New blog from Allen Beebe "Back to Aiki..."

New blog from Allen with the title Back to Aiki....

Enjoy!

Walter Oude Wesselink wrote: New blog from Allen with the title Back to Aiki....

I hope this is taken the right way as a constructive clarification -- because the diagram in the blogpost is SO, so close --- but it's just off enough to maybe point people in a wrong direction. And that would be a shame because the rest is so very good.

The Aiki #1 description is perfectly right: "tissues are in tension and bones are in compression." But the diagram shows tail-to-tail arrows which is a pure tension. It is not the described compression linearly allied to the compensating tension. What is described is a contact shear (like scissors, the analogy correctly used in the description). When this form of shear is applied, one can learn to feel how far the "contact" shear extends into the other body before the two stresses begin to separate. When they begin to separate from one another, that point of separation becomes structurally unstable, and starts to rotate. Separation causes a force couple at that point, and the structure wants to rotate around the common center of the opposed stresses where the separation occurs. This is the lesson of kokyu tanden ho -- FWIW. This basic relationship of separating a structure or medium with a thrust to create differential stresses and exploitable resulting rotation is actually what makes airplanes fly, and allows us to tread water by planing our arms back and forth (an action which is, mechanically, directly related to the natural forms of resulting action from aiki, FWIW.

Aiki #2, which is the resulting rotational aspect,as described, is like the uses of shear dynamics found in shaking out a blanket or sheet. One surface of the sheet is compressing and the opposite surface is stretching, and the imbalance causes a wave to form. This wave of shear stresses is being projected out through the structure of the sheet to its limits. The form of the tegatana in relation to the waki -- going from open (elbows out/up) to closed (elbows down/in) and back again are this Aiki structural waveform in the upper body. The opening and closing of the kua (groin areas) are this same waveform dynamic structure in the lower body. Movement and stress are equivalent, so setting up this form of stress in the structure creates a compensation in a live body that, when reversed (by changing from stress (potential) to actual dynamic) the reversing rotational waves move though the structure, causes structural instability or collapse from not just uncompensated rotations -- but the poised compensations to the stress ADD to the instability when the dynamic reverses it. This is the lesson of Ikkyo, FWIW.

The effect of the Aiki #3 torsion is to create a path of tensile stress 90 degrees offset from a companion spiral path of compression. See here:http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/attach...5&d=1214887302 Looking at any element of the structure, anywhere (technically, this is a "field" of stress) that element is being crushed (compression) along one diagonal spiral, and stretched (tension) along the spiral 90 degrees offset from it. This is the lesson of tenchinage, FWIW. In tenchinage, the low hand and the opposite leg are compressing, the high hand and its opposite leg are stretching, the torso is carrying and expressing these in diagonal, opposite stresses in torsional shear, and relieving that stress with torsional movement in the waza.

The key point in all of this is that effective aiki action is accomplished not by the sense of "loading" our opponent with our "force" "muscle" push etc.to create action in our opponent. That feels like MORE work to create MORE action, and is not aiki.

Rather, in creating aiki action we pre-load our own structure, and then in connection to the opponent's action we create counteraction by UNLOADING our structure along these forms and spirals. Our opponent becomes loaded up with them, and unable to move effectively, or else is torqued off his base with the earth from the uncompensated instability they create. That feels like LESS and less work is being done, as more and MORE action is being created.

Erick Mead wrote: I hope this is taken the right way as a constructive clarification -- because the diagram in the blogpost is SO, so close --- but it's just off enough to maybe point people in a wrong direction. And that would be a shame because the rest is so very good.

Erick-

The diagram is accurate for the model described in the blog. The aiki body functions in this way.

It seems to me that what your model is describing is the functioning of a body using frame/lever/pulley system, which is how most people use theirs. The body uses large structural muscles in contracting tension to hold the frame (torso and legs) fairly rigid so we can use the levers and pulleys (limbs) to do stuff. This system is very susceptible to torsional shear and shear waves. This susceptibility is the foundation of judo/jujitsu and, when applied very subtly (ju), can appear very aiki-like. But it's not aiki.

I applaud your efforts at building a model to describe the functioning of a body, and the tenacity with which you apply it, but to attempt to speak as a subject mater authority on someone else's blog post is a bit presumptuous.

