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Old 07-03-2012, 06:18 PM   #34
danj
Dojo: Brisbane Aikido Republic
Join Date: Jun 2004
Posts: 298
Australia
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Re: Ki to the Highway

Quote:
Ron Ragusa wrote: View Post
Aah... a clear line of demarcation.

Matthew's proposition - There are no things in the martial arts that cannot be explained by physics.

Mark's proposition - It is a fact that some things in the martial arts cannot be explained by physics.

It's at this point that the experimental physicist would devise an experiment to test which of the above propositions is supported by experimental data. Anyone care to contribute to the design of said experiment? Thought experiments welcomed.

Ron
There have been some really neat thought experiments done! Its not physics per se. Ulitmately it is physics, cause neurology and perception is just event potentials in the brain, but its easier to work at the abstracted level.

The question of what makes athletes in skill based sports react faster than others has been examined quite a bit (and also highly relevant to MA) Turns out the P300 type reaction times (300mS) to visual stimulus are pretty much the limit but what can be messed with is looking at perception of movement to make decisions earlier than an event (probably nothing new to aikiweb-ka). For example some neat stuff has been done in cricket when videos of bowlers have had the arms, ball, body alternately occlude (hidden) to look at how batters are making decisions. Turns out that getting up the much misquoted 10,000 hrs to expertise as a batter by using a bowling machine is probably training the wrong kind of perceptual skills as the cues in the bowlers run up and predelivery activity aren't being trained (though the physical skills in swinging a bat obviously are )

best,
dan

Last edited by danj : 07-03-2012 at 06:20 PM.

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