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Thread: What is Ki?

  1. #16
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    Ki is like duct tape, it has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

    hope that helps.
    Jim Boone

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    Quote Originally Posted by yoj
    Ki is like duct tape, it has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

    I think yoou are referring to "the Force".


    May it always be with you!

    Dan Botari

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    damn, I've been had!
    Jim Boone

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    Default The Nature of Ki

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian Owens
    My belief is that there is no such "thing" as Ki/Chi/Qi/Prana.
    Rather, I believe that through training our bodies become strong and flexible, and we learn techniques for moving our own bodies and controlling our opponents' bodies in the most efficient manner.

    What we perceive as a mysterious force is just a combination of focused intention and good kinesthetics.
    But you're limiting the concept to martial arts--"through training our bodies become strong and flexible, and we learn techniques for moving our own bodies and controlling our opponents' bodies in the most efficient manner".

    Ki in itself needs no such expression. It is strongly present in every child born, from the moment they are born. It does not have to be developed in technique.

    In short, "ki" is the difference between a living person and a corpse. In that way, it is "the life force". With it, you live, without it, you are dead.

    Another thing that must be noted is that the "chi" of "tai chi" is NOT the same as the "ki" of "aikido".

    The "chi" of "tai chi" is called "kyoku" in Japanese (tai chi chuan = tai kyoku ken in Japanese). It has a completely different meaning than "ki" as in "aiki" or "kiai". That "chi" or "kyoku" means "universe" and not "life force".

    "Ki" in that sense, can be more closely compared to "feeling". Some words to consider:

    kimochi = feeling ('holding' ki)
    kimochi ii = "feeling good"
    kimochi warui = "feeling bad"
    kibun = also "feeling" (your "portion" of ki)
    yaruki = desire to do something
    kigaeru = change your mind
    kichigai = "different mind" or "crazy"
    genki = "original" ki, or "healthy spirit"
    byouki = sick spirit (sickness)
    tenki = "heaven spirit" or "the weather"

    The list goes on and on. The main meaning of "ki" is so thoroughly dispersed into the environment and everyday life that it literally does permeate everything.

    So terms like "kiai" and "aiki" should be understood more like "attitudes" or "feelings" as in "cut with a strong feeling of TUT-TUT!!" (Musashi, paraprhased from Go Rin no Sho).

    "kiai", then, would mean "a feeling or attitude of dominating the opponent" while "aiki" would mean "a feeling or attitude of blending with the opponent" even though both forms of ki have the "feeling" or "attitude" of positively controlling the situation--never of letting it accidentally bumble along into whatever might happen.

    So, yes, ki is real but, like Zen, it's "nothing special" and we can get more of it by "not-doing" or by paying attention to very mundane matters than by focusing on the 'ki' itself and trying to generate it like a coal-fired electric plant.

    Best wishes to all and thank you for letting me lay out these ideas for your consideration.
    David Orange, Jr.

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    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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    Default Heisenberg???

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian Owens
    In my experience...people who vaguely invoke words like "quantum mechanics" to explain mysterious phenomena without further qualification often are folks who wouldn't know Max Planck from walking the plank, Albert Einstein from a beer stein, Niels Bohr from a wild boar, nor Werner Heisenberg from an iceberg.
    Heisenberg???

    Isn't he the guy that sunk the Titanic!!!!?????
    David Orange, Jr.

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    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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    Default More rambling

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian Owens
    ...the M-Theory, was proposed by Edward Witten in 1995. But it's still very much in the hypothetical realm. It has been suggested that the M stands for "Membrane." Witten has said it could be Membrane or it could be Magic. Others say it should mean "Monsterous" because it's an attempt to pull together Newtonian Mechanics, Einsteinian Relativity, Quantum Theory, String Theory, Unified Field Theory, etc. into one great big, monsterous, universal theory of everything.
    I says it stands for "Mmmm-mmmm-good Theory".

    But seriously, thanks for that explantion.