Best,
Tom

Tom Wharton wrote: Erick- The diagram is accurate for the model described in the blog. The aiki body functions in this way. It seems to me that what your model is describing is the functioning of a body using frame/lever/pulley system, which is how most people use theirs. The body uses large structural muscles in contracting tension to hold the frame (torso and legs) fairly rigid so we can use the levers and pulleys (limbs) to do stuff. This system is very susceptible to torsional shear and shear waves. This susceptibility is the foundation of judo/jujitsu and, when applied very subtly (ju), can appear very aiki-like. But it's not aiki. I applaud your efforts at building a model to describe the functioning of a body, and the tenacity with which you apply it, but to attempt to speak as a subject mater authority on someone else's blog post is a bit presumptuous. Best, Tom

. Tom, the point was that his written description is right for shear mechanics, but the diagrams do not show what he describes, or at least show it in a way that is liable to confuse . Additionally,. frame - lever- pulley uses bending stress and pure tensions and pure compressions to create action , not shear. In a lever, shear is concentrated at the point of rotation (where an over stressed lever breaks). Most structures are weakest in shear, and typically break where it is highest.

,In torsional shear dominated mechanics, shear is maximum at the periphery of the torqued body. They could not be more different, and I totally agree levers are not part of aiki. The point of aiki is that the opponent is made to bear the shears and I do not.

In ju, it is not shear to "Pull when pushed, push when pulled" as the classic formulation captures it. The force couples ju uses are like walking a refrigerator, only more dynamically, rotating about the point of support. Sometimes the support is on the ground sometime it is shifted on the to body of nage.

Aiki is acting within the opponent's structure and has reflexive exploits that it naturally provokes that are not present in ju. Leverage-specific techniques are basically banned in judo (though not in jujutsu) as these too easily damage joints, and typically appear in fullest form only in koryu.

Erick Mead wrote: . Tom, the point was that his written description is right for shear mechanics, but the diagrams do not show what he describes, or at least show it in a way that is liable to confuse .

The written description is of dual opposing forces, not shearing forces. The force vectors are end to end to note this. Any confusion lies in your steadfast determination to apply your model to what's written in the blog instead of taking it at face value.

Erick Mead wrote: The point of aiki is that the opponent is made to bear the shears and I do not.

The point of Aiki is to make dual opposing forces in your body. It has nothing to do with the opponent.

Erick Mead wrote: Aiki is acting within the opponent's structure and has reflexive exploits that it naturally provokes that are not present in ju.

Aiki does not act within the opponent's structure. Aiki acts within your structure (body), via the dual opposing forces.

Tom Wharton wrote: The written description is of dual opposing forces, not shearing forces. The force vectors are end to end to note this. Any confusion lies in your steadfast determination to apply your model to what's written in the blog instead of taking it at face value.

No, that is not what his description says. It says :

"Aiki #1 is created when tissues are in tension and bones are in compression"

1) That is entirely correct; and
2) That CANNOT be properly depicted by simple linear tension vectors across the whole body as in the diagram.

The two stresses are carried separately on separate elements -- and that fact creates a definitive shear load between them.

The point of Aiki is to make dual opposing forces in your body. It has nothing to do with the opponent.

... and the dual spirals of opposed stress he has described and depicted are called torsional shear. In a healthy body there ARE NO (or very little) directly opposed forces of pure compression or pure tension across the whole body or directly between its elements. Its not built that way --and you don't want it to be. The body DOES eventually get that way -- when you get old or badly injured -- and then stuff wears out VERY fast from direct impingement forces.

Where to begin? The tendons/ligaments/muscles carry tension; the bones carry compression. but Bone compression is NOT primarily transmitted directly from bone to bone -- the tension elements carry most of the load from compression element to compression element. Similarly the tension elements do not carry tension from directly from one to the other. It is the compression elements, the bones, that pass most of the load from tension member to tension member. They load alternately in this way along the whole load chain of the body. The people who talk about tensegrity in this context are not wrong at all.

Your spine is basically a stack of complicated bricks with sponges between -- Sponges don't carry compressive loads well. They squish. They cushion eccentric loads and maintain spacing -- like bushings. Until you get old and decrepit or badly injured and your connective tissues degrade -- the vertebrae do not actually compress the discs very much. They are set up to pass compression through the spinal ligaments and spinal process tendons and muscles as tension which then in turn compress the next vertebral element and so on...

The limbs are basically the same setup but stretched out and with far larger ranges of motion at the joints. The tendon insertions in the limbs are set up cross-wise from bone-end to bone-end. This is why you can twist your arms and legs freely around the long axis. So are stabilizing ligaments (e.g. the "cruciate" ligaments (ACL/PCL) of the knee) The ligaments and tendon/muscles trace along the length of the limbs -- explicitly-- the dual spiral actuation paths we are talking about.

