Science Vs Pseudoscience {Can you prove it?}

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Forum
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[QUOTE=mengfei;1312526]Isn’t Buddha one of Krishna’s ten avatars?[/QUOTE]

If I am correct (which I rarely am, lol), some in the Hindu religion view Buddha as one of Krishna’s avatars, while Buddhists themselves seem to reject this claim. What I find interesting about claiming Buddha to be one of Krishna’s avatars, is that in the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna calls for devotees to achieve absolute Krishna consciousness and devotion in order to reach enlightenment/salvation/etc. Why that is interesting is because, Buddhism was created in part as a rejection to the Vedas (which the Bhagavad-Gita is part of) and is therefore a rejection of Krishna consciousness. So to say that Buddha is one of Krishna’s avatars and that all religions were created to indirectly worship Krishna is to say that Krishna created Buddhism as a means for his creation (humans) to reject him, which completely goes against his call for humans to reach total Krishna consciousness. So the logical conclusion is that either, Buddha is not a Krishna avatar or Krishna is intentionally misleading others away.

And just for clarity, I am not speaking as a follower of Hinduism or Buddhism. This is just my personal observation.

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[QUOTE=Gweilo_Fist;1312524]Fair enough. We can leave it at that. Having said that, I always love engaging in these kinds of discussions (respectfully, of course) so if you’re ever down for it, Id love to dive further into it.[/QUOTE]

Sure Gweilo_Fist

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[QUOTE=wiz cool c;1312529]Sure Gweilo_Fist[/QUOTE]

I can’t tell if that’s a sarcastic “sure” based on my response to Mengfei or a sincere “sure”. Oh, how we lose so much nuance with text. Why isn’t there a sarcastic font for these situations! haha

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[QUOTE=Gweilo_Fist;1312528]If I am correct (which I rarely am, lol), some in the Hindu religion view Buddha as one of Krishna’s avatars, while Buddhists themselves seem to reject this claim. What I find interesting about claiming Buddha to be one of Krishna’s avatars, is that in the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna calls for devotees to achieve absolute Krishna consciousness and devotion in order to reach enlightenment/salvation/etc. Why that is interesting is because, Buddhism was created in part as a rejection to the Vedas (which the Bhagavad-Gita is part of) and is therefore a rejection of Krishna consciousness. So to say that Buddha is one of Krishna’s avatars and that all religions were created to indirectly worship Krishna is to say that Krishna created Buddhism as a means for his creation (humans) to reject him, which completely goes against his call for humans to reach total Krishna consciousness. So the logical conclusion is that either, Buddha is not a Krishna avatar or Krishna is intentionally misleading others away.

And just for clarity, I am not speaking as a follower of Hinduism or Buddhism. This is just my personal observation.[/QUOTE]

Thank you for your reply! Happy to read your thoughts! Well, my wife is Hindu and I was brought up with loose Buddha teachings mixed in with some Taoist. I think in Japan the Shinto is heavily mixed in with Buddhism although that is way off topic! My wife the other night had mentioned after we watched some movie, I believe I have watched more Indian films than Chinese lol. Love Akshay Kumar films, now way way off! She had mentioned about Buddha being one of Krishna’s avatars. I feel like you are thinking though as to me that really does not make sense.

I believe at one time, many Hindu’s born in a lower caste, started converting to Buddha. I have not read the Gita but I agree that being one avatar and Buddha’s teachings do not seem to go together! I cannot think that Krishna would intentionally mislead others away. Might be some Hindu’s decided to grab Buddha and throw him in the mix. I am sure my wife would disagree, ha!

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[QUOTE=GeneChing;1312462]While I generally agree with this discussion, I do have a bone to pick with it. I’ve always had issues with any martial arts claim to being ‘scientific’. It betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the scientific method and a misuse of the term. You can’t make predictions in the martial arts, which is a cornerstone of science. If you could, you might make a tidy fortune betting on MMA fights nowadays. While there are certainly some scientific experiments involving the martial arts (heck, my PhD thesis was martial, even though I never finished it :o), to bandy about the term ‘science’ in the context of martial arts betrays a pop culture notion of what science really is.
[/QUOTE]

Yeah, “scientific” martial arts even gets used as a selling point, but by definition they aren’t science. As someone that trains Gong Fu and Muay Thai, it irritates me when MT fans call it the “science of 8 limbs,” instead of the art, or claim that is scientific, unlike other styles…it demonstrates zero understanding of traditional, (and modern) culture of the art. Some practitioners are more pragmatic than others, some systems have higher ratios of pragmatic practitioners than others…I think that’s more accurate terminology than scientific/psuedoscientific.

