How can you feel Qi?

Discussion in 'General Martial Arts Discussion' started by 47MartialMan, May 7, 2015.

  1. Giovanni

    Giovanni Well-Known Member Supporter

    how do you know the qi master wasn't hooked up to a battery?
     
  2. Please reality

    Please reality Back to basics

    Had he have been, wouldn't that have caused shock? I wasn't shocked. He had nothing in his hand, I checked as well.
     
  3. ap Oweyn

    ap Oweyn Ret. Supporter

    I thought I'd been pretty clear that I (speaking personally) was perfectly comfortable with "qi" being used as a way to embody an abstract. IE, a metaphor. I studied a bit of Chinese myself in college and have some small sense of what you mean. I'm not arguing it.

    Okay, before we get to precise answers, I'd like you to dial it back a bit. I've been perfectly civil.

    If you were talking about energy in terms of something unproven, mystical, or unidentified, then people would probably ask you to prove or quantify that as well. And, given what you were describing, you might not be able to do so. I don't see how that shows prejudice against a Chinese term. So where does that get us?

    Yeah, I actually cited those meanings myself, if you'll recall.

    That's enough, Cloudz. You've got the wrong end of the stick. I'm not telling you NOT to engage. I'm telling you that we all still have a choice. And when we cease to enjoy the exchange, we should all stop for our own benefit.

    Of course it's perfectly valid for you to state your position. That's what we're here for. But it'll be debated. And if the debate brings you more unhappiness than anything else, then you shouldn't do it. That's all. I'm not trying to shut you down. Frankly, I'm a bit shocked you'd even think such a thing.

    Nothing wrong with it whatsoever. If you want to embrace it, go for it. If you're enjoying the exchange (or finding value in it, to perhaps put it a better way), I'm all for it.

    Hope springs eternal.

    I'm unclear what you mean here, aside from the needless hostility at my "stating the obvious."

    I think people are objecting to very specific applications of each of these words. Not the words themselves.

    Your perspective is to be highly acclaimed? I'm not sure I know what that means. But you asked to be excused. I didn't think that was necessary, so I said "no apology necessary." It just sounded more natural than "no excusing yourself necessary." Didn't realize that would be an issue. Apologies.

    Of course you are. I'm really surprised at the ire you've leveled at me here, Cloudz.
     
  4. ap Oweyn

    ap Oweyn Ret. Supporter

    Would it kill you not to be patronizing?

    Yeah, I studied that stuff too. Chinese language, literature, and philosophy. Throughout undergrad. I'm not a complete bumpkin, thanks.

    Isn't that precisely what it means? If we cannot grasp how it's done, how are we offering a fairly good explanation?
    But we have the means to measure electrical impulses, don't we?

    So you're describing something as being akin to things that happen in fairy tales. But wondering why people use the term "mystical"?

    Okay, but you've just stated that the heat change was scientifically measured. And we all know that electricity can be measured. So what's the hold up?

    Would YOU have accepted the account you're relaying to us, no questions asked, if someone else had presented it to you?

    But, if they DID choose to dig deeper, there would be something to find there. Yes? I don't know how insulin controls my daughter's blood sugar level. But if I chose to find out, there's decades worth of documentation on it.

    You could measure the current from a battery. I have a gadget that does that in my garage.

    Okay

    Can you think of another example of energy transfer that isn't able to be measured and observed? And if this one can be, that's all anyone's asking to see.

    But where does that argument lead? If someone did go out and seek out qi practitioners who claim to be able to do this (which they have), the qi practitioners have often been unable to do it under observation. Which leads people to say "that guy was a charlatan." And they could do so as many times as the skeptic located and tried someone.

    Scientists can, given the right equipment.

    Nope. It means I don't have the right equipment.
    And when science is able to do the same for what you're describing, you'll be sitting pretty.
    Okay

    We're all seeking to explain what we can't explain.

    Bit melodramatic isn't it?

