Impressive demonstration of no-touch martial art

Convinced me, much like this guy.

I shall never get tired of seeing this posted all over the interwebs.

 
So, the students believe that the "Master" can use EFO to knock them down, throw them etc? Wouldn't the "Master" know it was fake? When the students realize they don't have the "power" wouldn't they simply leave? In the second video the "Master" gets his clock cleaned, I wonder what his excuse is. I'm genuinely interested in this and hope someone can answer my questions.
 
I'm dumbfounded.

These guys must know this is fantasy, and everyone involved must likewise know. Which begs the question...

Why would they go up against anyone that is not part of the fantasy?

The only thing that might explain it, is the old guys expect deference. Rather than counting on people to 'believe' and fake it, they are counting on respect and deference due to old 'masters.' Either way, it seems massively out of touch with reality.
 
I've compared this sort of thing to the "slain by the spirit" stuff that goes on in religious revivals. Most all the participants quite willingly fall down when touched by the preacher.
They are invested in the nonsense, and they are fulfilling expectations. What would the crowd (including friends and relatives) think if you just stood there?
Same with these "students".... They are invested in the Master's teachings, they've probably spent a good deal of time and money on the lessons.....

There's a related video on the Reddit Martial Arts section... A "Chi Kung" master showing that he can be hit by a martial arts practitioner without harm. It's quite hilarious when he goes face-down on the mat....
 
Spindrift said:
What was that guy thinking? Going up against an MMA fighter? Did the 'master' really believe his own BS?
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Yes, I'm sure he does. He's had years of practice waving his hands around and watching his students writhe and collapse (or vice versa). Why should these other guys be any different?
 
There was a TV show featuring guys traveling to the schools of various martial arts, including some in distant and fairly isolated (from us Occidentals at least) places, to get some quick samples of what each featured art is like. They found a guy (I think on a Pacific island) who said he could wrap himself in invisible chi energy like armor that would protect him from any harm, and proceeded to demonstrate on just his arm, moving his other hand around and up & down that forearm repeatedly like he was wrapping a long piece of cloth. Then when he'd apparently done enough of that, he whacked himself in that arm with a machete. The TV show's host had to offer him the aid of his crew medic.

Aside from the injury, he must have suffered a lot of embarrassment, so the fact that he did it anyway tells me that he really thought he could succeed, which tells me he had never really put it to even a smaller test before.
 
malicus said:
Convinced me, much like this guy.

I shall never get tired of seeing this posted all over the interwebs.

Click to expand...
Spindrift said:
What was that guy thinking? Going up against an MMA fighter? Did the 'master' really believe his own BS?
Click to expand...
Madalch said:
Yes, I'm sure he does. He's had years of practice waving his hands around and watching his students writhe and collapse (or vice versa). Why should these other guys be any different?
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I wonder what he's up to now. The nonsense he was claiming, and his delusion that it was real, are both far from unique, but he gets the distinction of being the one person who's most famous for it. Surely the experience must have changed him somehow.
 
Audible Click said:
So, the students believe that the "Master" can use EFO to knock them down, throw them etc? Wouldn't the "Master" know it was fake? When the students realize they don't have the "power" wouldn't they simply leave? In the second video the "Master" gets his clock cleaned, I wonder what his excuse is. I'm genuinely interested in this and hope someone can answer my questions.
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You can't reason someone out of a belief he wasn't reasoned into.
 
Delvo said:
I wonder what he's up to now. The nonsense he was claiming, and his delusion that it was real, are both far from unique, but he gets the distinction of being the one person who's most famous for it. Surely the experience must have changed him somehow.
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I'm sure it has, he will never do a demonstration like that again otherwise he's probably back in business at the same old stand, it's easier to rationalize away an incident than it is to give up a lifetime of beliefs and income.
 
There are numerous excuses to choose from. A temporary hole in my chi. Something evil happening somewhere disturbed the Force. James Randi was too close. I was distracted by the hottie in the back row. My dog ate my chakra.
 
Ryan O'Dine said:
There are numerous excuses to choose from. A temporary hole in my chi. Something evil happening somewhere disturbed the Force. James Randi was too close. I was distracted by the hottie in the back row. My dog ate my chakra.
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The classic is to blame the students for their lack of faith, or he can claim it was a lesson in humility, he shouldn't have boasted and this is what happens when you do, so whatever you do never try to actually use what I teach.

Whatever, his sheep will show up for their regular shearing and all will be well.
 
Delvo said:
There was a TV show featuring guys traveling to the schools of various martial arts, including some in distant and fairly isolated (from us Occidentals at least) places, to get some quick samples of what each featured art is like. They found a guy (I think on a Pacific island) who said he could wrap himself in invisible chi energy like armor that would protect him from any harm, and proceeded to demonstrate on just his arm, moving his other hand around and up & down that forearm repeatedly like he was wrapping a long piece of cloth. Then when he'd apparently done enough of that, he whacked himself in that arm with a machete. The TV show's host had to offer him the aid of his crew medic.