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There are definite parallels between religions and martial arts, or at least how they are approached by many of their followers. At some point for many people, the “-ism” or the -anity" and the rituals, politics and exclusivity around them become more important than what the original purpose was intended to be. With MA, the sect is the style/system/lineage. “My style(s) {or lineage} is the only path to the truth, and everyone outside of it is ignorant.” The MA, or at least the school and/or the organization it belongs to if any, becomes a type of cult.

This can happen in ALL MAs, including MMA and the base systems that comprise it. Which is why I rarely discuss MA at all anymore, and I never discuss religion. I long ago ceased following any organized religion, anyway, and only classify myself now as ‘spiritual but not religious’. Some religious people roll their eyes at that, but IMO, true spirituality must be a deeply personal thing based on personal experience. What is ‘best’ is what’s best for you personally, and that will be different for each individual. I’m pretty much in the same place with my MA. It is VERY difficult for people who are fully indoctrinated and emotionally invested in a particular belief system to see beyond it.

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[QUOTE=Jimbo;1312552]At some point for many people, the “-ism” or the -anity" and the rituals, politics and exclusivity around them become more important than what the original purpose was intended to be. With MA, the sect is the style/system/lineage. “My style(s) {or lineage} is the only path to the truth, and everyone outside of it is ignorant.” The MA, or at least the school and/or the organization it belongs to if any, becomes a type of cult. [/QUOTE]

I’ve been playing with building a Matrix, or categorical system to describe this phenomena and how it happens. It goes something like this; There are 4 types of combat. 1) The first being the “bully fight”. This is what most people believe is da’ streets, but really it’s just a couple of egos huffing, puffing and posturing. Maybe punches are thrown. Most people grow out of this crap. 2) Sports fighting. This is fighting based on a specific rule set. Good fighters understand and utilize the rules to their advantage. 3) Sudden violence. This is the real da’ streets. It’s rare, and there are relatively few ways to prepare for it - but the military uses realistic scenarios. I think there are some martial artists coming close to this, for example the Spear System, or maybe Fit to Fight. But you can only do so much preparation. Key attributes would be good protective gear because in order to train this correctly, you’d have to make the scenarios as realistic as possible like blind-side a person, shove them into a wall and hit them with a baseball bat. See if any style can defend against that scenario :rolleyes: and the final 4) ritualized combat which is pretty much any traditional martial art. It’s similar to sport based in that there are rules and etiquette.

A person can be really good in number 4) but be terrible at 2) and 3).

I think a key to success is understanding which category you are training in. So if you’re training 4) and want to participate in something that falls in 2), then you should minimize 4) and train 2). If you’re training 4) and want to include 3), then invest in high quality protective gear so you can really go at it and see what works in different scenarios.

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Thanks Kellen

[QUOTE=Kellen Bassette;1312549]Yeah, “scientific” martial arts even gets used as a selling point, but by definition they aren’t science. As someone that trains Gong Fu and Muay Thai, it irritates me when MT fans call it the “science of 8 limbs,” instead of the art, or claim that is scientific, unlike other styles…it demonstrates zero understanding of traditional, (and modern) culture of the art. Some practitioners are more pragmatic than others, some systems have higher ratios of pragmatic practitioners than others…I think that’s more accurate terminology than scientific/psuedoscientific.[/QUOTE]

It’s reaffirming to hear someone else on the same page with me on this. It’s been a sticking point for me for years. I was trained as a scientist in grad school and TAed courses like Experimental Psych on the university level, so I had to be very conversant in the scientific method. It’s taken me decades to unlearn APA format. When martial artists make ‘scientific’ claims, it really just demonstrates their illiteracy. But then again, in today’s world, ironically, so many dispute science, predominantly as some sort of foe to religion. Clearly pop culture, and reciprocally martial arts culture, really don’t understand what science is.

