Chi and God ?

Harry Cook · Post by **Harry Cook** » Wed Jan 19, 2005 11:46 pm

Jorvik, I didn't know that a shotokan team had fought a team of Thai boxers. This is really interesting, do you have any more details or sources you could point me at.
Where did it happen, do you have any of the names of the Japanese fighters?
I know that a team of kyokushinkai fighters went to fight in Thailand. The story is described in Tadashi Hakamura's "The Human Face of Karate" Shufunatomo Co. Ltd. 1989. Nakamura won his match the two other Japanese fighters lost, although the decision in Kurosaki's match was open to question.
My definition of ch'i is taken from a variety of Chinese language sources, so I assume it is fairly standard among Chinese medical and martial systems. Actually that is part of the problem. As ch'i means different things to different people it is impossible to discuss it easily, as the usual response is 'that's not ch'i' etc etc.
Actually my T'ai Chi teacher Miss Rose Li said that a lot of the ch'i manifestations were simply tricks used to impress the peasants. They were promoted by popular medicine sellers to the uneducated masses!! She also classified karate as suitable for the same masses!! I think she meant me!
I had a look at the fighting taichi clips - Ok but the applications of the form looks like fairly standard pre-arranged sparring drills to me, very karate or judo like overall, and the free sparring looks like semi-contact karate with grappling added. It seems to me that they are not really sticking to the classical principles of T'ai Chi Ch'uan, and I didn't see much ch'i in evidence. The man doing the kettlebell swings etc was using physical strength, the same way I swing the k-bells
Harry Cook

Stryke · Post by **Stryke** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 1:13 am

look what they did to the Japanese Shotokan team about 20 years ago....none of these "champions" lasted more than a round

havent heard this on either , would be interesting to find out more , I`ll try find out .

Deffinately know of the kyokushin matches

Redbeard · Post by **Redbeard** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:01 am

Bill,

thanks for the info on body electronics, very interesting. What I am wondering now is if the whole chi thing might have originated from a perception of having an inner source of mysterious energy, like my comment about feeling a power surge during an electrical storm. We might feel like we have some inner energy even though it is our nervous system playing a trick on us. A rush of adreniline might be a different, but somewhat similar experiance.

I guess what I am trying to say is this, maybe the idea of chi energy originated because of man's love of legend and mystery, and from natural feelings produced by excitement, fear, etc.

Also, what is your opinion on "the touch of death" stuff that claims to disrupt the flow of energy from multiple points on the body? Is there anything to this or is it just myth?

TSDguy · Post by **TSDguy** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:39 pm

I was under the impression chi was something of a mistranslation. The easterners during WWII used it to describe very tangible, down to earth things like proper body position and give and take sensitivity like Jim was talking about. "Enterprising" westerners have come up with no touch knock outs and what not much more recently.? Is this correct?

Harry Cook · Post by **Harry Cook** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 6:03 pm

May I suggest you look at R. W. Smith's Masters and Methods for some Chinese comments re ch'i.
The idea is an old one in Chinese thinking, certainly well before the Han dynasty many of the ideas of ch'i were established. Ch'i was used to 'explain' medical concepts, the creation of the universe etc etc. The fact that some nutty westerners have pushed the idea into even more lunatic areas should not come as surprise.
Actully the West had concepts very similar to ch'i in science for example combustion was explained as the effects of 'phlogiston' a weightless, colourless fluid that made things burn, the more phlogiston something had the more it would burn. Of course the discovery of oxygen put paid to that idea.
Forget ch'i - it is an old idea whose time has passed.
Harry Cook

jorvik · Post by **jorvik** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 2:26 pm

Quote
"Jorvik, I didn't know that a shotokan team had fought a team of Thai boxers. This is really interesting, do you have any more details or sources you could point me at."

Sorry I can't remember

......I think that it might have been in "fighting arts" or possible Thai boxing Dynamite".........I'm fairly certain that it was Shotokan because I remember talking about it to a guy that I used to train with who did Shotokan.
My point remains the same though.Thai boxers are awesome I don't think many "white pyjamas" could face one ( I include myself in that statement).and Chisters ceratinly couldn't
Quote
"My definition of ch'i is taken from a variety of Chinese language sources, so I assume it is fairly standard among Chinese medical and martial systems. Actually that is part of the problem. As ch'i means different things to different people it is impossible to discuss it easily, as the usual response is 'that's not ch'i' etc etc."