    Belief too.
     
  5. qazaqwe

    qazaqwe Valued Member

    Funny how that happened when you stopped posting in it.
     
  6. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    Because people keep explaining it in mystical terms. Even using that very word.

    Well, if a camera captured it, it must be legit.

    Clearly, qi gong masters can generate whatever they want.

    No, the most ready explanation was qi, because that was the explanation, much to your protest, that both himself and yourself expected.

    I've had many such experiences, as well as far more out-there ones. That does not imply acceptance of paranormal events, unless you want it to.

    No, you don't.

    Again, wrong. I've experienced this, yet still don't believe in it. It is easy, not only to imagine, but also to reproduce my results, and yet I can still suspend any faith in whatever direction.

    What I would suggest, is that you have not experienced the efficacy of enough disparate belief paradigms to appreciate just how active, and surprising, our unconscious imagination can be.

    Again, I do not believe that to be true. Some people may have a faith in authority figures, but many are brought up in a culture that is suspicious of them. It doesn't change their function, though it may change how they affect them.

    Anyone with a modicum of education, or feeling of self-worth, can question their doctor and demand a second opinion.

    The infallibility of the witch doctor is not the same as the social position of a medical doctor.

    No, we believe that Western medicine is better than alternatives because the evidence suggests that is true. That is not to say that we have nothing to learn from other practices, but name me a school of medicine that has done better at fighting disease than Western medicine.

    Still not special.

    If I can do it, it's not special (hitherto known as "The Law of Dave" - if a Dave can do it; anyone can do it).

    This is the interesting bit. Might someone with no expectations deal with it better than someone who had built it up as a landmark phenomena beforehand? Could it actually be completely inconsequential to someone for whom it has no importance?

    You're still not acknowledging people who have experienced it, yet still do not believe in the models typically used to describe it. Or, in fact, actively oppose the models used to explain the phenomena.

    This is exactly what you are doing when you accept the answer to your experiences as qi. Unless you define it as any vague feeling you like, in which case your definition is perfectly valid, as is anyone else's.

    Not sure your bible analogy helps your argument. You seem to be saying that once you feel the bible, history becomes irrelevant.

    Not true. There is a third way. One can experience things without ascribing any truth to them.
     
    Last edited: May 23, 2015
  7. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    SECRETS OF THE CHI MASTERS!

    [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoxqIX5uAKA"]Static electricity - YouTube[/ame]
     
  8. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    PR, as someone who is being taught in a tradition that, as far as I know, used folk superstition to their advantage, you seem very accepting of things that are most likely not reality - at least in the way we usually accept the term.

    The history of magic and subterfuge are so interlinked that I feel it must either be willing suspension of disbelief or unwitting suspension of disbelief that lead you to believe in such things that, I would be willing to bet money on, should we ever have the use of a time machine, your antecedents never believed in but would exploit to their fullest advantage, if necessary.

    There are acts that can look like magic, but are far more powerful. Here's one of my favouries:

    "Another one of Hassan's recorded methods includes causing the hashashin to be vilified by their contemporaries. One story goes that Hassan al-Sabah set up a trick to make it appear as if he had decapitated one of his hashashin and the "dead" hashashin's head lay at the foot of his throne. It was actually one of his men buried up to his neck covered with blood. He invited his hashashin to speak to it. He said that he used special powers to allow it to communicate. The supposed talking head would tell the hashashin about paradise after death if they gave all their hearts to the cause. After the trick was played, Hassan had the man killed and his head placed on a stake in order to cement the deception."

    - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassins#Legends_and_folklore

    This may be allegorical, but given a mind like that, what power does magic have?
     
  9. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    Here is, what I think to be, a very typical chi master, when confronted with intelligent and educated people:

    [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZM3t9JpGjw"]REAL PROOF of psychic energy (Amazing footage)!!! - TV documentary - YouTube[/ame]

    How convincing was that?
     