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[QUOTE=MightyB;1312554]I’ve been playing with building a Matrix, or categorical system to describe this phenomena and how it happens. It goes something like this; There are 4 types of combat. 1) The first being the “bully fight”. This is what most people believe is da’ streets, but really it’s just a couple of egos huffing, puffing and posturing. Maybe punches are thrown. Most people grow out of this crap. 2) Sports fighting. This is fighting based on a specific rule set. Good fighters understand and utilize the rules to their advantage. 3) Sudden violence. This is the real da’ streets. It’s rare, and there are relatively few ways to prepare for it - but the military uses realistic scenarios. I think there are some martial artists coming close to this, for example the Spear System, or maybe Fit to Fight. But you can only do so much preparation. Key attributes would be good protective gear because in order to train this correctly, you’d have to make the scenarios as realistic as possible like blind-side a person, shove them into a wall and hit them with a baseball bat. See if any style can defend against that scenario :rolleyes: and the final 4) ritualized combat which is pretty much any traditional martial art. It’s similar to sport based in that there are rules and etiquette.

A person can be really good in number 4) but be terrible at 2) and 3).

I think a key to success is understanding which category you are training in. So if you’re training 4) and want to participate in something that falls in 2), then you should minimize 4) and train 2). If you’re training 4) and want to include 3), then invest in high quality protective gear so you can really go at it and see what works in different scenarios.[/QUOTE]

Nice post.

Your categories 1 & 3 are often referred to as ‘social violence’ and ‘asocial violence’. Social violence is like a bullying situation, or most commonly, (usually male) jockeying for status/dominance within a social circle. And of course, asocial violence is criminal/predatory, and far more serious, although serious injury or death can potentially result in a scenario in either category. Many MAists and MA sport fighters fail to distinguish between social and asocial violence situations.

The big problem with the “MA style/lineage elitist” mentality is that it’s completely divorced from reality. One’s style/system/lineage is not what will save you, but how you’ve trained what you have, and that you’ve modified and made it, or aspects of it, work under pressure. I needn’t go into details on that, as it’s pretty self-explanatory. Most MA elitists (in CMA and in any other MA category) seem unaware that the outside world doesn’t care about their styles, except perhaps MMA/BJJ/MT, and most of the elitist attitudes for the latter category seem to come from ‘nut riders’.

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[QUOTE=Jimbo;1312583]Your categories 1 & 3 are often referred to as ‘social violence’ and ‘asocial violence’. Social violence is like a bullying situation, or most commonly, (usually male) jockeying for status/dominance within a social circle. And of course, asocial violence is criminal/predatory, and far more serious, although serious injury or death can potentially result in a scenario in either category. Many MAists and MA sport fighters fail to distinguish between social and asocial violence situations.
[/QUOTE]

Now I know what I should call categories 1 & 3 :wink:

I think when you see people modify their training to accommodate different types of pressure it’s because they’re more aware of different types of fighting and they are adjusting to where they want to be effective.

I’m not sure I’m going to say that anyone’s being elitist, I just think they’re overspecializing. What I mean is someone could be really great at push hands and when they display their form, everyone watching would agree that they have great fa-jing. But then they decide they want to fight a kick boxer under kick boxing rules and then they get beat up. That same kick boxer then decides he wants to fight a MMA fighter under MMA rules and gets beat up. That MMA guy fights a Judo guy under Judo rules and gets beat up. That Judo guy fights a BJJ guy under BJJ rules and gets beat up. That BJJ guy picks a fight at a bar and gets beat up. And then that bar fighter picks a fight with the push-hands guy and gets beat up. And on and on it goes.

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[QUOTE=MightyB;1312587]I’m not sure I’m going to say that anyone’s being elitist, I just think they’re overspecializing. What I mean is someone could be really great at push hands and when they display their form, everyone watching would agree that they have great fa-jing. But then they decide they want to fight a kick boxer under kick boxing rules and then they get beat up. That same kick boxer then decides he wants to fight a MMA fighter under MMA rules and gets beat up. That MMA guy fights a Judo guy under Judo rules and gets beat up. That Judo guy fights a BJJ guy under BJJ rules and gets beat up. That BJJ guy picks a fight at a bar and gets beat up. And then that bar fighter picks a fight with the push-hands guy and gets beat up. And on and on it goes.[/QUOTE]

By elitist, I mean that old attitude (that still exists in many today) of “Only our style or lineage has the REAL stuff and everybody else is doing it wrong. (or can’t do it at all).”

Or like “If someone uses an elbow (or a knee) in a fight, he/she is definitely MT, because only MT knows how to use elbows and knees.”

