Why CTE is silly

[GetMeThere]

You might want to stay down a little while before getting back up again to see if you can figure out what's wrong.

I've seen you bring up that perspective elsewhere. It's an excellent point which, IMO, really separates the men from the boys: when something is wrong, trying consciously to become aware of WHAT is wrong, and what got you there.

It's OK to learn by unconscious trial and error, "naturally," it's far BETTER (faster and more productive) to add the conscious/deliberative/rational element to it.

IMO, in whatever way it actually occurs, the main thing that separates top players from run of the mill players is the ability of top players to LEARN more efficiently how to be good.

EDIT: IOW, IMO, the talent that made great players is not so much extraordinary hand-eye coordination, or special perceptive abilities. Instead it's, by some luck of the draw, or individual quirk, their enhanced ability to LEARN the pool skills more efficiently than others. There are MANY ways that learning can be blocked or inhibited (in all disciplines--some of the smartest, most successful people have suffered in school, for example); if those roadblocks can be eliminated, IMO, it would take only perhaps a few years for most "average" people to play at a pro level (average in terms of physical/cognitive abilities). For evidence of that, look at the huge crop of 20 year old Taiwanese/Chinese women who came out of nowhere and play at roughly a male professional level. These aren't necessarily one in a million talents. Instead they're people who got excellent instruction (and accepted and utilized it) right from the start.

 

[lfigueroa]

Come on Dave everyone's just having fun. If anyone deserves to be banned in this thread then it's the person who started the thread.

I don't feel like going back through it to list all the "names" he has called anyone in the thread who thinks CTE has merit.

Lou and I are just having a friendly banter. No biggie.

It's productive in the marketing for CTE that every time someone labels a CTE user as Tinfoil hat wearing brainwashed cult member that one of those CTE users should point out that a Tin Foil Hat Wearing cult member beat them.

Proof being in the pudding as the saying goes, whatever that means.

Well, yes. John and I have waltzed down this path together a few times before, hand-in-hand. No biggie. So thank you for your indulgence, Mr. Wilson.

But, to say anyone would be swayed by someone like John, beating someone like me, in a race to three at a social affair (an RSB get-together in Chicago years ago), would be an insult to their intelligence (foil caps and decoder rings not withstanding).

So I'm not buying that part

Lou Figueroa

 

[lfigueroa]

You might want to stay down a little while before getting back up again to see if you can figure out what's wrong. That might teach you to avoid that problem in the future. I do this on every shot during a measured pause before taking practice strokes - part of my pre-shot routine. Regular stock-taking like this has helped me to detect stance errors that aren't so obvious, and has helped me improve my pre-shot routine so that fewer of them happen.

pj
chgo

You're absolutely right, Pat. But here, I would make an additional distinction: figure out what's wrong *and then* figure out what made it go wrong.

It is my opinion that when we do something, good or bad, if you go just a bit upstream you will find that there was something that induced you to do it. It could be something as simple as a more relaxed grip. Or maybe your feet pointing somewhere other than usual, or something else.

This I think is one of the big things many players fail to figure out and it is often why, as an example, we can play good in practice and then play more poorly in a match: in practice we move from shot to shot, often without much pause. But in a match we go from the chair to the shot and we often stop in front of the shot and ponder, trying to decide what we want to do, and get into shooting position from there.

It changes everything.

Lou Figueroa

 

[JB Cases]

Well, yes. John and I have waltzed down this path together a few times before, hand-in-hand. No biggie. So thank you for your indulgence, Mr. Wilson.

But, to say anyone would be swayed my someone like John, beating someone like me, in a race to three at a social affair (an RSB get-together in Chicago years ago), would be an insult to their intelligence (foil caps and decoder rings not withstanding).

So I'm not buying that part.

Lou Figueroa

Not at all. It's just what's called delicious irony. Bash the clown in the tinfoil hat for and get beat by him? How embarrassing. At his game even as well by a clueless noob at one pocket.