    Still, I think these ideas do relate to "ki" because ki is the underlying energy matrix from which all "forms" arise.

    I have said that "ki" is merely the difference between living person and a corpse.

    It is life energy, itself. It has to have a body in which to express itself, but when it has departed, that body turns to ooze and foul odors.

    But every living function from breathing to digesting to passing gas requires, uses and expresses universal "ki". Babies have it and old ladies have it. There are words for every condition of it (good, strong, original, stale, poison, light, heavy, dark, etc.).

    What it is NOT (to my knowledge) is something that can be brewed up and concentrated and channeled across a room through the empty air to affect a person at a distance. However, it can pass from person to person through the eyes or the voice (kiai). All that really is, though, is just 'noticing' the other person's ki.

    But look at this idea: you decide you've had enough of your teacher's guff and you're on your way to punch him in the nose, even though he is a fierce fighter, himself. So you're walking along to attack this guy and just as you come around the corner, THERE HE IS!! Suddenly face-to-face with you and looking you right in the eye!

    Might you fall or be "knocked" down by the sudden shock of meeting his undisguised spirit before you meant to?

    Frankly, any of it can be "explained" by kinesthetics, but some things are not adequately explained in that way.

    My opinion.
    David Orange, Jr.

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    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by kimiwane
    But you're limiting the concept to martial arts.
    Of course I am. All conversations are limited, and are expressed within certain confines.

    I chose to converse in the context of Budo, because the question itself originated on a Budo forum.

    Quote Originally Posted by kimiwane
    In short, "ki" is the difference between a living person and a corpse. In that way, it is "the life force". With it, you live, without it, you are dead.
    My belief is a bit different.

    I believe that the diference between a living person and a corpse is that the former has many interrelated neurochemical and electrical reactions occurring that the latter does not.

    I don't think those reactions are what most people are talking about when they talk about ki.
    Yours in Budo,
    ---Brian---

  8. #23
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    Default about ki...

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian Owens
    Of course I am. All conversations are limited, and are expressed within certain confines.

    I chose to converse in the context of Budo, because the question itself originated on a Budo forum.
    But that's sort of like limiting a discussion of "air" to matters of "airplanes".

    Or to limit a discussion of "what is electricity" to "static discharge".

    Ki is an independent energy in all living things, whether they do martial arts or not. Saying that it's the difference between a living person and a corpse is wrong, actually, because even a rock has ki.

    Ki is just the energy of life in its many forms.

    My belief is a bit different.

    I believe that the diference between a living person and a corpse is that the former has many interrelated neurochemical and electrical reactions occurring that the latter does not.

    I don't think those reactions are what most people are talking about when they talk about ki.
    Well, it's usually not what they're talking about when they talk about "life," either, but it applies to both.

    I gave many examples above of uses of the word and concept of ki. The Japanese use it for every kind of mundane daily situation. Every little girl is full of ki, every baby and old lady. Martial arts don't even have that much to do with it, except arts like aikido. Karate uses kiai, but generally doesn't address things like 'punching with ki' and certainly not 'throwing ki balls' or such fantasies.

    'Ki' itself is formless and unlimited. Forms of ki, such as aiki and kiai, sakki, tenki and such are all passing phenomena against the background of pure, formless ki.

    yoroshiku
    David Orange, Jr.

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    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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    For those of you who don't know me, I'm a grad student going into neurobiology, with an extensive research background.

    The problem with personal experiences of ki is that they're not measurable. Not to say that they don't exist, but one of the things that nobody's taking into account is their own brain, which is constantly reworking the things that we sense into a framework which we call reality. For example, you see far more mirages than you realize. Very often, before the image reaches your conscious perception, it's reworked to make sense, and you don't see the ship floating above the water, or the shimmering image on the horizon. Your brain edits it out.

    Thus, guys, I hate to say it, but individual perceptions are a poor basis for statements about the fundamental nature of the universe. That's why scientists experiments must be repeatable, to correct for that, as well as being a basic honesty check. It's also why we build instruments to measure for us, because our own senses lie so dreadfully at times.