So, when you visualize a "pure" stretch of all the body parts reaching out in "simple" tension like the diagram -- end-to-end vectors -- in fact, any actual LOAD is being carried spirally in tension when you do that --together with the simultaneously and intervening compression elements in the chain. Those are chains of counter-poised shears working -- not a simple tension or compression force across the whole body.

Because torsion and its shears are the most dangerous structural stress in the body is structurally maximized with the elements of PRESTRESSED torsion to deal with it -- and in aiki -- to exploit it. "Extension" in Tohei's terms or Aiki #1 as a visualization of that "tension" applied across the whole body may be fine as a training regimen or recipe of it. But what's physically going on is more complex and the details are not trivial to understanding how they work.

Aiki does not act within the opponent's structure.

So to clarify, when I apply aiki-age NOTHING happened in his body ? .... I think this is semantics. Aiki produces that result.

Erick Mead wrote: No, that is not what his description says. It says : 1) That is entirely correct; and 2) That CANNOT be properly depicted by simple linear tension vectors across the whole body as in the diagram. The two stresses are carried separately on separate elements -- and that fact creates a definitive shear load between them.

Actually it says: Aiki #1: Linear co arising, mutually dependent oppositional forces.

This is Heaven and Earth, or up/down. Heaven and earth don't resist each other in a shear relationship, except maybe at the face of a cliff. Sure, technically there is a potential shear load between the two elements, but that's not the driving factor in the Aiki body model. This is why we tend towards a Tensegrity model to describe it. As you rightly point out, it is not wrong at all.

Erick Mead wrote: In a healthy body there ARE NO (or very little) directly opposed forces of pure compression or pure tension across the whole body or directly between its elements. Its not built that way --and you don't want it to be. The body DOES eventually get that way -- when you get old or badly injured -- and then stuff wears out VERY fast from direct impingement forces.

I absolutely agree with this statement. And it is not at odds with anything I've stated so far.

Erick Mead wrote: Where to begin? The tendons/ligaments/muscles carry tension; the bones carry compression. but Bone compression is NOT primarily transmitted directly from bone to bone -- the tension elements carry most of the load from compression element to compression element. Similarly the tension elements do not carry tension from directly from one to the other. It is the compression elements, the bones, that pass most of the load from tension member to tension member. They load alternately in this way along the whole load chain of the body. The people who talk about tensegrity in this context are not wrong at all. Your spine is basically a stack of complicated bricks with sponges between -- Sponges don't carry compressive loads well. They squish. They cushion eccentric loads and maintain spacing -- like bushings. Until you get old and decrepit or badly injured and your connective tissues degrade -- the vertebrae do not actually compress the discs very much. They are set up to pass compression through the spinal ligaments and spinal process tendons and muscles as tension which then in turn compress the next vertebral element and so on... The limbs are basically the same setup but stretched out and with far larger ranges of motion at the joints. The tendon insertions in the limbs are set up cross-wise from bone-end to bone-end. This is why you can twist your arms and legs freely around the long axis. So are stabilizing ligaments (e.g. the "cruciate" ligaments (ACL/PCL) of the knee) The ligaments and tendon/muscles trace along the length of the limbs -- explicitly-- the dual spiral actuation paths we are talking about. So, when you visualize a "pure" stretch of all the body parts reaching out in "simple" tension like the diagram -- end-to-end vectors -- in fact, any actual LOAD is being carried spirally in tension when you do that --together with the simultaneously and intervening compression elements in the chain. Those are chains of counter-poised shears working -- not a simple tension or compression force across the whole body. Because torsion and its shears are the most dangerous structural stress in the body is structurally maximized with the elements of PRESTRESSED torsion to deal with it -- and in aiki -- to exploit it. "Extension" in Tohei's terms or Aiki #1 as a visualization of that "tension" applied across the whole body may be fine as a training regimen or recipe of it. But what's physically going on is more complex and the details are not trivial to understanding how they work.

Where to begin indeed, I don't really disagree with much of this either. I think it's a nice analysis of the mechanical functioning of the human body. I just happen to think there's more to the functioning of the human body that your model seems to discount. I'm not sure how you jumped to the conclusion I advocate bone to bone transfer of compression. That is, by definition, resistance and not aiki. Tensegrity structures use the compression elements as discrete members and shear is a limited factor.

We do indeed get torsion in the limbs through movement of the connected body. We do not however, want, create, or look for torsion in the torso, ergo the point made in the blog about Funakoshi's sternum and bellybutton being aligned vertically.

While I find your quest to find shear in everything a bit quixotic, I think there's merit in some of the elements of your analysis. And then you go and make a statement like this:

Erick Mead wrote: So to clarify, when I apply aiki-age NOTHING happened in his body ? .... I think this is semantics. Aiki produces that result.

