{"id":16200,"date":"2025-10-10T20:07:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T20:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/yin-and-yang\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:55:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:55:12","slug":"yin-and-yang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/yin-and-yang\/","title":{"rendered":"Yin and Yang"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=eb880487-e1ad-5e35-b8f5-29eb45e70874&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1102\" height=\"1102\" alt=\"\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>Yin and Yang walked into an Irish pub.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat\u2019d ya have, laddies?\u201d asked the bartender. Neither said a word. The bartender, who had sailed the world in the Navy and had a girl in every port, asked the same question again in two Chinese dialects. But Yin and Yang still looked confused.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo hablo Scottish,\u201d they explained.<\/p>\n<p>In this week\u2019s position, White\u2019s bishop also speaks the wrong language. It can\u2019t speak to the light-colored squares \u2013 only the dark-colored ones. With this hint in mind, try to find Black\u2019s best drawing move.<\/p>\n<p>Black cannot win with only a bishop. The best outcome is a draw, and that seems dubious with White\u2019s two advanced pawns. But White\u2019s a6 pawn looks to promote on a8, which is a light-colored square. White\u2019s bishop, therefore, cannot support its promotion. This allows Black\u2019s bishop to sacrifice itself for White\u2019s f7 pawn \u2013 ending forever that pawn\u2019s hopes of a metamorphosis.<\/p>\n<p>After the White king takes the bishop, Black\u2019s king hops over in two steps to the corner on a8. There, Black\u2019s king will soon be stalemated or will draw by repetition.<\/p>\n<p>White has two approaches to promoting the pawn. One option for White is to advance its a6 pawn to a7 with the support of its bishop \u2013 preparing for the final leap with the help of its liege. Black\u2019s king, however, shuffles between a8 and b7. If White\u2019s king gets too close, as the next diagram shows, Black is stalemated; otherwise, White makes no progress.<\/p>\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image naviga-align-left alignleft\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=6531ad73-00fd-57b6-8d30-2588e6474c9c&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1102\" height=\"1106\" alt=\"\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>Alternatively, instead of advancing the a6 pawn immediately, White\u2019s king races toward the corner on a8. Now, because White\u2019s a6 pawn controls b7, Black\u2019s king shuffles between a8 and b8 until the White king gets too close \u2013 stalemating Black.<\/p>\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image naviga-align-left alignleft\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=92560476-c15a-5285-8232-66860dcbc153&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"1102\" height=\"1106\" alt=\"\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>Opposite-colored bishops are the yin and yang of chess. Speak their language, and you may maintain the balance \u2013 even when the position is lopsided.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>move and draw<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16201,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1091,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-columns","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16200"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16200\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20069,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16200\/revisions\/20069"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16200"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}