Aside from the injury, he must have suffered a lot of embarrassment, so the fact that he did it anyway tells me that he really thought he could succeed, which tells me he had never really put it to even a smaller test before.
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That sounds like Chris Crudelli's Mind, Body & Kick Ass Moves - it was stomach churning to watch.

ETA: I've played with various Martial Arts for 30 odd years now have seen quite a few who do believe this stuff works better than a well aimed fist or foot.
 
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That name gave me what I needed to find it. It's available at YouTube with the title "Chris Crudelli escrima jackass".
 
Audible Click said:
So, the students believe that the "Master" can use EFO to knock them down, throw them etc? Wouldn't the "Master" know it was fake? When the students realize they don't have the "power" wouldn't they simply leave? In the second video the "Master" gets his clock cleaned, I wonder what his excuse is. I'm genuinely interested in this and hope someone can answer my questions.
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I've been thinking about those questions since the first time I saw the popular qi-master-gets-clobbered video. To me the interesting parts of the videos aren't the failed tests, but the initial demonstrations using followers and students. What makes them fall down?

Part of the answer, I think, is that students are trained to perceive qi energy. It's a concept that is generally regarded as useful in martial arts training, and the non-woo explanations offered make sense to me. Visualizing concentrations and flows of energy is a perceptual shortcut for visualizing correct forms of attack and defense in many systems. Perceiving and extrapolating motion as it's happening takes time, and perceiving intention more quickly than that -- knowing where the motion is going to be before it happens -- is practically a necessity. If it happens that it's easier (with training) to perceive impending attacks in the form of "where in space is the opponent's energy flowing toward?" instead of "which muscles is the opponent tensing relative to his current stance and balance?" then it doesn't matter that the energy thus visualized doesn't really exist.

So, now, imagine students trained in fighting, actual fighting with strikes and kicks and everything, that also involves the perception of qi energy as a training technique. Remember that a lot of that training, especially early on, is in defense. Some of that training is likely to include "If you perceive qi energy building, get out of its way."

So, one way that students might start learning to fall down when the qi master gestures in their direction is defensive falls, dodging feigned attacks.

As a crude analogy, imagine taking an unloaded gun onto a subway platform, and then shouting and pointing it at people. I bet you'd see a lot of those people falling down. If you were an alien watching a video of that, you might wonder how people could be so gullible falling over from the imaginary emanations of a harmless object.

Of course, that analogy only goes so far, and so does my training scenario. (For instance, a conventional system would quickly move on from falls to more effective counters.) The rest of the path to roomfuls of people falling over on cue probably involves a lot of social pressure. Imagine a new student who stands there and doesn't fall, like the skeptics in the videos. How long before the teacher just belts him one instead so that he does fall? Or before the other students say, "If your qi is so strong you can stand up against Woo-Sensei, let's see how you do against the rest of us," and proceed to beat the crap out of him? Or perhaps teacher and students alike merely tell him repeatedly that if he doesn't learn to sense and react to qi he'll never be able to fight well. In addition, the "fall over properly when the old slow guy gestures at you" training could be a small portion of the overall curriculum, justified as a peripheral adjunct to the actual useful martial arts, and looked forward to by the students as a break from more challenging material—something like the showing of anti-drug films in U.S. high schools.

So much of odd human nature is on display in these videos. What makes them fall down? What makes us all fall down for some imaginary force or another? Skeptics really are more resistant than most, but we all still do it, whether it's compliance with detrimental and unenforceable laws, undeserved respect for people or institutions or symbols, imaginary needs conjured up by marketing, ineffectual preventive measures against statistically irrelevant fears, or conformity to pointless or toxic social conventions. Let's point and laugh, but also learn.

Respectfully,
Myriad
 
Squeegee Beckenheim said:


How could anybody fail to be convinced?
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Can't we get the mods to put some kind of warning around that video? Just watching it gave me convulsions in my diaphragm, a loss of motor control, and I fell off my chair twice.

I think it's too dangerous to view without some serious warnings!
 
Here is a webpage on the subject http://www.selfdefensetrainingtoday.com/1392/how-to-martial-arts-the-death-touch-secret/
It compares the students to people who sign up for weight loss diets that do not work - they tell the people what they want to hear.

So you want to make money fast? Here is a technique that works - find something that a lot of people want to do and would be willing to spend big to get. It must be hard to do. Then invent a technique for them to be able to do it easily. They just need to give you some $ and they get the technique. Be quick, first person to find that something that is hard to do gets the money.
 