To imply that someone must be doing Aiki because the name of the waza has 'aiki' in it and that the result of "applying" it to an opponent is, therefore, aiki is not semantics, it's absurd.

Personally, I doubt either of us will convince the other of much, and really, I'm not interested in convincing you of anything. I don't even care if you opine on the blog. I do care that you present yourself as a subject matter expert when you are clearly not. My interest lies in pointing out to the gentle reader.

Tom Wharton wrote: Personally, I doubt either of us will convince the other of much, and really, I'm not interested in convincing you of anything.

I do care that you present yourself as a subject matter expert when you are clearly not.

I don't present myself as anything -- much less gain anything from it. But I know what I know. And you presume too much. When it comes to shear, whether in fluids, fields or mechanisms and both conceptual and practical aspects of torque -- I've got a physics background, studied and flew helicopters in the Navy, and as a maintenance check pilot, 33 years or so in Aikido, (give or take a deployment or three, and a first semester of law school), primarily ASU and Iwama, but significant exposures to US Federation, and even a limited introduction to Yoshinkan when the late Parker Sensei still taught in Yokosuka. I pay close attention to what I and others actually do with their bodies. I paid a lot of attention to Ikeda Sensei.

Conceptual bias is in the mind -- and a shockingly large amount of what we see or think we see is what our brains have learned to EXPECT to see -- especially at the margins of perception or performance, where conscious perception is at its very weakest. The same is true of kinesthetic perception.

In the margins of performance, a correct conceptual grasp is not dispensable to interpret perception. A loose concept leads one progressively astray in the assumptions that are built on it. Overcome those assumptions and you see things much differently. IP/Aiki is a lot about overcoming such assumptions. I just don't have the ones you appear to think I have. I am quite sure I have many, many others besides that remain.

I've got nothing against the traditional transmission -- indeed, I seem to give its contents and forms more weight than you (or at least most of those who seek to find what IP is or does). Baby/bathwater, and all that. I think there are several ways to the concepts on these things that seem to be proven as commendable to that end -- including Beebe Sensei's. There is nothing that cannot be improved and none of us possess everything we need to know, me included.

So, IMO these things would be better served to ALSO put them into their correct, biomechanical concepts -- as most performative things are typically understood in THIS culture. Relying entirely on easily miscontrued sets of terms from foreign subcultures that are esoteric and poorly understood even in their native setting -- that is problematic. That's the way the ideas got lost in the transmission -- in the first place. IMO, having to do that over again in the future is an totally avoidable and unforced error.

My interest lies in pointing out to the gentle reader.

Ditto, here.

I have read every one of Allen's blogs so far and I think there go a long way to explain aiki for people who are looking into the subject. Hands-on is the best way to go, but sometimes all you have is the Internets... Also, I now know what Tom looks like

For me, I found the biggest issues entering the IP world to be:
1. It is about me. There is no room for discussion here. Aiki is resolved in you. Any talk of a partner or a dependency on a partner to "make aiki" is wrong. Aiki is in you, up to you, and a reflection of you. The clarity of this comment should scare the crap out of everyone here because it means that there are no excuses for your movement. You either do, or you don't.
2. It's not about academics. You are talking about phrases like "center" to describe a thing that does not exist, being moved by muscles you cannot even identify to move consciously with your brain. If you think you can talk your way into IP, you are wrong. Modern science, Eastern philosophy - it doesn't matter if you cannot do, explain, and show others what is happening.
3. It's not about a martial art. Aiki exists beneath a martial art. It's a layer below aikido. While debated in another thread, it's like someone showing up to water polo, never having learned to swim. Any discussion about aikido that infers doing aikido will learn IP is like saying play water polo will teach you to swim.

Also, it may be better to think about IP as a ratio of work. Whole body movement leverages the entirety of the body into a movement - literally "putting some muscle behind it" as you accomplish a task. This is a different thinking that "use your arm to..."

I've read some of Allen's blog.

Considering this: https://trueaiki.com/2017/03/05/463/ I'd say he knows what he is talking about.

Jon Reading wrote: I have read every one of Allen's blogs so far and I think there go a long way to explain aiki for people who are looking into the subject. Hands-on is the best way to go, but sometimes all you have is the Internets... Also, I now know what Tom looks like

Couldn't resist: Allens seminars in 2017.
For more info PM me

Jon Reading wrote: 2. It's not about academics. You are talking about phrases like "center" to describe a thing that does not exist, being moved by muscles you cannot even identify to move consciously with your brain.

