Is it a game of chance or skill? That question runs through my mind as I check my hole cards – pocket aces. Play aggressive to scare off those who might hit a lucky card on the river, or trap my opponents and bilk them for as many chips as possible? I take into consideration the players’ stacks around me, their tendency to bluff, the tells that scream I’m not interested in this hand. All signals that contribute to my final calculation… All in.

The poker analogy has been over-used in the game of international politics. Stanley Kubrick insisted that the War Room table in Doctor Strangelove be covered with the green felt used in casinos: he wanted the actors to convey the sense that the fate of the world was nothing more than a game of cards. It seems that Tal Pinchevsky is tired of the connections drawn between poker and politics, and argues that chess should be the metaphor of choice. 

On the surface, the argument makes sense. As a leader with an array of pieces at your disposal, there are gambits you can play to control areas of the board, while sacrificing a bishop here so that you can take a queen there. You need to think 5 or 6 moves in advance to have any sort of success. The strategies at play on the 64 squares can easily be transferred to any sphere in life, whether its global diplomacy, business or sports.

Still, the chess analogy feels limiting. As the game progresses, the more likely a specific outcome arises. Each player starts with 16 pieces of varying strength, and through a process of attrition, reduces their ability their respond to moves. Fewer pieces = fewer moves. Obviously good players avoid the scorched earth scenario, but regardless, you move and you respond. End game quickly reveals itself.

Perhaps its my Asian heritage, but I think go works better. You start with a larger playing surface: a clean 19 x 19 grid. Players take turns placing their stones on the 361 intersections. There are a few simple rules, with the basic goal to establish greater territory. The complexity of each game unfolds with maddening precision – each move changes the terrain and increases the number of possible responses. Add the fact that a professional go game can span over several days, it is an excruciatingly difficult game to master.

I’d argue that go represents the game of life more than chess. We start with a clean slate, each action we take representing a stone on the board. The specific placement is based on the thousands of considerations that came before it, and the possible permutations that follow. Our focus may shift from hobby to education to work to leisure, but it’s the sum total of all our experiences that’s more important. Likewise, go players take an extremely long-term view – my play in this area of the board will be a determining factor in the final configuration.

Maybe I’m thinking too hard about the analogies that all manner of games bring to the table. Of course, this is the domain of game theorists, so there must be some credence to all of the thought that they’ve created.

At the end of the day though, isn’t the point of life to have a little bit of fun?

Just going to share some scribbling I took about a week ago:

The 2 Indian men chattered nonstop next to me. As the wafts fragant basmati punctuated by aromatic bursts of garlic naan assaulted my nose, it was their baritone voices that left a deeper impression. You could tell they of an educated ilk – besides the various name dropping of the latest books they’d been reading, and their general disdain for morning television shows, they enunciated their words with almost military precision. It was like listening to captivating radio personalities dueling over the airwaves, jabbing, feinting, bobbing and weaving their words. The content was of no matter: arguing about Israel, the history of German beer, travel restrictions in today’s security conscious era. I was privy to a future that I wanted to find myself in 40 years time. Enjoying a good meal, yakking about anything and everything under the sun. Mental exercises with gastronomic delight.

Ideas for this blog post pop in and out of my mindscape like a carnival whack-a-mole stand – they’re not quite where my focus is, taunting me with beady eyes and pearly whites. It’s not writer’s block that’s guarding the on-ramp to my editorial freedom – like Little John, he’s demanding tribute and all I can offer is some off the cuff fluff.

And it’s not for lack of trying – unlike Spider Jerusalem conducting research through an information binge, my data stream is operating at 80% efficiency. There’s a jam somewhere and my organic transistors are giving off a foul stench as they sizzle with ferocity. There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief.

Overloaded, I’m parsing through possible explanations, and the only logical conclusion is that somehow I’ve crossed the streams of my Gen X and Gen Y personas. Technically I’m from the latter caste, but I think I sympathize on many levels with the former. Regardless, the Focus Alliance is clashing with the Multitask Horde and my poor brain is caught in the middle.

I know I already wrote about this earlier. Can’t help myself though; repetition just drives my point home.

Maybe this information dump of things I’ve been meaning to blog about will help the process. Call it my idea spring cleaning ritual (at the height of summer no less):

• The need for greater transparency in all systems
• Entrepreneurship: why it matters, and how to cultivate it
• A return to my realist manifesto
• The failure of the activism methodology
• Luck, chance and my existence
• Cheese

Time to take that left at Albuquerque…