I don't think that anyone here is swayed one way or the other by what two amateurs like us have to say about aiming. It's not as if either of us has the credentials in the game to be an authority anyway.

You beat a champion or two in short races that are meaningless and so have I.

But the FACT remains that there are players in the game who play as good as you or better who do use aiming systems. There are plenty of quality and qualified instructors who teach versions of these aiming systems.

So I get it that it's all a big joke to you to denounce everyone who does use such systems as tin foil hat wearing clowns but the fact is that there are plenty of those folks who could hand you a real ass whipping on the table consistently. I am not one of them, I just lucked into it at the right time to make it worth remembering and worth reminding you when we do this dance.

See you down the road.

 

[CocoboloCowboy]

silliest thing is about CTE is it Works!

 

[duckie]

You're absolutely right, Pat. But here, I would make an additional distinction: figure out what's wrong *and then* figure out what made it go wrong.

It is my opinion that when we do something, good or bad, if you go just a bit upstream you will find that there was something that induced you to do it. It could be something as simple as a more relaxed grip. Or maybe your feet pointing somewhere other than usual, or something else.

This I think is one of the big things many players fail to figure out and it is often why, as an example, we can play good in practice and then play more poorly in a match: in practice we move from shot to shot, often without much pause. But in a match we go from the chair to the shot and we often stop in front of the shot and ponder, trying to decide what we want to do, and get into shooting position from there.

It changes everything.

Lou Figueroa

There is so much truth in this that if you can't see it, you are blind.

I've recently started to believe what is more important in a match is what goes on while not at the table.

 

[lfigueroa]

Not at all. It's just what's called delicious irony. Bash the clown in the tinfoil hat for and get beat by him? How embarrassing. At his game even as well by a clueless noob at one pocket.

I don't think that anyone here is swayed one way or the other by what two amateurs like us have to say about aiming. It's not as if either of us has the credentials in the game to be an authority anyway.

You beat a champion or two in short races that are meaningless and so have I.

But the FACT remains that there are players in the game who play as good as you or better who do use aiming systems. There are plenty of quality and qualified instructors who teach versions of these aiming systems.

So I get it that it's all a big joke to you to denounce everyone who does use such systems as tin foil hat wearing clowns but the fact is that there are plenty of those folks who could hand you a real ass whipping on the table consistently. I am not one of them, I just lucked into it at the right time to make it worth remembering and worth reminding you when we do this dance.

See you down the road.

"delicious irony"

"worth remembering"

?!

lol. John, clearly you have taken at least one acupuncture needle too deep and too often.

Lou Figueroa
see you down the road
and all that

 

[lfigueroa]

There is so much truth in this that if you can't see it, you are blind.

I've recently started to believe what is more important in a match is what goes on while not at the table.

Thanks, duckie.

Just to add one more layer of distinction: what is more important (at least to me) is what happens the second you come out of the chair. That's when your PSR can begin, without the player even knowing it

Lou Figueroa

 

[JB Cases]

"delicious irony"

"worth remembering"

?!

lol. John, clearly you have taken at least one acupuncture needle too deep and too often.

Lou Figueroa
see you down the road
and all that

Maybe so but let's not forget that science now knows that acupuncture works and why. Maybe when the scientists get around to CTE you'll still be able to remember losing to the clown in the tin foil hat while he was using Hal's aiming systems to beat you at your best game. Until then, like those who used acupuncture before it was explained, those of us who find these aiming systems useful will just have to be satisfied with the victories they bring us no matter how small.

 

[GetMeThere]

Maybe so but let's not forget that science now knows that acupuncture works and why.

Acupuncture doesn't "work" if working means that it cures illnesses (which it usually claims). Acupuncture activates the body's own mechanisms for mitigating the pain response; that's all.

