and abilities. I'd say that it
is crucial to seek close contact with great performers that are way ahead of
you. E.g. go to live performances, seminars or if that's not possible, just
watch videos of these. I must admit that one of these masters, who is also a
teacher has given me some really great advice on things I have to improve.
This is because he not only got those unspoken things right, but also fully
realized them mentally, so he can turn them into advice. But those teachers
are really rare to find.

~~~
WalterBright
I have some friends in the dance business. Even (especially!) the top
professionals routinely hire various coaches to see if they'll catch something
missed. They'll also regularly go right back to the basics of how to take a
step. They'll be in the studio just walking back and forth.

What's weird about dance is what looks natural and elegant to the observer is
a rather contorted and sometimes painful position for the dancer.

~~~
p0nce
There is a saying for vocal coaches that singing before going to see one is
mostly useless, and that it's a 10 year journey, starting with their lessons,
towards being an adequate singer.

------
CuriouslyC
This is a case where I really doubt that the studies referenced in the article
were rigorous/well controlled. There are WAY too many talent "hot zones"
(small training clubs that produce an extremely inordinate number of
champions) for me to be swayed without iron-clad evidence to the contrary.

The author talks about being motivated, but I don't think she really
understands the scale of motivation. Mozart would typically play until his
fingers bled, and they grew somewhat deformed from the volume of playing as a
youth. When he wasn't playing, I'm willing to bet he was thinking about or
somehow otherwise engaged with music. That is the kind of passion that makes a
true master.

The author also talks about her teacher being good. Compared to what? How many
music teachers did she have? If teaching ability is normally distributed, even
if she had 20 teachers (extremely doubtful), the best teacher in the country
is probably two standard deviations above anyone she had in skill. That is a
freaking huge difference.

Outside of certain things like being a gymnast or a football lineman where
body morphology is absolutely critical, I'm pretty sure talent is overrated.
The exact amount of influence it exerts certainly depends on the activity, but
I doubt in most cases that it exceeds 2-3 percentile point shift in absolute
potential. Unfortunately, when you are at the highest level of competition
(e.g. olympics) the spread is probably somewhere between 99.9 and 99.999, so
someone at 96.9 isn't going to be competitive.

~~~
bagacrap
Wouldn't a small, elite training club only take in a relatively small number
of athletes that have already shown innate talent? Likewise, top universities
will turn out a large number of top scientists. They've already selected for
potential at the point of admission.

~~~
jacobolus
What about the Polgár sisters?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/László_Polgár](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/László_Polgár)

~~~
eveningcoffee
It appears, after reading this article, that the sisters actually had a very
talented father and therefore possibly very good prerequisites to become what
they did.

He should have accepted the proposed experiment of raising adoptees the same
way he did with his children.

------
mikebenfield
I read The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance, co-edited
by K. Anders Ericsson, the psychology professor mentioned in this article. His
work inspired Malcolm Gladwell's popular work on deliberate practice.

I found Ericsson and co's ideas to be completely counter to their data. A lot
of the articles were based on case studies. They studied wrestlers and
wrestling coaches, for instance. The wrestling coaches were adamant that their
selection process of weeding out less talented athletes and spending their
effort grooming the ones who showed lots of promise was one of the keys to
success. Somehow the authors completely ignored or glossed over lots of bits
like that, strongly emphasized the obvious fact that successful wrestlers
practiced a lot, and came to the ridiculous conclusion that practice is the
only thing that matters.

On a related note, here is a quote from Ericsson that appears in the article:

“Differences between expert and less accomplished performers reflect acquired
knowledge and skills or physiological adaptations effected by training, with
the only confirmed exception being height.”

This is so disingenuous it's hard to know where to start. Consider
powerlifting champion Andy Bolton. He deadlifted 600 lbs at 18 years old the
first time he ever lifted weights. I have been lifting weights for 20 years
and have never deadlifted 600 lbs. Bill Kazmaier is another one: he benched
300 lbs the first time he ever tried, and benched 400 a month later. These
guys were in a position to win local and regional powerlifting competitions
with basically no training at all. And here's Ericsson saying there's no such
thing as talent.