  10. Please reality

    Please reality Back to basics

    Not sure why it's patronising to say the thread was more interesting. Now that more people with some perspective and experience with qi are posting, the discussion has gotten beyond the "prove it," "it's voodoo and pixie droppings," stage and become more worthwhile.

    If someone had reported an experience similar to mine, I probably wouldn't believe them either(previous to having the experience that is). However, I wouldn't have necessarily thought they were hallucinatory, lying, a New Age Wiccan, or anything in that vein either.

    So here's the question, did what I experience change my life in some way? Not really, I didn't start eschewing martial arts and physical doing in order to dedicate my life and effort into reproducing that ability. I didn't start attending some cult ashram looking for spiritual enlightenment, or sit facing a wall for 9 years in deep meditation. It did open my eyes to TCM, and I have sense had acupuncture for several muscular related injuries.

    I would love to see scientists research the right people(you know, the one's who actually have the ability) in the right way with the right equipment. Not sure if the charges are too minute or in a different form than conventional electricity, but as far as heat generation has been shown to happen, some aspects of qi can clearly be measured.

    What happened to me was a surprise, but it was no miracle or paranormal event. I was not under a spell, hypnotised, high, drunk, hoping and wishing to believe in some invisible power, or anything of the sort. I was in a normal everyday state of mind, not intense concentration or daydreaming, just normal. Sure, I can see where the skepticism comes from, but once again people "knew" we couldn't alter our autonomic processes until shown that this wasn't necessarily the case. So yes, what I experienced was reality, if you ever get to experience it yourself, you will know. Belief has nothing to do with it.

    On an interesting note, an ex Bujinkan guy wrote some books on John Chang, which I have read. Some of the accounts are even more fantastic, but the bottom line when it comes to qi for me, is that it is really hard to train to any level where such seemingly amazing feats can occur, it takes a lot of time, and these things are more byproducts of the practice, not the goal. So if you start qigong seeking to do magical things, you might be doing yourself more harm than good.

    One thing I notice with a lot of the fakers is a bunch of moving their hands around, fingers twirling and such, this guy sat in front of me and just touched me while seemingly vibrate his hand on contact(can't be sure about this). I was not expecting anything. So yes it was quite a surprise and hard to believe. Replaying the encounter always results in the same conclusion however, it was some form of current coming out of his hand into my body. Qi is the only explanation that so far makes sense.
     
  11. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    There is no need to be under a spell, hypnotised, high, drunk, hoping or wishing to believe in some invisible power. Your senses can fool you quite readily in a normal everyday state of mind.

    I'm not saying what you say didn't happen as you say it, but I am saying that you have no way of categorically saying what you describe is real.

    I've certainly seen some people exacerbate mental health issues by becoming obsessed with internal MA, but the whole "be careful, if you don't do it properly all kinds of crazy bad things will happen" was also what kept the mystique and glamour of ceremonial magic alive in Europe. I think the only real danger is delusional fear and paranoia about having super powers.

    I think that shows a lack of imagination ;)

    What kind of feeling was it? There is an interesting massage technique where you vibrate your finger tip very subtly and in a way that is imperceptible to the subject. This creates pulsating waves of, what feels like, a current. It's uncannily effective at relaxing muscle knots.
     
  12. Please reality

    Please reality Back to basics

    I can categorically say that it was because I was there and experienced it. Nobody who wasn't can categorically state otherwise, though they are welcome to their suspicions and skepticism. In the end, there is only one way to find out.

    I described the feeling as best I could already. It was like plugging yourself into a socket but it wasn't a shock(negative sharp painful), more like a pulse of electricity or energy that didn't hurt.

    If you open your greater and smaller orbits without having developed the proper physicality for it, I imagine it would not be beneficial to your body. Kind of reminds me of reading the book about a yogi who opened his kundalini path in the wrong way and almost died from it. Not saying that is inherently dangerous, but I don't see why it wouldn't come at some risk. The Chang books talk about mixing yin and yang(if I recall properly) and how that mixture in your dantien creates certain effects.

