Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

It is often said that you cannot see "IP/IT/IS" in a video, or at least, you cannot see what is actually occurring. Many also say that you CAN see when someone is not doing/using "IP/IT/IS."

I would like to delve into this notion. Besides, finding out what something is not, can help us understand what it is.

My hopes for this thread are that people will post videos, or make reference to videos that have already been posted and state what they find impressive, what they believe is happening in the video, how the exercise/skill is beneficial, what they find lacking, etc.

Even better would be for some posters to take the time (probably less than one hour total) to make their own video of an area of their practice that they would like to share, and explain what is being shown by narration, text, or both.

Below are a few links that seem to pop up frequently.

Akuzawa in London 2006
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAJVQMCWeOA

Chen Bing MMA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIc5NIfrnJs

94 year old Ba Gua
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZdtM5p6ZkA

Mind, Body, Kick Ass segment with Kuroda
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXsMSoXrNgo

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Let me give a very simple explanation, Michael. Instead of me videoing this, let's just use my old favorite picture of the one-legged stand trick:



Let's imagine 2 tries. In the first try Nage has not yet mentally arranged his structural paths inside (that's what "intent" means) and Uke just pushes him over. In the second attempt, Nage arranges his structure inside so that Uke's push is met with an angled force-path from the ground that acts as a brace under Uke's push; Uke is therefore pushing against the ground. You cannot see the minute changes that go on within the body to change the alignment paths, so seeing a picture or video isn't going to show you much. If, however, Nage has to drop down to two legs and lean a bit toward Uke and tense his shoulders, we know that he's almost certainly not using intent and is instead using some variation of normal strength. Often what you're looking for is based on your own experience through the years... and you're looking for what the demonstrator does wrong that tells you the story.

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Folks
Once starting down this road how long will it be before there will be any number of threads analyzing this teacher or that one. This is a path with many places to stubble and openings for the angry defense of individual teachers. ….it will end badly.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

On the other hand, if analyses are kept to the clinical, it's probably OK. The part I disagree with is that everyone in, say, Aikido, Taiji, Xingyi, Karate, pretends that all teachers' stuff is legitimate when more experienced people know that a lot of a given teacher's stuff is not correct. When you deliberately go along with the pretense and diplomacy, you save the teacher's "face", but you basically consign the students and followers of that teacher to a bad place.

I've never forgotten one guy I worked with in New Hampshire once and he was a bright, 50-plus year-old guy. He caught the inferences of everything immediately. When we talked after the workshop I asked him what he was planning to do (in terms of training, based on the look at internal strength). He said he was just going to quit... he felt his teacher has taken his money and time and loyalty for so long that now he didn't have a chance to get things, this late in life. While I sympathize with "teachers", I also think that students are people worth worrying about, too. Clinical evaluations of internal strength demonstrations are fair, IMO, as long as the issue is kept clinical.

2 cents.

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Hi Gary
Good point. As many here now know all to well-it is amazing how much invective, personal attacks, politicing, agenda and mixed messages can embroiled in these so called clinical discussions eh?. And as you also know they are worse behind closed doors.
The good news is that there is work being done in person by people who actually do *support* the efforts of teachers and student alike who want to learn instead of lip service.
Anyway, good cautionary note. Interesting years ahead for sure.
Dan

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

In regard to the picture, nage is extending energy through his arm as uke tests progressivly stronger to help nage feel and trust his center.
Mary

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Also cannot see the specific direction uke is pushing (or even if not pulling).

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Let's assume for simplicity's sake that Uke is pushing generally in the direction that he is inclined and is looking. Fair enough?

Mike

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Akuzawa is a good demonstration of maintaining center line.
Chen Bing is using Koshi and all is from koshi.
94yr old is using Hara.
Kuroda, firstly is meeting, leading, moving, cutting. Then it shows how he 'walks' from center. Then in freeform it is a demonstration of shin shin toitsu. Finally a demo of moving one point.
Regards.G.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

All of those videos look like normal things to me. I don't see anything strange or unusual in them at all. Why would one need IP to do any of those things?