~~~
hnarn
When you say "these guys were in a position to win local and regional
powerlifting competitions with basically no training at all", do you have any
similar examples for things like chess tournaments? Because if not, you're
kind of disproving yourself. Of course genetics can assist you in becoming a
good chess player but I have a hard time seeing how a genius who never played
chess before just sits down, learns the game and then beats a grand master on
the first try through genetics alone.

~~~
dredmorbius
There are numerous cases in mathematics. I can't put names on incidents but:

* The schoolboy who realised the algorithm for adding the integers 1 - 100.

* The UC Berkeley Graduate student who solved 2-3 "extra credit" final exam questions ... only to discover they were previously unsolved proofs.

Chess isn't an area I'm closely familiar with, but there absolutely have been
prodigies there as well. Many in music.

~~~
mikebenfield
FYI, the schoolboy is CF Gauss, early 19th century German mathematician who
did... tons of stuff. (That's why so much in mathematics and physics is called
"Gauss" or "Gaussian.")

The graduate student was George Dantzig. While I think Dantzig is certainly an
example of extraordinary natural talent, if your parent comment was looking
for examples of talent manifesting itself before any training at all, I don't
think this qualifies. As a grad student in math, Dantzig had already spent
years studying mathematics by this point.

~~~
dredmorbius
Thanks, I suspected someone would provide the names.

On Dantzig: there's training, and there's the capability to come on a problem
cold, treat it as an ordinary exam question, and find a solution within a day
or so, to something which had dogged the rest of the maths world for _years_
or _decades_.

I'm not denying that Dantzig had had formal training by this point. But he'd
also accomplished in small time what others hadn't in big.

------
jondubois
It's pretty obvious that practice isn't enough. There are so many examples all
around us.

If someone is born with down syndrome, they are extremely unlikely to graduate
from university. If someone's eyesight isn't perfect, they will probably never
become a commercial pilot. If you're autistic, you probably won't become a
professional negotiator...

There are so many cases, sometimes rooted in tiny genetic differences which
can make a huge difference when it comes to winning and losing...

And when you take luck into account; you could argue that even the most
genetically fit human for a specific field is unlikely to become the best in
that field even if they practice non-stop. There is so much luck involved, a
single tiny problem can ruin an entire career before it even starts.

~~~
stangles1
What does having perfect eyesight have to do with becoming a commercial pilot?
In the US, you can become a commercial pilot as long as your vision can be
corrected to 20/20 [0].

[0].
[https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/av...](https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/avs/offices/aam/ame/guide/standards/)

------
something_
Growing up, my grandfather tried to instill two major ideas in me and my
siblings. The first being that perfect was an impossible goal, only achievable
under artificial circumstances. Secondly, that practice makes permanent, so be
mindful of what you're practicing.

The first part always seemed reasonable, but I have had a lot of trouble with
the second part. I recently gave up playing golf when I finally realized I had
spent 20 years practicing being angry.

~~~
mikestew
_Secondly, that practice makes permanent, so be mindful of what you 're
practicing._

That's a pretty common trope amongst musicians, as one example. If you play a
part wrong, go back and get it right. Otherwise, all that you're "practicing"
is how to play it wrong.

------
ACEace
Being a "professor at a music conservatory in Russia" does not necessarily say
much about how good of a music _teacher_ this person was. Especially in a
competitive field like concert piano. There are probably thousands of people
who studied piano from a teacher who was a professor at a music conservatory
in Russia. They can't all become world-class.

Ericsson's research stresses "deliberate" practice and previous criticisms of
his research were based on studies of just practice - but not specifically
"deliberate" practice. It's not just 10,000[1] hours of practice... it's
10,000 hours of practice the right way and ideally with an effective teacher.
I admit those caveats make it harder to study his claims in a research
environment, but it also doesn't mean research based only on total time
practicing disprove his research.

[1] And I know it's not really 10,000 hours. Using that metric to make a
comparison.

~~~
projektir
> ...it's 10,000 hours of practice the right way and ideally with an effective
> teacher.

There are a few problems with this.