    Thus, this force may exist, but so far, I'm hearing handwaving and individual perceptions being knit in with scientific theory to form something not believable. It's not that ki may not exist, it's that our own brains may be lying to us, and are certainly far more complex than the mere consciousness of our direct experience. If anyone can come up with an experiment that can prove any such thing as ki exists, and it can be repeated by any scientist and get the same results, then go to it! It's a Nobel for sure, guys! Personally, I don't think we'll be able to do those experiments for another century or so. And yes, that is indeed taking into account the exponential rate of acceleration of scientific knowledge.

    Further, if you want to comment on the basic structure of the universe, and the physics theories and paradigms that relate to it, may I suggest that you read T. S. Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions? It will help you to understand science in a way that few except expert scientists do.
    Trevor Johnson

    Low kicks and low puns a specialty.

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    There is also this interpretation, from a bibliographic essay by Professor Bodiford that will be posted to EJMAS in February 2006 or thereabouts.

    QUOTE

    Mencius (multiple translations)

    After Kaibara's Yojokun, the next most influential text is Mencius. In print, D.C. Lau's translation (Penguin, 1970) is recommended. Online, the most common translation is James Legge's. See, for example, http://www.galileolibrary.com/ebooks...us_page_28.htm. Legge was an excellent Sinologist whose translations can still be read with much profit, but his translation renders the vocabulary as if it is discussing abstract qualities. For example, what Legge translates as "passion nature," Lau simply transliterates as qi. Anyway, the original Chinese can be read as if it is providing concrete instructions on how to train. See, for example, the discussion of how to cultivate fearlessness in chapter 2, part A, sections 1-21.

    1. Kung-sun Ch'ow asked Mencius, saying, "Master, if you were to be appointed a high noble and the prime minister of Ts'e, so as to be able to carry your principles into practice, though you should thereupon raise the prince to the headship of all the other princes, or even to the imperial dignity, it would not to be wondered at. In such a position would your mind be perturbed or not?" Mencius replied, "No. At forty, I attained to an unperturbed mind."

    Note that the "unperturbed mind" mentioned here is translated as "unmoving mind" in English renditions of Takuan Soho's famous treatise on Fudochi Shinmyo roku. Takuan was not writing about a Zen approach to swordsmanship, but commenting on Mencius's Confucian approach. Regarding this point, see my essay "Zen and Japanese Swordsmanship Reconsidered" in Budo Perspectives, edited by Alexander Bennett, Auckland: Kendo World Publications, 2005, pp. 69-103.

    This section continues through the assertion by Mencius that:
    11. "I venture to ask," said Ch'ow again, "wherein you, Master, surpass Kaou." Mencius told him, "I understand words. I am skillful in nourishing my vast, flowing passion nature."

    "Vast, flowing passion nature" is ki, and it is the key to attaining an unmoving mind, the key to fearlessness, and the key to defeating any foe. Before ca. 1900, Japanese martial artists studied Mencius to learn how to cultivate or nourish their own ki so that it would become vast and flowing. See, for example, Takuan's essay on the unmoving mind (Fudochi shinmyo roku) and Yagyu Munenori's equally famous essay on "Our Family's Tradition of Swordsmanship" (Heiho kadensho).

    END QUOTE

  11. #26
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    Not to burst anyone's bubble...
    But the explanation of "Ki" "Qi" "Chi" (In a bujutsu/martial) context is much simpler than many might think.

    Suffice to say my personal take is that it's a myriad of physical factors that you can strengthen in the human body and when tied together was labeled as "Ki".

    I mean...seriously you expect the old guys to go and say, oh yea expand the fascia like this, you use the muscle but not in the way you might think, expand the tendons, rely more on your bone structure, connect the upper and lower bone stuctures, while making sure you gain control and strengthen the diaphram enough that you develop a "pressure" suit/webbing that stretches across the body which eventually accounts for a contradictory/equalizing force(six directional) to develop which in turn creates a superior sense of balance which also just happens to generate enormous force in strikes (without windup)?