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Chris, I think that a lot of these things are just getting started and your questions are valid one. Graham states his perceptions, just as everyone does, and those are the other side of the coin. On my part, I would say that there is simple physics involved, whether using athleticism or internal-strength (neijin), so I would actually take a third position from you or Graham on, for instance, the old Bagua guy. Hara is always assumed, but in the case of the old guy there is something else involved. Keep your mind open. ;)

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Mike, my mind is open. To me it's Hara. What is it to you?
Regards.G.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Graham, I'm not being coy or evasive, but the thing the old guy does is something that took him a lot of years to work on and perfect and it's not the simple kokyu stuff that is being passed off as "Aiki" in all these discussions. My point is that a lot of the attempts at labelling right now are probably somewhat premature. On the general forum of QiJin I would call what the old man did a "pressure pulse" and that's about as far as I'd be willing to go. Of course soon I expect to hear that "pressure pulses" are being taught in some workshops. ;)

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

What I see from the 94-old Bagua man video :

- with first uke (black tee shirt) :
When receiving uke's contact : Bagua man places his intent between his feet and the point of contact (shoulder the first time then chest), via his center, as if compressing a spring.
He then releases his body's stored energy (releases the spring) linearly to push uke away, using the ground as fixed point to transmit his extension to uke's end.
At the third attempt he guides uke away the same way but adding an extra element : he uses his perception of uke's structural weakness and guides his release to unbalance him "into a hole".

- with uke #2 (grey shirt) :
Same principle but : his spring is a spiral instead of a straight compression spring, winding under uke's energy, then unwinding to push him away.
Note that this time the push is made from Bagua man's side (it was from the front with uke #1)

- with uke #1 and uke #3 simultaneously :
Simultaneous winding/unwinding movements on both sides at the same time (one spiral spring for each uke)
His release is quicker this time. I would say that he previously released his stored energy progressively while with this attempt his intent blocks the stored energy (as if cocking an internal pistol trigger) then "pulls the trigger", thus releasing the stored energy more suddenly.
To take a more bodily analogy, the first attempts are like blowing his nose, this one is like sneezing (both result in air being pushed out of the nose, but the internal processes are different).

- with uke#3 alone (white shirt) :
Sudden releases from the side, but this time he seems to drop his weight (see movement of the hand on the other side at the first attempt), then uses some kind of rebound to send the energy to uke. The elbow of the grabbed arm also seems to indicate a quick downward movement before the push.

- with uke #2 :
Sudden releases from the side, the position and relaxed state of the grabbed arm clearly indicating that it cannot be the source of the push. It could at best only convey power originating from the body.
I also interpret the time when Bagua man shows as he could lose his balance as such : he could be saying "see, if I tried to push you away with my upper body, I would not be solid enough against you so I would fall over from my own force, but now, if I place my weight very low, between my base (the feet) and your point of contact, I can push you and remain stable". Funnily enough, uke #3 behind mimics the hand moves but does not seem to get it.

My attempt is of course open to comments and corrections, I claim no expertise on the subject and have no credibility to defend. I also add that Wikipedia helped with the spring and trigger explanations.

I would be interested to know what Bagua man says (he often seems to say something like "now I do this, then I do that"), in particular when he touches his head an points downward (around 00:36). Anyone care to translate ?

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Thanks Mike, thats a great one for a force plate experiment.

BTW I recognise Tamura sensei on the left, does anyone know who's on the right, could it be Maruyama sensei?