One is that it's unfalsifiable. For any given case of failure you simply say
the practice was not deliberate enough.

Two is that we do not have that ideal environment for deliberate practice.
There are only so many music conservatories. That's a resource problem.

Three is that we do not know what actually constitutes proper deliberate
practice, and that the informational component of the practice is a lot more
important than the hard work component. In the common regurgitation of this
phrase and the principle, it's typically told the other way around - as if we
have already figured out how to deliberately practice, and you can just go do
the work. See my rather large post above.

Finally, practice even with the best information can't compensate for motor
problems and other related issues, at least, I don't see how. There are most
likely genes that code for various degrees of the quality of the physical
apparatus, and then there are people whose body is more messed up than normal
in general.

> There are probably thousands of people who studied piano from a teacher who
> was a professor at a music conservatory in Russia. They can't all become
> world-class.

This is an important point. If you have thousands of people trying to do
something, they can't all become world class. Even if you have the absolute
best methods, if they are more or less equally practiced, you'll get a
homogenization effect and the best practitioners would be purely random. The
more this happens, the more inappropriate it is to tell someone that they can
become the best, because it requires some weird negative assumptions about all
the other participants. It's not even work or genetics at that point, but just
general randomness. This is not a problem that necessitates solving, it's an
artificial one.

------
FrozenVoid
Thats refinement versus improvement. Practice requires understanding, blindly
copying and refining is always limited. "Hitting a wall" is like brain neural
network stuck at local optimum, which requires forgetting and relearning.

Lets take example with Sudoku: if you know the basics(marking candidates and
eliminating rows/columns), you can solve easy puzzles with practice only, but
you'll be stuck solving mid-level puzzles. Mid-level puzzles require intuitive
understanding of column-row exclusion(where X number candidates in a block are
exclusively on one row or column they exclude X from entire row or column),
but aren't sufficient for solving high-level puzzles. High-level play requires
knowledge of subsets, X-wings,XY chains,coloring, etc to solve the hardest
puzzles(and practicing doesn't help, it requires intuitive understanding to
find such patterns).

------
bradhe
I used to have a band teacher who said "practice doesn't make perfect. Perfect
practice makes perfect."

~~~
caub
that's it I agree, but what does perfect mean also? perfect absolutely,
compared to your potential, or relatively to others?

~~~
odessacubbage
there's a difference between grinding out technique and actively confronting
the your weaknesses, especially those that have nothing to do with technique
e.g confidence, ego etc. there's also the question as to what percentage of
practice time is spent trying to replicate the masters as opposed to deepening
your understanding of the underlying mechanics or developing intuition. you
learn more from a poor creation than a perfect copy.

as for talent, i still think schmid summed it up the best 'Don't bother about
whether or not you have it. Just assume that you do, and then forget about it.
Talent is a word we use after someone has become accomplished. There is no way
to detect it before the fact... or to predict when or if mastery will click
into place.'

------
alfonsodev
"When the student is ready the teacher will appear" To me it means that you:

\- cultivate genuine curiosity

\- You can voluntarily leave your ego apart

\- You are good observing

\- Not afraid to ask, when reaching certain level some people are afraid to
ask others, fearing of being perceived weaker.

Then you start learning those 'unspoken' things mentioned in other comments,
also you become more open to mimic what other 'masters' do. I think is related
with mirror neurons, and that saying that you become the average of those you
have around. I agree hitting walls doesn't make perfect.

------
_Codemonkeyism
I found this highly interesting

" But for education and professions like computer science, military-aircraft
piloting, and sales, the effect ranged from small to tiny."

From teaching programming for some years, giving programming workshops to top
management, some people got it and others didn't _. Since then I 've wondered
how much programming is teached, practice or inherent in people. Not sure to
this day.

_ I could be a bad teacher, I wonder about that too.

------
roel_v
What happened to that guy that gave up his job to spend 10k hours practicing
golf in order to test the "10k hour makes perfect" theory? I was reading the
article expecting that to come up. A quick google doesn't find anything on
what/how he's doing today (it wasn't this guy, was it?)

~~~
swang
you're thinking of this guy: [http://thedanplan.com/](http://thedanplan.com/)

basically he was going to reach his 10k hour goal next month (Oct 2016) but
back in Nov 2015 he had to take a hiatus due to a back injury. Not sure what
has happened since he hasn't posted since Nov 2015.