Well, my definitions tries to encompass that but allows for a lot more leeway ..and this is an effort on my part to understand how a term like "Chi" or "ki" or "baraka","prana"
which could all mean the same thing ( or something totally different

) could find common usage in a language. The people are all referring to something, maybe it's the Chinese word for "Unexplained Phenomena pertaining to ma practice"

Quote
"Actually my T'ai Chi teacher Miss Rose Li said that a lot of the ch'i manifestations were simply tricks used to impress the peasants."
I believe that the Samurai had similar tricks............maybe, if people believe that you have some extraordinary power they will be too frightened to challenge you

.certainly the Salesmen of the new wave of MA'S always trade on that point...the fact that their art is sooooooooo deadly be it Krav Magda, BJJ Russian Ma's whatever

Quote
" I had a look at the fighting taichi clips - Ok but the applications of the form looks like fairly standard pre-arranged sparring drills to me, very karate or judo like overall, and the free sparring looks like semi-contact karate with grappling added. It seems to me that they are not really sticking to the classical principles of T'ai Chi Ch'uan,"
Well what is Tai-Chi?

I think that these guys are Wudang style taught by Dan Docherty ( who was taught by Chen-Tin-Hung in Hong -Kong)..his definition of Chi is doing stuff like having people jump onto your stomach from a ladder, and taking punches to the neck
check out http://www.taichichuan.co.uk/informatio ... iator.html
he also says that Chen style is a poor copy of TC from Shaolin sources,( I've also heard that it was copied from a book on Hsing-I)
and
http://www.taichiskole.dk/engelsk/instr ... cherty.htm
In fact I think the only style that can be called Tai-chi, is the Yang style..because apparantly it was the name coined by a court poet when he watched Yang practising

To be frank that stuff doesn't look like TC to me, not the stuff I do at least...which is a heck of a lot softer, and looks more like aikido with strikes and pushes in it

but I've no objection if they wish to call it Tai-Chi

Harry Cook · Post by **Harry Cook** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 2:31 pm

Yang San Feng? Who is he?
Doesn't the Yang style come from Yang Lu Chan's development of Chen village boxing?
Harry Cook

jorvik · Post by **jorvik** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 2:52 pm

Yeah,
noticed my mistake and edited it

, I get a bit confused with some of these names
Quote
"Doesn't the Yang style come from Yang Lu Chan's development of Chen village boxing? "
Well not according to Dan Docherty

Harry Cook · Post by **Harry Cook** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 2:59 pm

T'ai Chi was a term used well before the evolution of the martial art - it is found in various Taoist and Confucian works.
About the shotokan vs Thai boxers. I am fairly certain it wasn't in Fighting Arts mag - I used to write for FAI and I'm sure I would have remembered if it had been published there.
I don't have the Thai Boxing Dynamite book. If you can find the reference I would be mosy grateful - I would like to include this material in the new edition of my Shotokan History, if we can pin it down.
Harry Cook

jorvik · Post by **jorvik** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 3:25 pm

I'll have a look through my books and mags and see if I can find the article.
quote
"T'ai Chi was a term used well before the evolution of the martial art - it is found in various Taoist and Confucian works"
I read this on another forum, maybe the term was not used for MA until Yang's time. I've heard that Tai-Chi was referred to as various things "loose-Boxing" for one, one of the guys came up with that.

Harry Cook · Post by **Harry Cook** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 3:35 pm

Thank you - should be interesting.
Harry Cook

Bill Glasheen · Post by **Bill Glasheen** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 6:35 pm

Redbeard wrote:What I am wondering now is if the whole chi thing might have originated from a perception of having an inner source of mysterious energy, like my comment about feeling a power surge during an electrical storm. We might feel like we have some inner energy even though it is our nervous system playing a trick on us. A rush of adreniline might be a different, but somewhat similar experiance.

This is what I know about it.

1) Much of "TCM" (Traditional Chinese Medicine) came about before the science of human anatomy and cadaver dissection started in China. Imagine trying to guess how a phone works without being able to open it up and put an oscilloscope to various points on the circuit board. You likely would come up with theories on how the phone works without being able to prove any of them.

2) Some of the whole "chi" thing in this country is just information lost in the translation. I am told that Chinese language has references to many, many different types of "chi." For lack of a better word, "energy" might have been a better choice rather than some magic label. I use the expression "flow of energy" a lot when discussing how to maximize power on a technique, or sense the line of force of an attacker.

