An addition:
I use V as long as possible, especially for first 15 moves. Then, I start switching to M
I use V as long as possible, especially for first 15 moves. Then, I start switching to M
I think I'm some mix of V and M. I can play blindfold chess perfectly well ONLY if I have no sight of any chess board. Even an empty one can throw off whatever visualization I have going on in my head.
By contrast to that, during a game I visualize the moves as if they're being made on the board in front of me, actively remembering what has moved where. Eventually I have to rely on some mental picture of the position during calculation as it branches further from the present one.
The image I see is a whole board view and rather detailed. The pieces I "see" are those of the set I'm playing on.
I've experimented with different calculation methods (staring at the ceiling for example) but ended up with some hybrid approach of mixing what's in front of me with mental imagery.
I guess tangentially related to visualization is what happens when rebuilding a position. I don't create a full picture in my head. It's just bits and pieces, often guided by piece constructions I noticed during calculation/analysis. I just let my fingers place the pieces on the squares I 'know' they were on "x" number of moves ago.
Super interesting topic that I'll do some self reflection on and if I have any more thoughts I'll contribute them
By contrast to that, during a game I visualize the moves as if they're being made on the board in front of me, actively remembering what has moved where. Eventually I have to rely on some mental picture of the position during calculation as it branches further from the present one.
The image I see is a whole board view and rather detailed. The pieces I "see" are those of the set I'm playing on.
I've experimented with different calculation methods (staring at the ceiling for example) but ended up with some hybrid approach of mixing what's in front of me with mental imagery.
I guess tangentially related to visualization is what happens when rebuilding a position. I don't create a full picture in my head. It's just bits and pieces, often guided by piece constructions I noticed during calculation/analysis. I just let my fingers place the pieces on the squares I 'know' they were on "x" number of moves ago.
Super interesting topic that I'll do some self reflection on and if I have any more thoughts I'll contribute them
I am pretty sure that I suffer some form of aphantasia .
I need to look at the board all of the time.
Therefore I don ́t use V or M.
But to be honest, the visualisation of the position ist not the main problem for me.
The real problem ist to evaluate the positions correctly.
I need to look at the board all of the time.
Therefore I don ́t use V or M.
But to be honest, the visualisation of the position ist not the main problem for me.
The real problem ist to evaluate the positions correctly.
@iakov98
I use a mixture of both, but mainly the M method. I wouldn't call it "memory method", I would rather call it R for relative method - you do not remember the whole chess board as an absolute picture, but as pieces relative to each other. Not only do I find it extremely hard to think a whole picture, but I also find it way more useful to deeply think about all of the connections of the pieces - because while I reconstruct the board like this, I also see every attack, every check possible, every defense, every relation to pieces.
However, when pawns start capturing opening and closing new files and diagonals it starts getting complicated, because you need to revalue all of your pieces, because you don't see it immediately which pieces are affected by this change like you would with your eyes open or having a vivid image in front of your eyes. So in those cases I try to force the "V" method, so I take a step back and try to watch a kind of blurry image from afar.
I very rarily play blindfold chess, but when I do, I really take my time and play for hours. Interestingly enough my games with the lowest centipawn loss in my life (under 5) have been blindfold games.
I hope this helped you. It would also be interesting to know, how you do it - and if you think the V method is necessary for deep calculations like calculating if something is perpetual check in open queen endgames or if a king could escape an attack with a long king walk or not. Do you think someone that isn't able to imagine the whole board as one piece, can become a master? After all visualization is one of the key skills. How do you visualize and calculate when there are distractions? Do you memorize the whole board, can you freeze it in your mind? Most importantly how do you chunk information? Our brain can only think one to three things at the time - how do you think a picture consisting of 32 pieces?
I use a mixture of both, but mainly the M method. I wouldn't call it "memory method", I would rather call it R for relative method - you do not remember the whole chess board as an absolute picture, but as pieces relative to each other. Not only do I find it extremely hard to think a whole picture, but I also find it way more useful to deeply think about all of the connections of the pieces - because while I reconstruct the board like this, I also see every attack, every check possible, every defense, every relation to pieces.
However, when pawns start capturing opening and closing new files and diagonals it starts getting complicated, because you need to revalue all of your pieces, because you don't see it immediately which pieces are affected by this change like you would with your eyes open or having a vivid image in front of your eyes. So in those cases I try to force the "V" method, so I take a step back and try to watch a kind of blurry image from afar.
I very rarily play blindfold chess, but when I do, I really take my time and play for hours. Interestingly enough my games with the lowest centipawn loss in my life (under 5) have been blindfold games.
