Excellent comment. I have only two objections. First, this statement:
But it’s not the content of the objection that matters, it’s that ANY objection that stops you from actually trying something useful, means you fail. You lose.
is good on its merits, but I caution everyone to be careful about asserting that some technique or other is “something useful”. There are plenty of reasons not to try any random thing that enters into our heads, and even when we’re engaged in a blind search, we shouldn’t suspend our evaluative functions completely, even though they may be assuming things that blinds us to the solution we need. They also keep us from chopping our legs off when we want to deal with a stubbed toe.
My second objection deals with the following:
If the master sat there listening to people’s inane theories about how they need to punch differently than everybody else, or their insistence that they really need to understand a complete theory of combat, complete with statistical validation against a control group, before they can even raise a single fist in practice, that master would have failed their students AND their Art. ust as EY fails his students and his art by the public positions he has taken on his weight and akrasia.
What grounds are there for assigning EY the status of ‘master’? Hopefully in a martial arts dojo there are stringent requirements for the demonstration of skill before someone is put in a teaching position, so that even when students aren’t personally capable of verifying that the ‘master’ has actually mastered techniques that are useful, they can productively hold that expectation.
When did EY demonstrate that he’s a master, and how did he supposedly do so?
A lot of martial arts schools are more about “following the rules” and going through the motions of ritual forms than learning useful stuff.
As has been mentioned here before multiple times, many martial artists do very poorly in actual fights, because they’ve mastered techniques that just aren’t very good. They were never designed in light of the goals and strategies that people who really want to win physical combat will do. Against brutally effective and direct techniques, they lose.
Humans like to make rituals and rules for things that have none. This is a profound weakness and vulnerability, because they also tend to lose sight of the distinction between reality and the rules they cause themselves to follow.
Read that as “socially-recognized principles as to how something is to be done for things that physics permits in many different ways”.
Spill the salt, you must throw some over your shoulder. Step on a crack, break your mother’s back. Games and rituals. When people forget they’re just games, problems arise.
This tendency can be used for good, though. As long as you’re aware of the weakness, why not take advantage of it? Intentional self-priming, anchoring, rituals of all kinds can be repurposed.
Because repetition tends to reinforce things, both positive and negative.
You might be able to take advantage of a security weakness in your computer network, but if you leave it open other things will be able to take advantage of it too.
It’s far better to close the hole and reduce vulnerability, even if it means losing access to short-term convenience.
There are plenty of reasons not to try any random thing that enters into our heads
...and most of those reasons are fallacious.
The opposite of every Great Truth is another great truth: yes, you need to look before you leap. But he who hesitates is lost. (Or in Richard Bandler’s version, which I kind of like better, “He who hesitates… waits… and waits… and waits… and waits...”)
When did EY demonstrate that he’s a master, and how did he supposedly do so?
Excellent comment. I have only two objections. First, this statement:
is good on its merits, but I caution everyone to be careful about asserting that some technique or other is “something useful”. There are plenty of reasons not to try any random thing that enters into our heads, and even when we’re engaged in a blind search, we shouldn’t suspend our evaluative functions completely, even though they may be assuming things that blinds us to the solution we need. They also keep us from chopping our legs off when we want to deal with a stubbed toe.
My second objection deals with the following:
What grounds are there for assigning EY the status of ‘master’? Hopefully in a martial arts dojo there are stringent requirements for the demonstration of skill before someone is put in a teaching position, so that even when students aren’t personally capable of verifying that the ‘master’ has actually mastered techniques that are useful, they can productively hold that expectation.
When did EY demonstrate that he’s a master, and how did he supposedly do so?
There really aren’t, though one does need to jump through some hoops. That’s part of what I like about this analogy.
A lot of martial arts schools are more about “following the rules” and going through the motions of ritual forms than learning useful stuff.
As has been mentioned here before multiple times, many martial artists do very poorly in actual fights, because they’ve mastered techniques that just aren’t very good. They were never designed in light of the goals and strategies that people who really want to win physical combat will do. Against brutally effective and direct techniques, they lose.
Humans like to make rituals and rules for things that have none. This is a profound weakness and vulnerability, because they also tend to lose sight of the distinction between reality and the rules they cause themselves to follow.
There are no “things that have no rules”. If there were, you couldn’t perceive them in the first place in order to make up rules about them.
Read that as “socially-recognized principles as to how something is to be done for things that physics permits in many different ways”.
Spill the salt, you must throw some over your shoulder. Step on a crack, break your mother’s back. Games and rituals. When people forget they’re just games, problems arise.
This tendency can be used for good, though. As long as you’re aware of the weakness, why not take advantage of it? Intentional self-priming, anchoring, rituals of all kinds can be repurposed.
Because repetition tends to reinforce things, both positive and negative.
You might be able to take advantage of a security weakness in your computer network, but if you leave it open other things will be able to take advantage of it too.
It’s far better to close the hole and reduce vulnerability, even if it means losing access to short-term convenience.
...and most of those reasons are fallacious.
The opposite of every Great Truth is another great truth: yes, you need to look before you leap. But he who hesitates is lost. (Or in Richard Bandler’s version, which I kind of like better, “He who hesitates… waits… and waits… and waits… and waits...”)
I never said he did.