From the Wikipedia article, here is a quote from an acupuncture proponent:

Felix Mann, founder and past-president of the Medical Acupuncture Society (1959–1980), the first president of the British Medical Acupuncture Society[43] (1980), and the author of the first comprehensive English language acupuncture textbook Acupuncture: The Ancient Chinese Art of Healing first published in 1962, has stated in his book Reinventing Acupuncture: A New Concept of Ancient Medicine:

"The traditional acupuncture points are no more real than the black spots a drunkard sees in front of his eyes." (p. 14)

and...

"The meridians of acupuncture are no more real than the meridians of geography. If someone were to get a spade and tried to dig up the Greenwich meridian, he might end up in a lunatic asylum. Perhaps the same fate should await those doctors who believe in [acupuncture] meridians." (p. 31)[44]

 

[JB Cases]

Acupuncture doesn't "work" if working means that it cures illnesses (which it usually claims). Acupuncture activates the body's own mechanisms for mitigating the pain response; that's all.

From the Wikipedia article, here is a quote from an acupuncture proponent:

Felix Mann, founder and past-president of the Medical Acupuncture Society (1959–1980), the first president of the British Medical Acupuncture Society[43] (1980), and the author of the first comprehensive English language acupuncture textbook Acupuncture: The Ancient Chinese Art of Healing first published in 1962, has stated in his book Reinventing Acupuncture: A New Concept of Ancient Medicine:

"The traditional acupuncture points are no more real than the black spots a drunkard sees in front of his eyes." (p. 14)

and...

"The meridians of acupuncture are no more real than the meridians of geography. If someone were to get a spade and tried to dig up the Greenwich meridian, he might end up in a lunatic asylum. Perhaps the same fate should await those doctors who believe in [acupuncture] meridians." (p. 31)[44]

An academic who relies on Wikipedia?

Who said I believed in acupuncture Chi lines? That's projection on your part.

I said that practical experience had shown that the practice relieved pain. It's no matter that the practioners didn't understand the physiological and chemical reasons WHY it worked. They figured out how to insert needles into the human body and stimulate muscle tissue to relieve pain EVEN though they didn't really know why it worked.

Get yourself current on the research and get back to us.

I haven't checked Wikipedia but I am fairly sure that what I am referring to isn't published there.

While you're doing that I will be practicing my aiming using CTE until it becomes second nature.

 

[GetMeThere]

I said that practical experience had shown that the practice relieved pain.

No, you said that acupuncture "worked."

That "working," to Chinese practitioners, meant that it cured disease--by balancing "qi" forces that flowed through the meridians. The relief of pain was the PROOF that it "worked." What science has shown is that some pain relief is likely the ONLY effect of acupuncture--not an incidental one.

Maybe so but let's not forget that science now knows that acupuncture works...

This reminds me of all the people who have said that acupuncture cannot work. Yet recently scientists finally figured out that it does work and how it works.

I think that with a little research you will find prominent papers written by prestigious doctors who dismissed acupuncture as a bunch of primitive nonsense.

It only took 4000 years for western scientists to discover why acupuncture works.

 

[JB Cases]

That's right I said SCIENCE now knows how it works and why it works. SCIENCE now knows the underlying reason why pain relief comes from getting stuck with needles.

You should be above the semantics game as you understood my example just fine.

Like acupuncture CTE also works. To what degree and what the limitations are is under debate.

However it's not silly nor is it BS. And you still do not know how to implement it. Remember the premise of your opening is that CTE is silly and BS because no one is talking about accuracy?

However when a CTE advocate claims that they make the balls with great accuracy you claim that they are lying, self-deluding, and a bunch of other names and labels.

Never mind that you are critiquing a method you don't even know the steps to.

So again, it's taken thousands of years for Western Science to figure out just exactly how acupuncture works. In those thousands of years millions of people got pain relief through acupuncture in the mistaken belief that the needles were restoring the Qi or Chi balance. In many instances people did recover from illnesses while getting acupuncture treatments and that recovery was surely attributed to the acupuncture further propagating the myth.

The difference between that and CTE is that CTE is 100% results oriented with immediate feedback. Either it works it does not.

Enough people who play the game at a high level think enough of it to teach it and use it for it to be simply silly or BS.

