Talk:Chinese martial arts

Qi and Western science

"The existence of qi as a measurable form of energy as discussed in traditional Chinese medicine has no basis in the scientific understanding of physics, medicine, biology or human physiology.[47]" The cited source is " Ernst, Edzard; Simon Singh (2009). Trick or treatment: The undeniable facts about alternative medicine. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 978-0393337785." Why is it necessary to include this statement? You might as well include the statement that "however Western science is limited by the tools it has with which to examine the world, as it always has been". Qi of course does have it's "basis" in spiritual and religious understanding of many religions and yogic practices. 83.84.100.133 (talk) 11:41, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Removal of qi as part of a s pseudoscience, the root meaning of qi can be seen as transformation. Just because something from another culture has not been explained properly does not make it not Science based. To talk as it is better to clarify things like this of a caltural nature than to insight prejudice that will bring more harm than good. The world Heath organisation has just recognised Traditional Chinese Medicine. The understanding of Qi comes with this. When it comes to understanding the nature of qi it is time for those that do not know to go back to study and learn some more. I am happy to talk about the some of the basics of this study. But for me it has been fifty years so far. Amituofo 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼 Shenqijing (talk) 04:15, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Discipleship

Most long-term practitioners of traditional Chinese martial arts, and all teachers of them, are familiar with the concept of Discipleship. A fine section has been written on the subject matter, but it is being consistently deleted by a Wikipedia user whose nickname is MrOllie. I call upon professionals in the field and genuine martial artists to intervene and prevent the continuation of this trolling campaign. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.244.113.106 (talk) 23:57, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

Please have a look at WP:RS. We cannot rely on self published books as citations. Adding a few more citations on top of them does not solve the essential problem that the section depends on unreliable, self published materials. - MrOllie (talk) 00:01, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Your claims are incorrect. The section does not rely solely on these sources, as I have added references to 7 books which are not self-published and to two feature-films which were produced by studios. You are obviously an internet bureaucrat and not a practitioner of traditional Chinese martial arts. You have deleted the section once more without actually reviewing or reading any of the sources which were referenced. Your keyboard bullying does not do justice to this page or to these traditions. How about you google the joint terms "discipleship" and "chinese martial arts". Is it a coincidence you get 42,000 results? No, because this topic is central to the history and lore of these arts, and you are here engaged in a silly power-grab from behind the safety of your screen from far away, enjoying the little game of having control over information which pertains to traditions that you are not a part of. This is literally a no-brainer, as basically ANY and ALL teachers of traditional Chinese martial arts teachers are aware of the facts presented in this section. Every single one of them. It's common knowledge, not special commentary. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 00:08, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

If you would like your content to remain on Wikipedia, it will be much more effective to learn our policies and write with them in mind. A paragraph full of personal attacks isn't going to get you anywhere. - MrOllie (talk) 00:11, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Look... I would agree with you that concerning matters of personal commentary or interpretation about a topic, one needs to bring forth sound evidence, and support for any claims being made. But on the subject of traditional Chinese martial arts, to state that Discipleship exists and to portray it in the manner that I did, is akin to suggesting that a car has wheels. Really. Check out the sources, by all means. I referenced a book by professor Peter Lorge, for instance. He is an internationally renown authority of the history of Chinese martial arts and related cultural aspects. His book alone, which has an enormous pile of academically-valid references, could support that section all by itself. But the other books, and the experts who wrote them, do a job just as good in my opinion. Take another example - Jess O'Brien's book, 'Nei Jia Quan'. That book includes in-depth scholarly interviews with over a dozen masters of traditional Chinese martial arts, and most of them refer to Discipleship either directly or indirectly. Please, read the books! You have dismissed such works but you are not familiar with the source material and the subject at hand. Discipleship is a tradition that goes back over 3000 years in China, and is strongly rooted in Confucianism. In martial arts you see it being referenced as a concept as far back as The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which is one of the most important books in Chinese history, whose plot is referring to Chinese customs as they were nearly 2000 years ago. 00:20, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Why cite trash-level sources from the likes of createspace and amazon selfpublished ebooks, then? Just write a version based on what Lorge has to say about it and leave out the rest. - MrOllie (talk) 00:27, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

The point about this social construct of 'Discipleship' is to manifest the Confucian relationship between father-son/master-disciple, which cannot be formally manifested without proper ceremony. Confucius taught that the ceremonies and rituals were of utmost importance for social order, and in The Analects, a book about his teachings, are explained the social virtues expected in this relationship of father-son/master-disciple. To have a Discipleship is means by which teachers of traditional Chinese martial arts are often able to build better trust and a stronger bond with students, in a paradigm which was originally devoid of rank or financial incentives. This is a very Chinese idea about relationships, that they ought to be formalized with ritual and ceremony, and embody a 'family-like dynamic' in order to deepen. The bowing thrice comes from feudal traditions in China, and the offering of tea, and sometimes a gift, is meant to symbolize the student 'feeding' his 'new parent'. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 00:48, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

