OK, sounds like a semantic difference to me - I think you're doing stuff in there that adds up to what I call aiming. I do things very much like that (no formal aiming routine), but just more aware of the parts that I consider "aiming related".
Like most things in pool, which is best probably depends on the player.
pj
chgo
Of course he is aiming. Pretty sure I have video of his entire process from start to finish to examine. Can't say for sure but I seem to remember a few times where he checks the aiming, gets down, gets up checks again, gets down and so on. What Lou wants to do here is relegate "aiming" to "something that happens automagically" when a person has "spent a long time" developing a set of body motions that one consistently does before taking the shot. In other words, another way of saying that aiming is just a by-product of developing a straight stroke.
With one major exception. I think that there are objective aiming systems available now which give the user a much higher degree of confidence in the aiming and which are not at all incompatible with all of the textbook pre-shot routine steps that are considered the pinnacle of pool fundamentals. Thus while a good pre-shot routine with no special emphasis on consciously and objectively aiming can certainly "work" for a person satisfactorily there is no evidence that this works better than a person with an equally good pre-shot routine AND who uses an objective aiming system that resolves to the shot line consistently.And I’m certain John will see it exactly the same way, lol.
Lou Figueroa
While you can certainly state "aiming happens" without describing any useful mechanism of how it happens other than the circular "by using a solid pre-shot routine the proper selection of the shot line just happens", this doesn't really help any other person to aim better. It is in fact similar to when I say that a proficient cte user gets the correct result. The key word is proficient. So a player with a proficient PSR is likely to experience more successful outcomes than one without a proficient PSR due to the effort, years I think you said, expended to have a proficient PSR.
With CTE and other aiming systems the singular focus is on isolating the aiming process. This allows the user to master several techniques and to make adjustments and tweaks based on the objectivity and consistency with confidence in the shot line chosen. With that shot line they can employ their fundamentals in the form of the formal and deliberate pre-shot routine. All the same body motions that you would make after getting into shooting position, with the same stroke structure are possible for an aiming system user. And the teaching of aiming systems uses step-by-step instructions with some extra skill building training the eyes to focus on objective relational lines between the cueball and object ball, and by training the brain to accurately subdivide the cueball into halves and the object ball into quarters for some of the aiming systems. Others require the user to establish positions in zones for the purpose of doing simple math to uncover the amount of fractional overlap that corresponds to the correct shot line as seen from the shooter's perspective behind the cueball. Because these systems can be taught the same way anywhere on earth they become a sort of aiming language for those who know them.
So with a person whose "aiming" is wrapped into the PSR with perhaps simple self-conversations like a little thinner/thicker guiding the aim they can't really look at a diagrammed shot and tell another person EXACTLY how to aim it. But an aiming system user can look at a diagramed shot and give an answer that contains a "solution" that another user of the same system can apply without even bothering to double check it and that solution is likely to be correct.