    After having my experience with a qigong master, I did read a bit about qigong and all, but my interest waned and I never made a practice of it. Had I been doing some traditional Chinese arts instead of Japanese, it might've been more intriguing. A lot of what I read was hard to visualise or believe without experiencing it personally, but there is much we don't know about our world, both outer and inner, so time will tell.

    It wasn't a massage though I'd be interested in hearing the name of the one you are describing. It was not like anything I've ever experienced, and seemed more akin to something dealing with electricity.



     
    Last edited: May 23, 2015
  13. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter

    The guy Derren Brown punched absolutely believed he was hit by an invisible force

    Our own senses can be the WORST measure of things
     
  14. Please reality

    Please reality Back to basics

    Can.

    I'm not the guy in the video. It was not some magic trick. Try again.
     
  15. ap Oweyn

    ap Oweyn Ret. Supporter

    If it's true that you're not sure how you're coming off as patronizing, that would explain a great deal of your woes on this forum.
     
  16. SWC Sifu Ben

    SWC Sifu Ben I am the law

    And you know this how? You know you weren't subject to any of the innumerable fallibilities of perception, how? You know he couldn't have possibly decieved you, how?
     
  17. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter


    You CANNOT say it wasnt a trick; what you can say is that you cannot explain it....big, nay HUGE difference. I cannor explain how Penn and Teller do their tricks but I do know they are still tricks

    So all we have is your say so...which is no more credible than Joseph Smith


    This is not to say you are in the same class as him I hasten to add...he was a fraud with an agenda for making a lot of money
     
  18. AndrewTheAndroid

    AndrewTheAndroid A hero for fun.

    I think the people making that documentary were in on it. There were at least several times where the camera was not focused on what DJ was doing. IE Jack lighting the news paper on fire.

    EDIT: According to this thread, http://www.sciencechatforum.com/viewtopic.php?p=143137, the "scientists" that were doing the testing weren't exactly represented properly.
     
    Last edited: May 23, 2015
  19. Giovanni

    Giovanni Well-Known Member Supporter

    it's actually kind of interesting to believe our obviously faulty senses, and some video of supposed chi magic--like the guy setting the newspaper on fire. but some people don't believe science, which actually requires no belief.

    really? setting paper on fire with our hand? that's not a trick? our senses and our mind have been proven over and over to be unreliable. certainly, the ability to use our hands to burn paper should be of some note.

    in a controlled environment, when specific things are tested, like acupuncture, it's no better than placebo. or considering there is no evidence at all for anyone shooting energy out of their bodies.

    this goes back to the purposeful vagueness of it all. "it's a metaphor" we're told and not meant to be specific. "science has to catch up" or some such nonsense. never mind that humans being able to project energy would probably be the biggest science news of all time. "come to china": lol, our lovely standard response. whatever chi is is never defined purposefully.

    yes, i do demand proof. i'm a skeptic. so until we have some legitimate proof, then this goes into the bin with anti-vaxx, creation, levitation, yeti, all sorts of nonsense.
     
  20. Please reality

    Please reality Back to basics

    Demand? Pretty strong words. But okay. Are you willing to go to China and demand to be shown this ability by every qigong master or visit a TCM hospital and receive such treatments yourself? If so, perhaps your demands have some meaning beyond your own personal appeasement. Otherwise, it's just talk. There's nothing vague about that at all.

    Nobody is expecting you to or saying you should believe it's true, but that's just the crux of it all. You won't ever know if you don't find out. You can stay confident that you know what we are and aren't able to do, but that won't change the ability of some to do things we think aren't possible.

    The skepticism is fine, the hyperbole does nothing to further your stance, just shows you have a closed mind and inability to discern between fantasy and fantastic claims. The leprechaun thread is somewhere else.;)


     

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