    It's a lot easier to just say...it's "Ki" and get it over with

    Btw, Ki essentially referred to any phenomenon they couldn't put a label on at the time

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    Quote Originally Posted by Joseph Svinth
    There is also this interpretation, from a bibliographic essay by Professor Bodiford that will be posted to EJMAS in February 2006 or thereabouts.

    QUOTE

    Mencius (multiple translations)


    1. Kung-sun Ch'ow asked Mencius, saying, "Master, if you were to be appointed a high noble and the prime minister of Ts'e, so as to be able to carry your principles into practice, though you should thereupon raise the prince to the headship of all the other princes, or even to the imperial dignity, it would not to be wondered at. In such a position would your mind be perturbed or not?" Mencius replied, "No. At forty, I attained to an unperturbed mind."

    This section continues through the assertion by Mencius that:
    11. "I venture to ask," said Ch'ow again, "wherein you, Master, surpass Kaou." Mencius told him, "I understand words. I am skillful in nourishing my vast, flowing passion nature."

    END QUOTE
    The Mencius is a great text, and I'm surprised to find it brought up in the context of a discussion of Ki/Qi, because it is usually ignored. The only disagreement I have with Prof. Bodiford's use of these quotes is that he left out the most fascinating part of that chapter. Here is an abridged and slightly altered version (based on David Hinton's excellent translation) of the same chapter he mentions, but with the really salient parts left in place -

    (My apologies to sinologists who will notice that I've mixed up pinyin and Wade-Giles; I did it to avoid confusion between "Qi" the political state and "Qi"/energy) –

    Kongsun Chou said, "Suppose you became Prime Minister in the state of Ch'i and put Dao into practice, making the sovereign of Ch'i an emperor without peer – would you feel moved, or not?"
    Mencius replied, "My mind has been utterly still since I was forty."
    "Is there a way of stilling the mind?"
    "There is. The Will guides the Qi, and the Qi fills the body. So for us, Will comes first, Qi comes second. That is why I say, Keep a firm grasp on your Will, but never tyrannize your Qi."
    At this, Kongsun Chou said, "If you say for us, Will comes first, Qi comes second, how can you also say Keep a firm grasp on your Will, but never tyrannize your Qi?"
    Mencius replied, "When the Will is whole, it moves Qi, and when Qi is whole, it moves the Will. When we stumble and hurry, Qi is affected, but that in turn moves the Mind."
    Kongsun Chou said, "May I ask what makes you excel and flourish so?"
    Mencius replied, "I understand words, and I nurture the Qi-flood."
    "May I ask what you mean by the Qi-flood?"
    "That's hard to explain," replied Mencius. "It is Qi at its limits: vast and relentless. Nourish it with fidelity and allow it no injury – then it fills the space between Heaven and Earth. It is the Qi that unifies Duty and Dao. Without it, we starve. And it is born from a lifetime of Duty: a few token acts aren't enough."
    Mencius continued. "You must devote yourself to this Qi-flood without forcing it. Don't let it out of your mind, but don't try to help it grow or flourish either. If you do, you'll be acting like that man from the state of Song who worried that his rice shoots weren't growing fast enough, so he went around pulling at them. At the end of the day, he returned home exhausted and said to his family: I'm worn out. I've been helping the rice grow all day. His son ran out to look and found the fields all withered and dying. In all beneath Heaven, there are few who can resist helping the rice shoots grow."

    - I've always thought of this passage as a perfect set of instructions for meditation and qigong/neigong, especially the part I put in italics, but I haven't come across anyone else who thinks so until recently. I think it was Mike Sigman, over on the Aikido Journal website, who posted a link to a series of essays by a Taijiquan/Yiquan practitioner in Portland named Gregory Fong. In several of the essays, he notes that the idea in developing power in Yiquan is based on the idea of "don't make it happen, but don't forget what you are doing." To me, he is saying what Mencius is saying.