Very often I can listen to someone who speaks the "chi" language describe something, and understand what they mean in terms of Newtonian physics, physiology, anatomy, etc. Sometimes I can't. Often when that is the case, the phenomenon in question cannot be validated - e.g. Mr. Moonie's "empty force." And sometimes it's just complex, and an example of where someone sloppily puts a label on a phenomenon that is a bit of a Gordian knot. Kyusho KOs are a good example.

Redbeard wrote:Also, what is your opinion on "the touch of death" stuff that claims to disrupt the flow of energy from multiple points on the body? Is there anything to this or is it just myth?

I've read two Dim Mak books by "western thinking" authors. Michael Kelly is an osteopathic physician who has a fine book on the subject. Bruce Miller is a physician's assistant who writes a book specifically on death touch (dim mak) as opposed to the broader field of kyusho. Both give reasonable explanations (using modern understandings of anatomy and physiology) for how this stuff may or may not work.

Their books are worth a read, and the subject matter of targeted, sequential striking is worthy of investigation. But don't bet then farm on it when it comes to personal protection. These are just ideas (a.k.a."force multipliers") to help round out your martial training.

- Bill

jorvik · Post by **jorvik** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 7:39 pm

Hi Bill,
The thing that I keep on thinking about all this stuff is that folks must have asked questions of the doctors, and if this stuff didn't work.surely they would have either not bothered with it or sued the doctors ( .much as we do now

).but they did bother with it

.....You should know that I'm not your average Chister from my previous posts...and I said what Harry said long before he said it ( I actually said it in a letter to"fighting arts" 20years ago) ...i.e. that if your average Chister is So strong with Chi put him in a ring with a Thai boxer and let him prove it

.i still believe that, fighting wise, but I think that Tai-chi or IMA's ( interna martial arts) are health systems, much like Yoga and that they offer a bit of both...but it is very,very hard to give impirical evidence take T.T.Liang
he wrote this
http://www.tctaichi.com/articles/liang_music.htm
http://www.tctaichi.com/articles.htm
he suffered from poor health ( due to over indulgence

).and rectified it by doing Tai-chi.and lived to a great age 100+, that's one example.......to be more specific you'd have to test a whole load of people ( + know when they would die, and know how long their life was extended ).To be able to say that TC prolonged life....can't be done

I can rationalise the whole "chi" thing to myself.by looking at it in the manner Ian did, as a whole load of things all mixed together psychological/physiological/tricks/illusions/etc.some folks still look at as star wars, the force and all that, that's where the confusion arises
By the way how did you get on with Dr.Kelly.....weren't you going on his forum to look at his theories??.not prying just curious

Bill Glasheen · Post by **Bill Glasheen** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 8:18 pm

jorvik wrote:By the way how did you get on with Dr.Kelly.....weren't you going on his forum to look at his theories??.not prying just curious

One of his colleagues came on our forum and started talking about him. I took it to be spamming, and called her on it. In the end, Dr. Kelly himself came on board and chatted with us.

I ordered his book and read it. It's pretty good. It's not really a "how to" book like what most of the kyusho people sell, but rather a "how it works" book. IMO, that's much more valuable because if you understand underlying theory, then you can figure a lot of stuff out yourself rather than memorize "left nut 37, right toenail 13, left booger hole 16". The acupuncture nomenclature can be useful for "landmarks" when chatting online, but those are just names to areas that have physical features beneath them. I haven't had a lot of time to spend with Dr. Kellys' work lately, but I may come back to it.

My next area of interest is to read up on Bruce Miller's "reflex points" work. This is where it's at from a practical point of view. Everyone has them, and they don't rely on pain or become desensitized by drugs. And as it turns out, Bruce lives near my company headquarters in Minnesota. We've already agreed to meet up next time I take a trip up there.

- Bill

jorvik · Post by **jorvik** » Fri Jan 21, 2005 10:17 pm

Well I don't know if we are talking the same language, but my referance point now is to have an effect

i.e. I want to disrupt someone, put them in pain or discomfort enough to allow me to do something really wicked

.as an example there are a couple of points on the elbow that if you squeeze are really uncomfortable

.which makes manipulation into someting more uncomfortable ...like a joint lock soooooooo much easier, that;s what I'm looking at now

....it could really fit in with chister terminology, gass burner one, stomache flanger two

etc.but hey, it works