Shin’s Eye #5: Mahjong Psychology and Philosophy (part 1)
Hello Mahjong players of the world. It’s been a few weeks.
I am Shintaro Kamimura from the Japan Professional Mahjong League.
For the next few columns, I would like take the time to look at Mahjong from a number of different angles.
The three themes I have in mind right now are:
1. Mahjong from a psychological view
2. Mahjong from a quantum mechanics view
3. Mahjong from a philosophical view
Number 2 and 3 are very specialized fields and quite difficult concepts.
Also, it is very abstract and perhaps self-righteous, I think maybe you can feel Mahjong in a way different than your normal senses, so I really hope you will join me until the end of this series of columns.
I’ll start with the easiest concept to understand on the list, the psychological view.
First of all I want to let you know that the things I will say are not the be-all, end-all.
That is because according to culture, lifestyle, religion, gender, and various other factors, each person’s psychological make-up is very different.
On that note, you all might be thinking, “So what does any of this have to do with playing Mahjong?!”
Certainly, on the surface each person’s psychological make-up is different and that makes any judgments difficult. However, deep in each person’s heart and soul there are also many similarities with the psychological make-up.
Those similarities are not in our conscious mind, but show up in our subconscious.
If you’re still with me, some of you may now have an idea of what I am going to talk about in this series.
In the beginning:
“Reading your opponents’ hands by considering their psychological state based on their subconscious actions.”
I think that poker players understand this concept very well. The idea of observing your opponent to determine whether they actually have a big hand or are bluffing is very similar to what I am talking about..
Generally, beginners show on their face and expressions what they are thinking. However, this can’t be helped. That is because it is natural for humans to act this way. It takes a lot of practice and training in order to hide such expressions from your opponents. In poker this is called a “poker face.”
In my opinion, when playing Mahjong techniques using math theory and logic are very important and are the fundamentals of the strategy of the game.
However, I do not believe that those are the only things that decide the outcome of the game.
I believe that the result of observing your opponents appearance and using those conjectures to guide your math and logical theories to read their hands, which you can’t see, with accuracy is a huge jump to being a winning player.
Professionals are always observing their opponents to look for chances to take advantage of and to make sure they don’t miss changes in their opponents’ psychological state.
Personally, I am of course looking at my opponent’s expression, eyes and gestures, but I am also looking at their breathing patterns, muscle movements, changes in skin color, representing changes in body heat and other factors as well.
Besides that, in Mahjong just training and learning a perfect poker face won’t defend against this.
This is because you also need to take very meticulous precautions with discards. Even a discard order based on a small subconscious tick might give away your wait and give your opponents a chance to pounce.
The introduction has been very long and I’m sure that you’re all thinking, “Get to it already.” I’ve run out of room this week, but I promise to jump right into real-game examples in my next column and go on with the series from there. I hope you’ll all be ready to read.
