[yangez]

> The bottom line is that the difficulty of the decision is the most important factor in determining whether a player makes a mistake. In other words, examining the complexity of the board position is a much better predictor of whether a player is likely to blunder than his or her skill level or the amount of time left in the game.

I wonder if this also works the other way around with good moves instead of just avoiding blunders.

A parallel in business: we spend so much time thinking about hiring "A players" and "10x-ers". But could refocusing on better processes, environment, and goal-setting (reducing the complexity of the position) be just as effective for increasing performance?

[vernon99]

On point. I think that also is applicable to your personal life btw. I had a short-lived existensial crisis a few days back, realizing that my life is getting too complex for me to properly manage it. Things were falling out of hand, I wasn’t making enough progress, etc. I even had a suicidal thought, my first in a very long while. But then reflecting on it I realized that this complexity is driven by my mounting desires. To improve my balance and regain the sense of control over my life, I should examine these desires and get rid of secondary ones, which would make my life simpler and I would be less prone to error (blunder in the article’s terminology). Instantly made me feel better :)

[sova]

Our lives are frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify, simplify. -hdt

[coldtea]

As also suggested by lots of ancient religions and philosophers!

[EGreg]

Seems like a “d’oh” finding