I offer the following comments, which should supplement Eisenberg’s (”You look like you’re faking”). Most Asians, particularly a Chi gong instructor, are quite concerned with face and image. If one is interested in his teacher’s saving face, then it is quite important not to bounce him on his head on international television. If you do so, then the teacher might, at the very least, not teach you anymore. Second, I have found myself in many situations where I have been required for one reason or another to lift people up off their feet and into the air (ambulance attendant, hospital orderly, rock- concert security guard, older brother, happy uncle, etc.). Step one in picking up another person is pretty much always to make sure that you have your feet firmly planted on the floor, or else you both might land on your faces as you fall over. It would seem that before we accept this segment of the Moyers program as cause to revamp Newton’s laws of motion, we should at the very least conduct a few controlled tests to see if the student just might have been trying to make his instructor look good in front of Bill Moyers. I’ll leave to someone else the mechanics and ethics of designing a double-blind test to see if a martial-arts student can throw a non-Chi gong master more easily than a Chi gong master.
Having surveyed the evidence so far, there seems to be little evidence of substance that supports the existence of Chi. Although some, including myself at times, find this quite disappointing, it is really not too surprising when we look at the extent of the claims and the way science works. Science and scientific theories and knowledge don’t just happen arbitrarily. They are developed based on careful observation and testing over the course of many years, if not generations. Chi theory states that the function of the human body is based on a system of energy that circulates throughout all other existing systems and integrates with them all. There is no evidence that such a system exists. Similarly, if such a system does exist, but for whatever reason has managed to avoid detection by science, then it would seem logical that there would be large and sweeping gaps in our knowledge of human physiology every time we examined a system that the Chi interacted with. In other words, if Chi controls and influences the behavior of the human body, and we have not detected Chi, then the existence of Chi would be conspicuous by its absence. Personally, I believe that further study of traditional Chinese medicine should uncover many valuable things, such as some useful herbal treatments. I also believe that modern medicine and healthcare have many problems that should be looked at seriously and possibly fixed. Despite these, it is important to examine any body of knowledge critically before employing it for anything as important as healthcare, and this includes the traditional arts and sciences of other cultures. If one wishes to truly understand something, one must be willing to look beyond the explanation traditionally presented. To be truly open-minded, one must be willing to step beyond the boundaries and limitations that have been inherited. To pursue the truth, you must be willing to consider the teachings that cultures have to offer, but you must also hold those teachings up to careful examination.
Notes
1. Actually this life force, Chi, is believed to flaw through everything that exists in varying amounts, not just living matter. The study of how Chi flows through landscaping and living environs and how it can he manipulated to benefit humanity is known as “feng shui,” or Chinese geomancy. Feng shuj is still taken quite seriously by many people throughout China.