sarkeizen

Interesting. Thanks for the reply. Are you still talking about "during a fight"? What exactly would you visualize? Can you clarify what you mean by 'mental determination'? (BTW: Technically biology isn't outside of physics but it is probably outside what I mean by 'simple physics').

I think we're all going to be somewhat unable to answer very well since we don't really know what your friend means but.... Personally, I've not heard the term "drum technique" but even within WC terminology changes. To me this is situational, for example you can use a fook sau or a jut sau to open the center but if the guy is built like a tree ( and IMHO you study MA to handle those people stronger than you - not weaker!) good luck. So if you can't move him ( or her ) it is you that should move! Again I would say this is situational but if you hold with the assertion that you are preparing to fight someone stronger than you then learning to move around your opponent isn't a bad idea even if the person you are currently practising against is weaker than you. Well I've certianly seen this idea in WC. I've seen people deal with a center-line punch with pak-sau, then fook sau, then punch when pak/punch would do (or even just a punch!). Traditionaism is a double-edged sword. It insures that you never fall backwards but also that you never move forward. If you read Rene Ritchie's book you'll see that there a least a dozen of branches of WC across China - they all have differences. How does any Sifu know his Sifu "got it right"? As another poster wisely said: It's important to change but only if necessary.

Any fruitful discussion requires definition! The problem I find with most discussions about Qi, or Qi-gong is that they lack any useful definition. For example, if Qi just was a blanket label applied for things that people didn't understand the mechanism for or couldn't see. Then to treat it as some kind of unified concept that can be applied to activity "X" isn't going to be productive. In fact, treating it like some kind of unified concept e.g. "just add Chi!" betrays just how little we know about the term. The concept wasn't even unified among the Chinese - Taoists, Neo-Confucians all had different ideas about the subject. So how would you even know what to add? My own experience? I've yet to see anybody provide any significant evidence that in a fight whatever they call "Qi" can do anything beyond simple physics. So my personal advice would be "study physics instead! "

The problem here is with the term: 武術 can be used in several different contexts. 1) An old Chinese sense meaning 'all martial arts' 2) The modern Chinese sense refering the sport used in China today. 3) An english borrowed word refering to a specific martial art which borrows from various chinese martial arts. The problem with saying: "How does 武術 differ from...". Is that definition (1) isn't really applicable. So you can only be talking about (2) or (3). Since (2) and (3) can vary radically you're going to get a very different answer depending on who you ask. However I would wager that (2) is far and wide the most popular definition even in North America. So I would generally expect 武術 schools in the west to have very little to do with sparing.