Myriad said:
Part of the answer, I think, is that students are trained to perceive qi energy. It's a concept that is generally regarded as useful in martial arts training, and the non-woo explanations offered make sense to me. Visualizing concentrations and flows of energy is a perceptual shortcut for visualizing correct forms of attack and defense in many systems. Perceiving and extrapolating motion as it's happening takes time, and perceiving intention more quickly than that -- knowing where the motion is going to be before it happens -- is practically a necessity. If it happens that it's easier (with training) to perceive impending attacks in the form of "where in space is the opponent's energy flowing toward?" instead of "which muscles is the opponent tensing relative to his current stance and balance?" then it doesn't matter that the energy thus visualized doesn't really exist.
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I don't disbelieve you, but I must counter with plain old western boxing. Why can people be trained to be very effective at receiving and dealing blows, yet chi-lore is not found among the classes?
 
Myriad said:
<snip>
I've been thinking about those questions since the first time I saw the popular qi-master-gets-clobbered video. To me the interesting parts of the videos aren't the failed tests, but the initial demonstrations using followers and students. What makes them fall down?

Part of the answer, I think, is that students are trained to perceive qi energy.
</snip>
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FTFY
From what I have seen it's a combination of "don't want to make Sifu look a fool" and "I don't want to look the odd one out" - so they play along to start with. It then becomes a reflex action, I do this hand gesture and someone falls down. The guy on the street after your wallet, however, hasn't attended the same lessons as you and . . . . . .
 
The Norseman said:
I don't disbelieve you, but I must counter with plain old western boxing. Why can people be trained to be very effective at receiving and dealing blows, yet chi-lore is not found among the classes?
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A good question. I don't know. My guesses are that chi-lore is not the only effective way to teach or learn martial arts, and/or that its effectiveness differs for different styles.
 
Myriad said:
A good question. I don't know. My guesses are that chi-lore is not the only effective way to teach or learn martial arts, and/or that its effectiveness differs for different styles.
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Given that chi/ki/etc. was never brought up even once in any of the classes I've taken, including the Asian styles, I'd say that's pretty obvious. Heck, it didn't even come up on the rare occasions where we did stuff like breaking bricks and boards: the only instructions we were given were physics-based.

Then again, those were all full-contact schools. I'm sure if I'd gone to LARPER-centric McDojos, they would have needed something to keep the student's attention instead of proper training.
 
Myriad said:
A good question. I don't know. My guesses are that chi-lore is not the only effective way to teach or learn martial arts, and/or that its effectiveness differs for different styles.
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I think the chi lore acts as a sort of motivational placeholder, keeping students engaged throughout the long years of practice it takes to actually get really good. It also provides the older and now physically waning master with a ready tool to manipulate and cow younger and stronger students into not getting too uppity with their "master".
 
Bikewer said:
I've compared this sort of thing to the "slain by the spirit" stuff that goes on in religious revivals. Most all the participants quite willingly fall down when touched by the preacher.They are invested in the nonsense, and they are fulfilling expectations. What would the crowd (including friends and relatives) think if you just stood there?
Same with these "students".... They are invested in the Master's teachings, they've probably spent a good deal of time and money on the lessons.....

There's a related video on the Reddit Martial Arts section... A "Chi Kung" master showing that he can be hit by a martial arts practitioner without harm. It's quite hilarious when he goes face-down on the mat....
Click to expand...

I've mentioned that too.

One of the things I do remember seeing is Paul Daniels (UK TV magician in the 1970s) and he did a trick that looked very similar - making an audience member get either stuck to a chair or jump up from the chair. Now, I guess the audience member could have been a stooge, but I did wonder if he just chose a suggestible person (I can't remember if he had a group to chose from).
 
In regards to the "slain by the spirit" shtick, I have experienced similar things like that first hand. I was raised in a non-denominational, charismatic, fundamentalist, bible church. By raised, I mean church on Sunday mornings, elder meetings Sunday afternoon, and Sunday and Wednesday nights. Can't forget about all the youth group activities and Sunday school stuff. Oh, and I went to the ACE accredited school attached to the church. I pretty much lived there.

I don't remember any slain by the spirit stuff, exactly, but as we were charismatic, it was a 'spirit filled church". So we had speaking in tongues, with the attendant interpretation of tongues, along with the gifts of prophecy, discernment, and of course healing.

I remember as I grew into early teen-hood, that I was dismayed that I exhibited none of those gifts. We were told that they were given to those who prayed for them and were chosen by the spirit to receive them. Being "good faithful believers, with pure hearts" was an implied criteria. So as I prayed and waited for my gifts to be bestowed on me, I noticed that my friends (most of them kids just like me) starting to exhibit some of the gifts. And that got me to thinking; they sure ain't no better a believer, or purer than I was, as there was a lot of, ahem, shared mischief that was frowned upon by both holy scripture and church elders committed by all of us.

So I knew that their gifts weren't real as there was no way they were higher on the biblical totem pole than I was. But yet, they were blessed by the gifts of the holy spirit. I will admit that there was a lot of peer pressure placed on me to also exhibit these gifts, as it was a sign of ones holiness. But I couldn't do it. I knew my friends were faking, and I started to suspect everyone else was doing the same. But man, it was hard to resist the peer pressure to fake it.

It has been a long hard climb out of that place. Even after 30 years, it is hard to buck an upbringing like that.
 
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