~~~
roel_v
That's the one, thanks. A bit more sleuthing shows he's given up on The Dan
Plan and is now selling soda: [http://portlandsyrups.com/our-
story/](http://portlandsyrups.com/our-story/) . Too bad it didn't work out.

------
dgregd
My summary of the whole discussion:

genius_level = talent_genes * hard_work * know_how

talent_genes - natural ability to be good at something

hard_work - amount of practice, willingness to practice hard is determined by
genes, but can be also artificially increased by the demanding parents or
trainers

know_how - knowledge of discipline secrets by coaches or teachers

------
r2dnb
Someone said : practice does not make perfect, only practice of perfection
does.

Too few people realize it.

------
TheSpiceIsLife
I haven't click through to the article yet, so I'll just respond to the
headline now with something I've been saying for a long time:

Practice doesn't necessarily make perfect, it could very well just make you
habitually wrong.

~~~
shiro
"Practice doesn't make perfect, it makes permanent", my music teachers say.

------
rhapsodic
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the book "The Talent Code" by Daniel
Coyle.[1] I play several stringed instruments and applying the concepts in
that book has made a huge difference in my rate of progress. He talks a lot
about Ericsson's work, and is firmly in the camp that believes that
improvement can always be achieved through practice, when the practice is done
properly.

[1] [http://thetalentcode.com/](http://thetalentcode.com/)

------
pritishc
The bit about athletic performance for the average, advanced and elite
categories is fascinating. I had read about this phenomenon in Mark Rippetoe's
Starting Strength, and reading it here again makes so much sense.

The title really should be "Practice _Alone_ Doesn't Make Perfect". We all
have our own genetic potential, but how much of it we're able to harvest then
depends on how we are nurtured and how much we're willing to push ourselves.
Makes a lot of sense.

------
zerognowl
Maybe somebody can elaborate on the fine distinction of Skill vs Talent?

Skill:
[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/skill](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/skill)

Talent:
[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/talent](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/talent)

I'm slightly confused as both these entries in Wiktionary sound like each
other!

~~~
falcolas
Talent is the foundation, theoretically an unbounded positive value set in
stone. Skill is like a 0-1 multiplier applied over the top of talent to
produce the final output.

Talent boils down to physiology, but skill is the ability to use that
physiology correctly.

IMO, of course.

------
projektir
The Sports Gene already reduced my confidence in Ericsson's studies in
particular. They were not very extensive and there was effectively no control
group.

An important thing to remember, though, is that these things are really,
really hard to study. The meta-analysis is likely to be negative information
in how accurate it is. "deliberate practice" is not a valid term, you can
create a whole new field to figure out what it means to "deliberately
practice" for any given thing, and there's no evidence whatsoever that we're
any good at it. We're trying to measure the efficacy of something the purpose
of which is... well, that very thing.

I'd posit that the entire discussion is absurd...

What matters more depends entirely on where you stick your goalposts. That is,
it doesn't matter at all. The question doesn't actually make sense.

Hard work matters... among people who are extremely similar to each other. And
if we take the hypothesis that hard work is also genetic, it's yet another
trait by which those two people are actually different. Outside of the equal
genetics factor, hard work matters in a given genetic composition vs hard work
in another genetic composition. Very boring equation: genetics1 + hardWork1
vs. genetics2 + hardWork2. Each of the 4 values has a max. Which one matters
more? What a silly question! Depends on what the values are! We even have a
saying for this: "Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard."

Genetics matter so disproportionately that the only reason the genetics vs
hard work discussion can hold at all is because we're always having it within
carefully defined goalposts around some area we're unsure about. Hard work is,
effectively, always given value in situations where genetics are perceived to
be "equal enough". The Sports Gene has a section on women in sports and all
the interesting implications that entails. It's fairly obvious to everyone
that women can't compete with men on, say, physical strength. And people
without legs can't compete with runners. Usain Bolt is nowhere near as fast as
a cheetah. Let's not talk about Down Syndrome. All that should have shut down
the genetics vs hard work argument long time ago. The only reason it didn't is
because we moved the goalposts.