I hope this helped you. It would also be interesting to know, how you do it - and if you think the V method is necessary for deep calculations like calculating if something is perpetual check in open queen endgames or if a king could escape an attack with a long king walk or not. Do you think someone that isn't able to imagine the whole board as one piece, can become a master? After all visualization is one of the key skills. How do you visualize and calculate when there are distractions? Do you memorize the whole board, can you freeze it in your mind? Most importantly how do you chunk information? Our brain can only think one to three things at the time - how do you think a picture consisting of 32 pieces?
Hi, I am currently doing academic research into imagination and visualisation. I love your distinction between Visualisation and Memory blindchess, which is very intuitive and often used. However, when you dig deep into them, they will start to look alike more and more. Visualisation crucially depends on our memories (and it is often hard to distinguish whether you 'purely' visualize something or whether you visually remember it --- certainly in chess, where many positions have structural similarities); and memories are often visual and heavily infused with imaginary content. So, while the distinction between V and M processes of blindfold chess are intuitive, they appear to break down very rapidly, both in practice and in theory. If you would like to talk about this more in depth, I'd love to have a chat.
I'd also like to mention there is a lot of empirical research from 1960-2010 that directly studies visualisation in blindfolded chess. See results from scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=blindfold+chess&oq=blindfold . I could provide some useful summaries of these articles for your blogpost, if you'd like.
As a final note, the exact character of an 'image in the mind' is highly controversial. It is most certainly not a 'picture projected on a mental screen that we see with the mind's eye'. It is even disputed whether there is any 'imagery' at all, in the sense that your brain would be processing visual information. What seems more accurate is to characterize mental imagery as a process in the brain that involves 'making prediction on the basis of EXPECTED visual information from the outside world, while that visual information is actually absent'. So, what does the 'real work' here is the expectation of some visual experience, not some actual 'mental image'. And, of course, expectations are heavily dependent on our memories. This makes even more trouble for the distinction between visualisation and memory processes.
I'd also like to mention there is a lot of empirical research from 1960-2010 that directly studies visualisation in blindfolded chess. See results from scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=blindfold+chess&oq=blindfold . I could provide some useful summaries of these articles for your blogpost, if you'd like.
As a final note, the exact character of an 'image in the mind' is highly controversial. It is most certainly not a 'picture projected on a mental screen that we see with the mind's eye'. It is even disputed whether there is any 'imagery' at all, in the sense that your brain would be processing visual information. What seems more accurate is to characterize mental imagery as a process in the brain that involves 'making prediction on the basis of EXPECTED visual information from the outside world, while that visual information is actually absent'. So, what does the 'real work' here is the expectation of some visual experience, not some actual 'mental image'. And, of course, expectations are heavily dependent on our memories. This makes even more trouble for the distinction between visualisation and memory processes.
For me, it is definitely a mixture of both, but the ratio changes depending on my familiarity with the position.
In the opening, my approach would be almost entirely visualization based. I see the position of the pieces and what they attack, but only since I have seen the positions before. Once a new move is played, I can clearly visualize the position of the moved piece, but not immediately what squares it could move to next. This is something I need to evaluate on a square to square basis (e.g. "the bishop moved to b6, now it attacks c5, d4, e3, f2...").
The longer the game goes on, the more memory based it becomes. I can still "see" the pieces, but their role on the board becomes increasingly fuzzy. If the game goes on very long, I need to repeatedly recall the coordinates of all pawns and pieces on the board before I can continue calculating. On the other hand, if I can get a peek at the board, it gets more 'V' based again.
Maybe interesting in this regard is that playing e.g. on lichess with invisible pieces is a lot easier to me than playing completely blind, as seing the board makes it so much easier to see the role of the pieces, and one only needs to remember their position.
Also I noticed when playing correspondence games, seing only the notation of the move my opponent made is often times enough for me to decently visualize the position, since I am very familiar with the position, even though I might not have seen it for several days.
In the opening, my approach would be almost entirely visualization based. I see the position of the pieces and what they attack, but only since I have seen the positions before. Once a new move is played, I can clearly visualize the position of the moved piece, but not immediately what squares it could move to next. This is something I need to evaluate on a square to square basis (e.g. "the bishop moved to b6, now it attacks c5, d4, e3, f2...").
The longer the game goes on, the more memory based it becomes. I can still "see" the pieces, but their role on the board becomes increasingly fuzzy. If the game goes on very long, I need to repeatedly recall the coordinates of all pawns and pieces on the board before I can continue calculating. On the other hand, if I can get a peek at the board, it gets more 'V' based again.
Maybe interesting in this regard is that playing e.g. on lichess with invisible pieces is a lot easier to me than playing completely blind, as seing the board makes it so much easier to see the role of the pieces, and one only needs to remember their position.
Also I noticed when playing correspondence games, seing only the notation of the move my opponent made is often times enough for me to decently visualize the position, since I am very familiar with the position, even though I might not have seen it for several days.
Aphantasia is the new animated blockbuster coming soon from Disney. It's two hours of a black screen.