Or “Since 98% of fights go to the ground, BJJ is the most effective martial art in the world.” How they arrived at that percentage is TOTALLY unscientific, but was a '90s marketing campaign not based on reality. But it worked, because I’ve seen people still parroting that. BJJ is a brilliant method of floor fighting (I trained in it for awhile). It works extremely well, especially in one-on-one social (and some asocial) violence situations. But there are too many variables in asocial violence to say “the most effective” across the board.

Or, “TKD practitioners are the best kickers in he world.”

Or “Bajiquan is the most high-level MA, and its fa-jing is the most powerful. We only train for One Strike Kill; Compared to us, Tanglangquan (Mantis) is fast but has no power or stability. And southern styles are lower-level and inferior to northern styles.” Believe it or not, I encountered several practitioners in Taiwan from a certain well-known CMA institute who spouted this and believed it.

“Only Taiji/Xingyi/Bagua develop internal power, and are superior to ‘external’ styles.”

“Wing Chun, with its economy of motion, is the most efficient, and only effective, kung fu system.”

This also goes for attitudes among different lineages within the same general styles/systems.

I’m not picking on these particular systems; I’m only presenting a few examples of what I’ve either been told personally, or heard/read being given. Such people are what I call MA elitists. It comes from being ensconced in one’s own little world, usually without much or any real-world experience around actual violence, and buying into the idea of style superiority.

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Krishna is the living avatar of the pantheon.
Notably, he is Vishnu incarnate.

Buddha is not an avatar at all. He was simply a man who recognized the potential of everyone and anyone to become enlightened.

We apparently still are working on that. :slight_smile:

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[QUOTE=David Jamieson;1312656]Krishna is the living avatar of the pantheon.
Notably, he is Vishnu incarnate.

Buddha is not an avatar at all. He was simply a man who recognized the potential of everyone and anyone to become enlightened.

We apparently still are working on that. :)[/QUOTE]

We’re ALL working towards that. If we were enlightened, we wouldn’t need to be here in this lifetime.

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[QUOTE=Gweilo_Fist;1312465]
But when it comes to Buddhism, the differences among the branches and followers are so different and contradictory that I can’t figure out what defines Buddhism in China.[/QUOTE]

Perhaps a decent definition of the essentials would be as follows: You need legitimately ordained monastics who live by the Vinaya, and whose teaching and practice are founded on the Four Noble Truths and their elaborations; also, laypeople who support the monastics and turn to the monastics for guidance and teaching.

The more superficial differences in beliefs and practices, especially among laypeople, can be chalked up to culture.

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Can I prove it? Well, all we need to do is to invite Bruce Lee (or similar level MA students) to face these monks, and I bet they will run away at speed 100 meters/ 9.90 sec. without teaching their secret techniques.

Regards,

KC
Hong Kong

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[QUOTE=Jimbo;1312600]By elitist, I mean that old attitude (that still exists in many today) of “Only our style or lineage has the REAL stuff and everybody else is doing it wrong. (or can’t do it at all).”[/QUOTE]

I agree with most of what Jimbo is saying here. I say it like this I like Shaolin kung fu because I really think it is an intricate way to condition and train my body for attributes like balance, coordination, flexibility, building strength and stamina, I do not think it is a better fighting system than any other. How good a fighter someone is usually depends on the indivual and how hard they train along with in some cases natural gifts. The one’s usually saying this style knows it all and others are all wrong don’t have the real world experience in violence to be thinking this way, or medical training either. In the real world anyone can get knocked out stabbed etc. How anyone walks around calling themselves Master is beyond me. What if they slip on a banana peel, a Master should never slip but we all slip sometimes, I know I do once in a while after doing MA for 36 years. Also I know people like my older brother who has no MA training that would destroy a lot of these so called masters in a fight. THE ONLY SECRET IS SWEAT.

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[QUOTE=SteveLau;1312741]Can I prove it? Well, all we need to do is to invite Bruce Lee (or similar level MA students) to face these monks, and I bet they will run away at speed 100 meters/ 9.90 sec. without teaching their secret techniques.

Regards,

KC
Hong Kong[/QUOTE]

That is true, to be fair though I also met some good young students that are humble, train hard, spar hard and are good fighters. It is usually the one’s making money running a school in that area that has the inflated egos.