192 Touchless Knockout
Many of you in the comments have noted that this only seems to work on the sensei’s followers. Hmm, interesting. Here is a skeptics group in Spain who attended just such a dojo in order to find out for sure:
And for those of you interested in an in-depth panel on the topic of woo in the martial arts:
Have a great weekend, we have big news next week! See you then!
↓ Transcript
SENSEI
Behold, the touchless knockout!
MITCH
Nope. Nothing. This is getting a little awkward.
SENSEI
Do you yield?!
Behold, the touchless knockout!
MITCH
Nope. Nothing. This is getting a little awkward.
SENSEI
Do you yield?!
COME ON MAN! YOU CAN’T TELL US ABOUT BIG NEWS AND THEN JUST LEAVE US HANGING!
Non-contact martial art is inherently hard to prove if some people volunteered to be “hit” by it. How the hell did people believe in it in the first place?
A firm grasp of anime and a tenuous one of physics?
Okay, totally bizarre, but… on the main page, the video for “woo in the martial arts” was showing the movie trailer for Christopher Nolan’s “Interstellar.”
And then I click to check the comments (and add this one), and it’s now properly showing the “woo” video.
I don’t know about that, I for one have always felt that trying to explain the physics behind anime to be quite fun. for instance, the blood splatter in some anime leads me to believe that the residents of that world have a very high pressure circuitry system. also, anytime a anime character jumps more then ten feet I try to calculate how much force per square inch they are putting out. but ya, their grasp of physics is worse then mine.
Reading “Magic of Reality” by Richard Dawkins (so far, highly recommended if you get the hardcover with the fantastic illustrations) and he makes the mention of General Stubblebine who ran into a wall thinking hew could walk through it. They used that as the basis for General Hopgood in “The Men Who Stare at Goats” (Yet to read the book; great film, though the end is disappointing). Which brings me around to the quote from the film that fits in nicely right here:
Lyn Cassady: There’s a story that Wong Wifu, the great Chinese martial artist… had a fight with a guy and beat him. Then the guy gave him this light tap. Wong looked at him and the guy just nodded. That was it. He had given him the death touch. Wong died.
Bob Wilton: Then and there?
Lyn Cassady: No. About eighteen years later. That’s the thing about Dim Mak… you never know when it’s gonna take effect.
Looks like the skepticism is starting to rub off on good ol’ Mitch 🙂
Is it only coincidence that woo hoo rhymes with poo poo?
I would do a Kung Fu Woo Hoo Poo Poo Haiku if I knew what a Haiku was.