Those people however are just the journeymen benefitting from the system. If you want to dissect it and show us the anatomy of CTE then your first step is to learn it.

Are you willing to do that or is too comfortable in the ivory tower?

 

[Patrick Johnson]

John:
Like acupuncture CTE also works.

Depends what you mean by "works". It seems valuable as a conceptual aid for some, but it's not a "system" in the sense of a clearly defined series of steps that anybody can follow "mechanically" to an objective, precise shot solution.

If you want to dissect it and show us the anatomy of CTE then your first step is to learn it.

The evidence is against that. Those who "learn" it are the least able to dissect it. You're exhibit A.

pj
chgo

 

[JB Cases]

Depends what you mean by "works". It seems valuable as a conceptual aid for some, but it's not a "system" in the sense of a clearly defined series of steps that anybody can follow "mechanically" to an objective, precise shot solution.

I define works as the ball goes in the hole when I use a method to align myself to the shot. Using CTE/Hal's methods I get successful results more often than by using any other method.

Actually there are clearly defined steps. You just don't have them. Yet.

But there is no method which satisfies your definition as all methods require a bit of estimation coupled with perceptual differences. Where you "see" the GB center may not be where I see it. GB is only objective on paper. In real life it's quite subjective and prone to user error.

The evidence is against that. Those who "learn" it are the least able to dissect it. You're exhibit A.

pj
chgo

Actually Pat, just because I haven't yet "dissected" it doesn't mean I can't. You should know better than to make that correlation.

And it certainly doesn't apply to all "those" who learn it. I know it's really hard to understand that Hal asked people not to print directions on the net and people are following his directions and not putting out ABC guides to CTE just yet.

And I know it's frustrating and leads to Hal being criticized and the people who learned from him being criticized. Cest' La Vie. It is what it is. I agree with you. Until there is a CTE/Pro1 for dummies diagram or video then it will continue to urban legend. No biggie, helps the post count. and keeps the lights on.

I think you got my point about acupuncture and the fact that ultimately it was found that it does work and why even though it was used without precise knowledge of HOW it worked for thousands of years.

 

[PoolSharkAllen]

What's really silly about this CTE thread is how a small number of posters like JB Cases and GetMeThere can completely ruin a thread for others to read.

So far JB Cases has 60 postings to this thread but he's losing the race to the bottom as GetMeThere has 65 postings in this thread.

 

[JB Cases]

GetMeThere started the thread. If you don't want to be a part of the discussion then don't read it. The people who are conversing with each other are GetMeThere, LouF, and Pat Johnson and a few others. We are all making our points and having a decent conversation.

Who cares how many posts we each have? It's our conversation.

 

[randyg]

GetMeThere started the thread. If you don't want to be a part of the discussion then don't read it. The people who are conversing with each other are GetMeThere, LouF, and Pat Johnson and a few others. We are all making our points and having a decent conversation.

Who cares how many posts we each have? It's our conversation.

Amen!
SPF=randyg

 

[Patrick Johnson]

John:
just because I haven't yet "dissected" it doesn't mean I can't.

I think we both know (and so does everybody else) that's exactly what it means.

GB is only objective on paper.

And CTE isn't. You keep trying to dodge that distinction because you know it's meaningful. It's the difference between a system that everybody understands and can use immediately and another that isn't systematic at all in that sense.

Hal asked people not to print directions on the net and people are following his directions

Bullshit.

pj <- pardon my bluntness
chgo

 

[GetMeThere]

GetMeThere started the thread. If you don't want to be a part of the discussion then don't read it. The people who are conversing with each other are GetMeThere, LouF, and Pat Johnson and a few others. We are all making our points and having a decent conversation.

Who cares how many posts we each have? It's our conversation.

Yeah. I have to agree with that. The issue has and is being discussed--that's what the thread is for. I don't think anybody has "ruined" anything--unless it's because their post doesn't make sense

In any thread I start, people are invited to say what they please, or what the topic incites them to say.