THE MOVE AND THE BOARD

ADDENDUM — THE RECORD IS NOT THE PERSON

A constituted record preserves the field necessary to understand an event. It does not constitute the character of the person who moved within it.

Observed conduct may establish what occurred.

Repeated conduct may establish a pattern.

Neither automatically establishes identity.

This distinction is sharpest where the resulting state was partly produced by the field. Distress, resistance, withdrawal, instability, or adaptation cannot first be conditioned by circumstance and then returned as self-explanatory properties of the actor.

Do not convert consequence into character without recovering the field.

But there is a prior question.

Why is character being adjudicated at all?

An inquiry into an event does not ordinarily require a verdict about the person. To move from what happened to what kind of person this is is not another evidentiary step. It enlarges the object of the inquiry—from conduct to identity—and assumes an authority the original question may never have conferred.

If the matter can be resolved by determining the act, the constraint, the consequence, or the relevant obligation, character need not enter the record.

A record of conduct is not an invitation to become a critic of the person.

The board may be necessary to understand the move.

Neither the board nor the move constitutes the player.