I can "see" only fleeting glimpses of sections of the board, and yet I can somehow play two blindfold games at once. I just kinda "know" where the pieces are. My level of play drops off quite a bit though.
I have partial "aphantasia," I suppose. I struggle to mentally picture anything for more than a second or two. It's weird.
I have partial "aphantasia," I suppose. I struggle to mentally picture anything for more than a second or two. It's weird.
@Saminam That is incredibly helpful, thank you so much. I'll look into everything you mentioned in detail and try to understand it as best as I can.
I'll most probably come back to you for some help if that's alright, as this appears to be the kind of topic where learning more about it results in more questions popping up than are being answered.
Do you have any reading recommendations on visualisation (and imagination) introducing the subject matter to the uninitiated? Where could someone looking to develop a basic understanding of the science start?
The V vs. M distinction made intuitive sense to me, but I'm definitely prepared to introduce a lot more nuance (or even throw it out the window entirely) if it turns out to be inaccurate or based on false premises.
Visualisation depending on our memories makes a lot of sense to me, I guess my intuition was that there is a distinction in the type of memory utilised, one being 'visual', whatever exactly that entails, and one 'factual' or perhaps 'propositional', directly expressible in language. I'll definitely look into the science of memory too, there is probably some misapprehension on my part there as well.
Regarding your last paragraph, how can I understand what exactly aphantasia is, or what exactly it is people with aphantasia don't have / are not capable of doing, taking your point into consideration?
I would have thought that people in general actually would be capable of conjuring up an image of something in their mind, while I personally can't.
E.g., I can think of the Japanese flag and how it looks conceptually, I can remember 'there is a red circle centered on a white rectangular background' and have some sort of 'feeling' of how that would look like, but I can't actually 'see' it. So my guess was that in general, people could actually have an image of the Japanese flag in their mind without the actual visual information traveling through their eyes into their brains. But again, it seems like it's very easy to be under some misapprehension with these kinds of topics, as it's so very difficult to describe the character of one's thoughts/imaginations.
I'll most probably come back to you for some help if that's alright, as this appears to be the kind of topic where learning more about it results in more questions popping up than are being answered.
Do you have any reading recommendations on visualisation (and imagination) introducing the subject matter to the uninitiated? Where could someone looking to develop a basic understanding of the science start?
The V vs. M distinction made intuitive sense to me, but I'm definitely prepared to introduce a lot more nuance (or even throw it out the window entirely) if it turns out to be inaccurate or based on false premises.
Visualisation depending on our memories makes a lot of sense to me, I guess my intuition was that there is a distinction in the type of memory utilised, one being 'visual', whatever exactly that entails, and one 'factual' or perhaps 'propositional', directly expressible in language. I'll definitely look into the science of memory too, there is probably some misapprehension on my part there as well.
Regarding your last paragraph, how can I understand what exactly aphantasia is, or what exactly it is people with aphantasia don't have / are not capable of doing, taking your point into consideration?
I would have thought that people in general actually would be capable of conjuring up an image of something in their mind, while I personally can't.
E.g., I can think of the Japanese flag and how it looks conceptually, I can remember 'there is a red circle centered on a white rectangular background' and have some sort of 'feeling' of how that would look like, but I can't actually 'see' it. So my guess was that in general, people could actually have an image of the Japanese flag in their mind without the actual visual information traveling through their eyes into their brains. But again, it seems like it's very easy to be under some misapprehension with these kinds of topics, as it's so very difficult to describe the character of one's thoughts/imaginations.
@iakov98 said in #1:
I find it difficult, I certainly can't visualise the whole board position easily in my head. Perhaps abstract parts of it sometimes. For (eg) correspondence games that have been going on for a while, I can sort of remember where most of the pieces are especially later on in the game, and I can think about the next move without looking at it (for example if I am walking in the mountains), but it is all visual in my head.
I don't think I can use memorisation at all. Like if someone tries to tell me directions to a place (turn right, second road on the left etc), I find it hard to convert audio information into a visual format, it is better to just draw lines on a bit of paper and I can see it and remember it better then.
I find it astonishing that there are people who can clearly visualise a whole chess board position in their head in detail. Is this just something people are born with, or is it acquired?
I find it difficult, I certainly can't visualise the whole board position easily in my head. Perhaps abstract parts of it sometimes. For (eg) correspondence games that have been going on for a while, I can sort of remember where most of the pieces are especially later on in the game, and I can think about the next move without looking at it (for example if I am walking in the mountains), but it is all visual in my head.
I don't think I can use memorisation at all. Like if someone tries to tell me directions to a place (turn right, second road on the left etc), I find it hard to convert audio information into a visual format, it is better to just draw lines on a bit of paper and I can see it and remember it better then.
I find it astonishing that there are people who can clearly visualise a whole chess board position in their head in detail. Is this just something people are born with, or is it acquired?
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