Chalenge no 1- explain how this is done without meditation and chi kung (prana work)

Meet Wim Hof the Ice man. He claims that his extraordinary ability is a result of Tummo meditation, a technique mostly practiced in Asia that produces heat. Science says “we don’t know how he does it because no one is supposed to be able to do it”. By the wat Wim is teaching his technique to who ever wants to learn.

I would like people here to give their opinion as to how this is done. I would like those who claim that things like meditation, chi qung and so on are crap, and that everything can be done through mechanical means, to please do the same thing that this guy does, film it and post it here as eveidence.

Wim Hof is a Dutch world record holder, adventurer and daredevil, commonly nicknamed the Iceman for his ability to withstand extreme cold. He holds nine world records including for the longest ice bath. Wim broke his previous world record by remaining immersed in ice for 1 hour 13 minutes and 48 seconds at Guinness World Records 2008. Hof describes his ability to withstand extreme cold temperatures as being able to turn his own thermostat up by using his brain.

Wim is probably the first TEDx speaker to do his presentation in his shorts. Neither has another speaker ever spent 80 minutes on stage… and that covered in ice from neck to toe! That’s exactly what happened here today, astonishing every single person in the packed Stadsschouwburg. Wim wished to demonstrate how he can influence the hypothalamus (so called “body thermostat” ) and suppress the flammatory marks in his blood. According to Wim, he has the ability to do this because he is in balance with nature. “Nature is our teacher,” were the words that got an applause before he stepped into a box and was covered in ice.

Prof. Maria Hopman Maria Hopman, MD, PhD, FACSM, is a medical doctor interested in cardiovascular regulation and adaptation to exercise training and inactivity/deconditioning in humans.

She stepped on stage to try to explain how Wim can be exposed to ice for so long. They did an experiment with Wim, and, surprisingly enough, it showed that his core body temperature didn’t drop more than half a degree, whereas his outer body temperature drops significantly. His heart rate hardly increased (the expected reaction), yet he managed to double his metabolism.

Maria Hopman gives three possible explanations:

- Tummo meditation, a technique mostly practiced in Asia that produces heat
- Training in being exposed to the cold (Wim has done it for years)
- Genetic advantages

No final answer is given because more research is needed, so the mystery of the Iceman remains. Moderator Jon Rosenfeld did ask why Wim does this: “The cold is my warm friend… My mission is to show that everybody, by their mind, can reach more depth within themselves, and that we all have healing power, an inner doctor. Go back to that inner power and heal yourself.”

Here is the TED talk presentation that the above paragraph talks about. there are hundreds of other videos showing Wim’s achievements on the internet.

http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/TEDxAmsterdam-Wim-Hof-113010

Wim is now teaching his technique to anyone who wants to learn it. Here is his official website if you want to learn more about what he does.

http://www.innerfire.nl/en-home

 

The body's systems for maintaining homeostasis are very impressive. People have survived, uninjured, temperatures which cook steak and eggs. In this case it simply appears that the situation is reversed. Ice will be at a temperature of 0 degrees, which is uncomfortable but certainly not a cause for instant death.

In the arctic, and other cold climates (below 0 degrees) people have been known to sunbathe for short periods of time, and to wash by scrubbing themselves with snow.

This is impressive, but it does not require a supernatural explanation. Regular exposure to cold will train the body's homeostasis systems to better maintain internal temperature. Alternatively there may even be some level of conscious control over an autonomic system (requiring nothing more supernatural to explain than the same mechanism by which we might hold our breath, or force ourselves to stay awake for long periods of time, exerting conscious control over the body's autonomic systems).

Further study would be good, but I see no reason to resort to superstition to explain something like this.

Please note that he does not claim it is some sort of supernatural spiritual ability. In fact he makes it quite clear it is simply a result of practice and training.

 

Yes and I don't claim it is supernatural. I claim that it is perfectly natural. It is natural to be able to learn how to consciously control you internal energy processes. Which is accidentally what science claims is impossible.

and the practice and training he was doing is called yoga, tantra and Tummo meditation. all rubbish and trickery. he must be crazy to claim something like this.

 

Any sort of training focussed on this would also work, alongside practice. It's impressive but it doesn't require mysticism to be involved.

In fact it's not that impressive now that I think about it - David Blaine (show-off magician self-publicist) spent 64 hours in an ice box.