Because as long as we move the goalposts, we can keep things interesting. As
long as we don't know why someone won, we can get excited about it. We can
talk about hard work, dedication, cunning, special approaches, whatever we
want to do. It's all dice in the end, but as long as we don't see it, and as
long as we can fool ourselves, we love it. We want the randomness. We want to
be surprised. Azart.

I'd argue if you're actually trying to measure something, not merely entertain
yourself, you don't get to keep moving the goalposts.

But the absurdity is just beginning.

Genetics and hard work are hilariously inferior to information.

I can read and write, because that has been granted to me by society. I can
tell a computer what to do, because that framework and profession was created
for me. I can lift weights, because someone told me I can. I know where I am,
because someone made me a map. I have a chance of learning quantum mechanics,
because someone was there to describe them, perhaps even in ways that someone
like me can understand. Consider the weight of that: a person with inferior
genetics and inferior hard work can get a free informational transfer* from a
person with superior genetics and superior hard work. No person of the past,
no matter how intelligent or hard working, has any chance against that...

This is also why "deliberate practice" is such a tautological concept - a lot
of it is information dependent. If you have much better knowledge on how to
practice something you can go a long way.

It gets worse.

People without legs can't compete with runners. I just said that earlier.
Well, unless they get metal legs... creating so many problems for people who
are now trying to figure out what that means and where we need to stick the
goalposts next time. [The whole concept of "cheating" implies goalposts.]

People with certain mental illnesses can't do a whole host of things. But if
they can get certain medication and therapy, they suddenly can.

People had genetics to be tall, but they ate so poorly it didn't matter. [the
article touches on a few things like this and refers to them as environment,
but I think the overall thing is a lot wider]

Athletes engage in some interesting substances to boost performance in ways
never before possible.

I can't outrun a cheetah. I can't fly like a bird. Doesn't matter how hard I
try. Will never, ever happen. Nobody would even suggest it. I don't have the
genetics for it. Doesn't matter, I have an airplane.

My memory may be poor, but I have notes and my phone and lots of other tools.
My eyesight at night may be bad, I should be sleeping at this time, but I have
the electric light.

The degree to which my fate is affected by information and causality is
obscene. In comparison, my hard work, even my genetics, are nothing, beyond
the very fact that I am a somewhat healthy human, which is also a product of
these very things.

Why, then, are we in such despair? We're improving at an alarming rate! Maybe
we're not getting more intelligent and our genetics are not getting that much
better but we're still so much more capable of actually achieving things than
our ancestors. Why is this so invisible, and why we care so little?

Well, because of competition. When we improve things, we often do it across
the board for a large area. Not all that fairly, not all that proportionately,
but, at the end of the day, almost everyone gets access to that Wikipedia
webpage, and almost everyone gets access to that car. So the things that
matter the most, apply to everyone, and the only thing left is the small
portion that genetics and hard work take up. Because we've equalized
everything else, and because we can't be satisfied with merely just living
better, we have to find that last small portion and decide based on it who
deserves to live how, because there's simply nothing else left.

For those who understand it, it promotes hoarding power and information.
Promoting the notion that hard work or genetics is all that matters moves the
attention from the more important things. And that's why you'll never get a
clear answer on the whole genetics thing because information and causality
absolutely, unambiguously matters. That's probably your Flynn effect. It only
doesn't matter in your eyes because you are looking at people who both got the
major benefits so genetics and work start kicking in.

We could be elated that we have more children than ever who can read and
write, we have so much information available freely that the informational
transfer is staggering, we have so many means and tools that modern high
school athletes are beating Olympic athletes of the past. This is far greater
progress than genetics could even dream of. We could understand how this was
all achieved, and how much is gained from every individual person growing,
pool our resources, research ways for better information transfer, discover
new information, and develop superior tools and enhancements for the human.