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

When you said that about the force plates, Daniel, I did a quick imagination-examination of the equation-modeling and was rapidly filling in the gaps of what would be needed, assumed, extrapolated, etc., in the modeling, but then I ran into a problem. The forces and their impact-angles on the force plates probably could not tell us much about the exact configuration of the body and body configuration/shape would have a lot to do with the alignment structured by "intent" that is such a keystone to internal strength skills. I.e., I'm not sold on force-plates, yet. ;)

YMMV

Mike

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Gotta find something that can register the physical effects of intent before significant progress can be made.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Let's keep science away from IT as long as we can.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Hmmmmm.... it should be recognized that the early "cosmologies" had varying degrees of religious belief in them, but in essence they were founded on early attempts at science and trying to articulate how the world really worked. "Ki" is a term that attempts to explain all things in a condensed "Theory of Everything" (TOE) much in the same way that the current super-string theory is an attempt to reconcile the various branches of science into one whole.

So keeping western science out of internal-strength discussions is actually an idea antithetical to the original descriptive literature.

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Tamura? Where?

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Don't be holding your breath now Robert, that will be a long time coming:(

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

But not to today's one. Times change.

What was an attempt to explain back in the day can be used for concealement today.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

In my opinion the physical roots of the skills associated with "intent" (i.e., ki and kokyu) really wouldn't be that hard to isolate and define. The problem is that the defining paradigms, etc., are fairly vague and scattered and most people have difficulty condensing and codifying the associated physical phenomena.

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

It's not Koretoshi Maruyama - he looked pretty much the same today as he did back then, but with no gray hair of course :)

Also, I do not think that it is Shugi Maruyama as well - someone identified these two the last time it was posted by Mike, so maybe search the archives for that - good luck.

Greg

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Iwao Tamura on the left.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Uh...like say...EMG?

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Surface muscle is one thing but intramuscular probes means sticking needles/fine wires into the flesh. MAers can be so squeamesh about such things. It would be nice to have whole body EMG ... coupled with time correlated EEG (preferably with subdural probes-more needles into the brain this time) to link mental states with muscular actions. Given those options I think getting folks to hop onto a force plate should be no problem!

Might want to hold off until fMRI gets into the millisecond time ranges and bypass all the needles and bore holes through the skull ... unless on simply cannot wait. Do let us know how it goes.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Well, 6 lead surface EMG tied into a force plate may suffice as a first approximation. fMRI studies like the ones you suggest have been done IIRC but they show roughly what you'd expect - activation of particular parts of the motor cortex etc when visualizing movement

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Hi Mike,

not sure whether you are saying it can be done or not:confused:
The physical roots of the skills must be the easiest to both quantify and measure. The non physical ie mental/psychological/hara is really hard to both quantify, measure, condense, codify etc. And as these skills are a combination of mind/body and spirit.
I for one am not going to hold my breath waiting for someone else to explain to me what is going on from a physics point of view.

You probably know as well as anyone, that this is a field ripe for investigation, but it is unlikely to happen anytime soon, when we cant even agree on the parameters of what we are doing.

regards,

Mark

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Hi Mark:

Well, I guess part of the problem is that the entire spectrum of "internal strength" skills is broader than most people think, if you break them down into isolated (but related) components. That means that the number of things you're going to measure as factors in I.S. will be fairly broad; i.e., there isn't a simple, isolated group of skills that can be readily measured in any investigation.

Most of what people are working on at this point in time are simple jin skills. There are varying approaches and IMO the easiest thing to do at first is to focus on the jin/kokyu skills ("kokyu", "aiki", jin, whatever; they're all aspects of the same thing). My point was, though, that yes these measurements are all capable of being made currently.