    None of which actually helps to explain what Mencius *really* meant when he used the word "Qi". But it is a great part of the text nonetheless.
    Josh Lerner

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    Quote Originally Posted by Joshua Lerner
    To me, he is saying what Mencius is saying.

    None of which actually helps to explain what Mencius *really* meant when he used the word "Qi". But it is a great part of the text nonetheless.
    As far as I've experienced it's a cycle really, you go through periods of intense "figuring" out where you tax yourself mentally and physically (in a different way), where you strengthen those "parts", then you have to let the subconscious take hold, and do them naturally without thinking too hard(nagasu). Doing too much of either doesn't produce results. It's a fine line to walk, but once you find it, walking that line is at once easier and harder (just had to throw a contradiction in there ^^; ) than most might think.

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    Default misunderstanding

    Quote Originally Posted by Asura
    Btw, Ki essentially referred to any phenomenon they couldn't put a label on at the time
    That's not a worthy statement to make in this kind of forum.

    Thanks.
    David Orange, Jr.

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    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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    Default Scientific Analysis is Useless on This Subject

    I don't think it's helpful to try to analyze or even attempt to define ki in scientific terms.

    Can you analyze and quantify elan vitale?

    How about "inspiration"? Can you prove anything about it scientifically?

    "ki" is a descriptive term for the "life energy", the "elan vitale", the "inspiration" of a living person in the world as we know it, in which trees pull air from the sky and send it down through their roots into the earth, in which the tree's leaves rot to form the dirt that feeds the tree, in which the squirrel finding his food "grooms" the tree that provides that food while he climbs and knocks off dead twigs and bits of bark. It is an interconnected system in which very little can be changed without breaking the whole system down.

    The Japanese have described people and the world in terms of subtly different forms of ki for hundreds of years. Are we to say that because we "cut" the idea into little pieces that we can fit into our analysis machine, and we get nonsense answers back, that "ki" does not exist? I think the best we can say there is that science can neither describe, define, measure or prove or disprove the existence of ki. Our attempts to do so tell us more about the limits of our scientific method than about tha nature of ki.

    And a big part of the problem is people latching onto "forms" of ki as being "ki" itself. So you mention ki and they think "ki balls" or "force fields out of my palms". And then they try to prove that scientifically. It's like arguing whether Jesus exists based on arguments about wine making. That won't get you anywhere useful.

    All Chinese medicine is based on emprical observation of the human body and nerve system, resulting in the theory that the life energy moves through the body in consistent pathways. "Science" cannot detect this energy. Well, it could not detect electromagnetic fields just a few decades back. It has only recognized radioactivity for a few decades. The air was around us all the time, but "science" only learned to make airplanes fly through it very recently in historical terms.

    The Chinese were healing people with "chi" applications when the West was using stone scalpels.

    But if we must insist on looking at everything through scientific eyes, then please analyze Pablo Picasso's "inspiration" for us and tell us the chemical or electrical components that separate him from Bill Burbus, who teaches painting to old ladies at the Craft Hut.

    Again, let's get back to how the Japanese USE the term instead of how anime fans have come to think of it.

    Ki is used to describe a person's emotions, physical feeling, state of mind, their relation to a fighting opponent, their enthusiasm, the weather, radio waves, electricity and pretty much every phenomenon in the human world.

    Let's get away from "ki balls" and "long distance knockouts," "telekinesis through ki power" and all that cartoon stuff.

    If "ki does not exist", how do we explain the weather, which Japanese call "tenki" (same "ki").

    How do we explain electricity, which the Japanese call denki (same "ki")

    or pleasant emotions (kimochi ii) (same ki)?

    If you want to analyze something scientifically, first, be clear about just what you're analyzing.
    David Orange, Jr.

    -------------------------------------------------------

    "That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
    Lao Tzu

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