But, instead, we're worried about whether or not this particular human can run
1 second faster than this other one. And we agonize over this meager
improvement and how to get it. And how to promote it. Because we decided only
the very best one deserves anything. We're looking for the diamond in the
rough because we don't think the rest of humanity deserve it, all because
they're not contributing 100% to a .00000000001% of their fate.

Can you become a musician? Maybe. Maybe not. But don't limit your options to
just work and genetics, there are more powerful forces in this world.

* Disclaimer: some amount of intelligence and work required.

~~~
Lordarminius
> Genetics and hard work are ... inferior to information

I have never seen it put better.

The Soviet Union had a stranglehold on chess for almost 70 years until its
collapse in the nineties. Then information fled with grandmasters to the west
and the present bloom in talent began. Westerners began to regularly defeat
soviet players. An Indian, then a Norwegian became world champion. Before
then, it was a small miracle to defeat a soviet player. Reason? Information.

My personal experience: I played chess with a lot of frustration and little
improvement for over a decade until I began reading 'honest' books written by
Soviet trainers. That was I began to see progress.I gained approximately 200
elo in one year.(I would estimate that 90% of chess books for intermediate
players are crap, some of these are deliberately misleading hence the 'honest'
term)

 _Genetics and hard work are vastly inferior to information_

~~~
ambicapter
What did the Soviet books talk about that the other books were ignoring?

~~~
Lordarminius
>What did the Soviet books talk about that the other books were ignoring?

Amongst other things they introduced better training methods; diligent
classification and cataloging of common and critical positions. For instance,
a systematic introduction to pryomes and positional maoeuvers. These books
were written by people who had mastered the craft as players or coaches of
elite players. Improvement in chess to a large part entails becoming
conversant with known positions and manoeuvers.

Recall that it was almost treason to reveal the techniques that soviet
grandmasters used. This was one reason why Korchnoi was harrassed.

Three examples of fantastic books:

[1]Find the Right Plan with Anatoly Karpov [[https://www.amazon.com/Find-
Right-Plan-Anatoly-Karpov/dp/190...](https://www.amazon.com/Find-Right-Plan-
Anatoly-
Karpov/dp/1906388687?SubscriptionId=AKIAILSHYYTFIVPWUY6Q&tag=duckduckgo-
ffab-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1906388687)]

[2]Techniques of positional play Brozhnik and Terekhin [
[https://www.amazon.com/Techniques-Positional-Play-
Practical-...](https://www.amazon.com/Techniques-Positional-Play-Practical-
Methods/dp/9056914340/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1475353444&sr=1-1&keywords=techniques+of+positional+play)]

[3]A practical guide to Rook endgames by Nikolay Minev
[[https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-
alias%3Ds...](https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-
alias%3Dstripbooks&field-
keywords=nikolay+minev&rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Anikolay+minev&ajr=1)]

..and I have not even gotten started on the Dvoretsky series

------
quickmouse
I think that someone with a good knowledge of reinforcement learning should
give his opinion about exploitation versus exploration. First comment is about
being strangled into a local maximum.

------
ktRolster
"Practice makes habit"

------
known
Sounds like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-
driven_development](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-driven_development)

------
carsongross
The modern world looks on with increasing horror:

My God, you are dead, and the eugenicists were right.

~~~
AstralStorm
Not necessarily. Selective breeding and genetic manipulation might not be the
best of things. It may be better to have a bunch of people who love to sweep
floors rather than 100% super intelligent. Plus we need different
perspectives. To an extent, their should be variance in many things.

Sometimes a janitor solved the problem, by turning the genius thinking around.

~~~
projektir
There's nothing better about designating a class of people to sweep floors.
The loss of power and agency is the problem.

------
pedrodelfino
What a disturbing reading.

------
ak39
In case you weren't paying attention while reading this otherwise fascinating
article ... practice has little positive influence on:

1\. Academic achievement,

2\. Computer science shyte, and

3\. Sales

Fuuuuuuck this. I'm off to the beach.

~~~
MasterScrat
Saying that practice has little influence on computer science skills just
sounds wrong to me.

I don't know any computer scientist who looks at the code he wrote a few years
ago and won't think of mich better ways to do things.

What is that if it's not an increase in skills due to practice?