Even some of the "woo woo" stuff can be measured since it seems to be mainly related to the interaction of electromagnetic fields and peoples' own susceptibility/psychology. Not that I'm very interested in that aspect of it (don't have time to look too hard); my point is that there is no aspect of "internal strength" that cannot be measured with current instruments. People who view internal-strength and "ki" things as metaphysical will of course reject the idea that anyone can see their special unicorn, but that's life. ;)

FWIW

Mike Sigman

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Yes, I'm all for baby stepping into complexity instead of jumping with both feet into the deep end.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Hi Mike,
yes you are right it probably won't reveal anything about the linkages but through measuring the ground reaction forces (grf) either under Iwao Tamura (left) or his mysterious companion might give a visual representation of the stuff or the interaction we feel when participating in these tests as either person. e.g. the feeling of not feeling the power when grounded and being pushed agains, t or that feeling of not being able to get to the ground when pushing, all should be reflected in the grf vector. Have to book some time on the plates when I have a moment and see. The approached it worked well for unraisable body - though that clearly more about vertical grf

Success or fail i'll bring back to the list - this is the western science process inch by inch up and down blind alleys we crawl eventually moving forwards.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

How do you know that? Have you been working with most people? Have you been keeping tabs on what everyone out there is working on? Even those not associated with Aikiweb? Or do you like just relegating everyone out there to "simple jin skills"?

How about defining the differences in those aspects of "kokyu", "aiki" and "jin". And the varying approaches. Why not explain to everyone here who is supposedly working on "simple jin skills"? Why don't you show the people your expertise in this area.

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

I'm thinking of something simple as an example of a question: If I push, for instance, a plate that is on the wall at shoulder height, I can draw my force by several types of manipulation, one of which would be a "groundpath" from my foot to the hand. While the plate may be able to recognize the impinging direction of the force, I'm not sure that it could tell the difference between jin/kokyu and a variation of normal force.

Similarly, I looked at your description of an unliftable body on your website before. Hold on I need to double check. OK, I would give do the unliftable body differently and my analysis would be different. So let me re-phrase it and note that we might have 2 different solutions to roughly the same results, so the analysis could be markedly different for two different ways of doing something. If you see what I mean.

Best.

Mike

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

a set of bathroom scales is a reasonable way to measure 'force' though i suspect the interaction with another is the key aspect because of the dynamic response characteristics.

I think you are spot on here, its a representative task to show possibilities for the gamut of such test and raises plenty more questions. Unfortunately for zealots (and I'm not implying anything here about list-ka) there is always the yes but what about this, that and the other can your so called science explain that - which has been my experience during my time in the Ki Society with some (but not all)

I agree there are lots of ways to apply the lift and methodologies to pass it as well. The example is useful in so far as it demonstrates that at least some of the stuff is measure able, would that i had time to do more - been meaning to get back to some of this stuff for 10yrs.

Wether helpful as a learning tool or not I dunno...personally I found it helpful to give me confidence to embrace a eastern training methodology knowing that it wasn't some mumo jumbo but a useful training paradigm.

best,
dan

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

I definitely agree. What helps me personally is knowing that there is even more to it than the triangular analysis (which is a good one, though) and the ultimate solution involving jin/kokyu forces is sweetened by the mind's ability to manipulate force vectors not only within itself but within a firmly-attached unit structure (such as 2 people lifting).

Best.

Mike

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

True internal power in the context of Aikido requires singular action resonant with the source of creation. IP in the context of Aikijujitsu only requires the most efficient resonant or non-resonant control of uke. I don't believe asymptotic activation, a direct connection with the infinite, is possible in Aikijujitsu without nage harming himself in the process. I learned the hard way when I first began staffwork several years ago, I gave myself mild to moderate concussions doing yokomens the wrong way in solo practice. A few months of that will make anyone learn Aikido somewhat quickly. Luckily I can teach it now in a way so others don't have to suffer the same experience.

Video link to IP/Aikido: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJkSIHUinno

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Ludwig,

At 00:36, this master said:"It is my brain that controls my wick(core)." Here I'm using the word "core" but actually he used the word "wick" (like the wick of candle) to represent his core (straight line paralel to his spine), that's why he used his finger to point and move down. Hope this helps.

Ting

Re: Assessing "IP/IT/IS" via video
 

Thank you very much.