Tom mistakes my purpose. And I like his movement descriptions BTW. Bottom line, if Beebe's work wasn't any good -- it wouldn't be worth trying to buff up a bit. It is good, therefore I kindly criticize, both because the substance of the work can bear it -- and it is worthy of being as right as it can be, where notable quibbles exist.

The Chinese proverb says that the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names. Why?
Because a name is not really just a verbal form of grunt-and-point to ask for the ketchup across the table. One needs no names for this -- or any language at all really. The thing is there - you see it-- you point at it, you get it. The name "ketchup" is dispensable. A name is something else. A name is the entry into an entire system of meaning. Without that system, no name has any meaning. Western learning is the universal systematizer. That's why the Japanese and the Chinese do science and engineering in these terms, because a universal system of reference works better than any isolated or culturally-bound system of reference.

1. There IS no current system in this sense for what we are discussing. Not because the methods aren't useful notation when training -- words pointing to the ketchup on the mat -- which is there, to be seen and felt. They are effective in those terms. The problem is also not that those several systems of understanding fail relate to things they address. How could they not? The problem is that they actually are just arbitrary systems of shorthand. A shorthand correctly signifies every sound it represents - but it's not actually language. Assuming there are no oddball things like Xhosa click-sounds or something, any capable shorthand practitioner can transcribe sounds of nearly any language -- or sheer gibberish. None of the shorthand systems relate to one another except in the sense that all point to the ketchup -- sets of phonemes -- but they do not in themselves relate those to anything else meaningful, no matter how meaningful what they point to may be. The map is not the territory. But a map is meaningful if you have navigated any territory with the same map system.

2. So to terms used or misused. The only mention of "center" here in this discussion was something that happens in the opponent when the opposed forces he connects with undergo a uncompensated separation and induce a rotation (or moment) -- and THAT is NOT Aiki, as you mean it. HOWEVER, Aiki provokes that, and the mechanisms of provocation in you are the mechanisms provoked to inverse effect in the opponent. IN-YO HO occurs on several scales simultaneously, not JUST in you. They ARE inherently related, one is progressively unburdened, the other burdened -- I remain sitting, he rises; I remain upright, he collapses -- this is ALSO in-yo ho, in other words, at a larger scale, beyond my own body, and related to it. In and yo never cease their action and flow into one another ceaselessly at all scales simultaneously. The taiji-tu is a larger vortex formed by (or spawning) two smaller vortexes. It is an inherently fractal concept, not a binary one. That symbol is also a faithful schematic of fluid shear in eddies, FWIW.

3. OF COURSE it is not chiefly conscious -- I've said here and elsewhere -- repeatedly -- that there is a powerful reflex component to what is going on in the practitioner of Aiki and in the opponent. Reflexes can be consciously primed and accentuated - AND reflexes can be consciously suppressed. Aiki, in terms of its practical utility, is about BOTH of these things. All the talk of "intent" is orbiting these anatomical reflex mechanisms and the means of both priming and suppressing them at need. The one pre-conscious manner of action calls forth the other pre-conscious manner of response because both are directly related. Deep calls unto deep.

4. I can understand a point of view that considers what happens in the opponent NOT to be Aiki -- it creates and exploits internal structural vulnerabilities in them whereas the Aiki that provokes those conditions prevents those kinds of vulnerabilities in the practitioner. The point is taken -- but largely I think this is a semantic distraction. Call what happens in the opponent something different from what it you cause that to happen, if you must, but relate them properly. In English we'd just make a portmanteau with some prefix or hyphen modifier. However, it isn't anti-aiki -- because it cannot really oppose Aiki. It isn't un-aiki or non-aiki -- there are lots of those, and almost all of them aren't the internally felt compulsion that pops or drops a guy. Mis-aiki just seems like a really dumb pageant winner. Dis-aiki or dys-aiki (bad or unfortunate aiki) comes closer. But that would make the practitioner doing eu-aiki (good or happy aiki) so the Greek seems way clumsy. Nihonngo ? How about kō-aiki (幸 - 合気) in the practitioner and fukō-aiki (不幸 - 合気) in the uke ? Good fortune Aiki v. Bad fortune Aiki

5. Lastly to Jon -- if we agree ( and I think we do, on this aspect anyway) the thing is something relating to "muscles you cannot even identify to move consciously with your brain" then the only way to really get at things that lie back of your conscious and lagging physical perceptions are the abstract systems of universal reference that are the stock in trade of Western technical culture. That's all I'm on about, nothing more. The Chinese and Japanese actually agree too, in nearly every area except those freighted with strong traditions (like these). We do not bear that burden, and we ought not assume the burden, either. Examine it, yes, mine it, sure, but let it weigh us down? No. There is no need.