 

How was Mickey Mantle able to count the threads on a fastball without practicing meditation or chi kung?

How is Jacob Barnett able to work out complex mathematical problems at the age of twelve without practicing meditation or chi kung?

How are the Tarahumara people able to run 100 miles in a day like it was nothing, without practicing meditation or chi kung?

Why does everything that is amazing in the world have to be chalked up to some mysterious force?

 

That's simple. It shows a misanthropy, believing that 'normal' humans are incapable of amazing feats. It's also a way to form a much stronger social group bond, by showing how all these amazing things are possible through ${insert myth}, but all those muggles won't get it.

On top of that I always feel that it shows a pitiable subconscious depression, a way to believe that someone must be special in some way to do anything amazing.

 

i never said that these things are super human or mystical. chi kung meditatin, and lots of strange and amazing human abilities are perfectly natural. unfortunately sciense has no idea how they are done, but is refusing any other explanation from anyone, even people who are actually performing these amazing things.

bunny, if normal humans with no special energy and meditative training can do it, please hop in the first frozen lake and show us how you can do it.

you are the ones using words like mystical. because you just can't accept the posibility that there is more to this world that what you can understand, and what you have experienced.

sad.

 

It's not that science has no idea how it's done, it's that there hasn't been compelling evidence that chi exists. If there ever is, then we'll want to know how it's done.

And no, lots of isolated examples of this that and the next thing are NOT evidence indicative of a single 'force' or 'energy' which can be manipulated by human beings.

 

oof... that's a really blinkered take on things.

 

No - it's refusing any explanation without evidence, one which doesn't offer an actual explanation but just resorts to 'it's basically magic' rather than trying to study the phenomena and explain the mechanism behind it.

Saying it's done by tummo meditation doesn't explain anything, no more than saying that planes fly with engines. If you don't understand the engine, can't explain how it works, then it's a useless explanation.

Hmm. Did I not say that it's done through training and practice? Yep, I think I did.

I am the one refusing to accept mystical explanations, and asking for actual study and a mechanism. You are quite happy to say 'oh, it's meditation and chi' and leave it at that.

 

so if the guy that does this says he can do it because he practices meditation, and you can't accept that as truth because you don't understand how that meditation works, do you think it is worth researching that meditaion in order to understand it?

and no chi was never defined as single force, it was just a chinese name for energy, any type of energy in the universe. all that chi kung says is that you can conciuosly control or influence to be more precise some of these energies.

and no sadly i can't do this. i woild love to be able to do it though. it would save me thousands on cloths.

 

I can't accept it as an explanation because it isn't one. It's a cover story, a bit of visualisation technique stuck over a fascinating physical process and hindering any real research. Several mechanisms have been proposed, do you refute these? If you refute them, what's your evidence for it being due to magic rather than well-conditioned homeostasis?

 

That's a bit of a catch all explanation then isn't it? I mean we can find pretty much any force and you can say "it's CHI you unbelievers!" To be honest, I find the universe as it stands to be a pretty amazing bit of kit, and I get frustrated at these relics of window dressing we cling on to as a species. Mostly because, to my way of thinking, they're a hell of a lot less amazing then reality. And a fair bit of what bunny is saying as well, it's not an explanation, and why would you want to gloss over something when the explanation might be amazing?

 

i don't think meditation or chi kung are magic. i think they are tools that allows us to access and control our internal biological processes. the biological processes that actually keep his body hot are more or less known. how he is able to willingly switch them on and off is not known and he claims he does it through meditation. and i think this internal control mechanism is well worth studying.

 

odds

if you want unifying force look at electro magnetism. everything in the universe is just an electro magnetic vibration of diferent frequencies. you can call that chi if you want? diferent manifestations of the same principle, which is what chinese explanation for chi is.

 

:bang:

No, it's not. That's been disproven. The predictions made by such a theory do not match up with observed phenomena.

 

Ah I see, so you think that we can control the feedback mechanisms which regulate homeostasis? I'll be honest with you, I'm not convinced there's any means by which we can do that consciously. However, and I realise this is not strictly on topic, an awful lot of your posts here make claims about Chi Kung, meditation and what have you which vary wildly, and couldn't all be explained by a process like this. So, what's it to be?

 

simon

i do study it. its fun. i have no idea what i will uncover, but it is better than boring repetition of: "its all magic and mystical rubbish" which will never uncover anything.