May I ask you - by what judgement or account do you refer to these sources as 'trash', via the sole virtue of them being self-published? I have read these works in the past and found them to be excellent and up to standard - which is why they are referenced. I googled now and found the following article: https://selfpublishingadvice.org/famous-self-publishing-authors/ . It claims the following famous authors were all self-published: Margaret Atwood, Frank Baum, William Blake ,Ken Blanchard, Robert Bly, Beatrix Potter Alfred, Lord Byron, Willa Cather, Julia Cameron, Pat Conroy, Stephen Crane, e.e. cummings, Charles Dickens, Roddy Doyle W.E.B. DuBois, Alexander Dumas, T.S. Eliot, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Benjamin Franklin, and many others (listed at the link). How would they fare in their time, if Wikipedia existed and someone was to comment that their works are "trash" because they are self-published, and he had not read them?

Adding to this, I would argue that with this particular section, some bias is actually due. We are here overall discussing a prevalent tradition which includes similar concepts and actions, such as the father-son/master-disciple relationship, the tea-offering and the bowing. However, there is variance between the schools, sects and lineages. It is therefore important to have sources which showcase their bias - such is evidence to their special minor divergences from the norm in terms of practice and ceremony.

Furthermore, the world of traditional martial arts (not solely the Chinese ones) is non-academic by nature. These are traditions being promoted by families and lineages. None of these people sits in a laboratory or quotes by the standards of Academia. Wikipedia is not going to change the manner in which this has been carried out for thousands of years. Most articles of Chinese culture on Wikipedia reflect this.

The notion that one could simply ignore a key thematic concept pertaining this this broad subject, borders on cultural racism. Not that I blame your for it, but please allow me to explain. There are certain things in a culture which are a given. Any Chinese person alive who lives in China, knows that the Shifu-Tudi relationship exists in these traditions. It is a cultural given. It is a given about as much as the fact that there was/is Italian Mafia in New York City, or that there are tensions between Native Americans and the US Government over land and oil. However, it would be ludicrous for anyone on Wikipedia to doubt that the Italian Mafia or Native American tensions over land or oil exist, because all Americans know this, as do most people who were born and live in English-speaking countries. You are herein casting doubt on a cultural element which is a given, because of your unfamiliarity with Chinese traditional culture. See what I mean?... Of course one needs sources to back up more detailed claims concerning even cultural givens, but some things do not need a special justification.

Instead of attacking the sources and the subject matter as such, please do a little bit of research. Google the thing and read about it for a few hours. Or better yet - randomly approach teachers of traditional Chinese martial arts, and ask them about it. You will then see that the section is perfectly reasonable, and that the sources are valid. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 00:48, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

I would like to add, that one cannot make a case for the supposedly 'objective' nature of works put out through publishers, as compared with those which are self-published. A publishing house is usually a private or public company. The majority of Western nations have corporate laws which strictly state that the sole or primary goal of a commercial company is to make money. This goal is not necessarily in-line with either objectivity or truth. A publishing house is not akin or equivalent to the environment provided by a peer-reviewed journal. That being said, with respect to cultural elements pertaining to chinese martial arts, there are no peer-reviewed journals, and the publishing houses, as stated before, are primarily motivated by what will sell more copies - the corporate laws require this of them, unless they are a non-profit, and most of them are not. The only valid way therefore to make an estimate of the references in such a case is to consider what is written, and who were the authors. The entire premise for the deletion of this section therefore, was not based on sound logic, but rather on rules and regulations which are irrelevant to the subject at hand. Yet even if we were to accept this argument, it seems to me that Wikipedia is still lenient with self-published sources, as long as they were authored by 'experts'. I do believe that everyone who authored the sources which had been referenced here were indeed experts. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 00:58, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Again, please read WP:RS. With only very limited exceptions, self published sources are not used on Wikipedia. The whole point of WP:V is that we do not expect our readers to go ask a bunch of people in person if our articles are accurate. The way we do this is by using only sources that have a reputation for fact-checking and editorial control. That includes academic publishers, and excludes the likes of createspace, where anyone can write anything and get it published. If this field is 'non-academic by nature' it may not be a good fit for Wikipedia. Perhaps you could start a blog or something, there you would not be responsible for meeting Wikipedia's sourcing standards. If you'd like instead to argue that Wikipedia's sourcing requirements are illogical and should be changed, you can bring that up at WP:RSN, but you should not expect your content to remain on Wikipedia if you are going to simply ignore our content policies. - MrOllie (talk) 01:01, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

You are once more ignoring all of the facts and arguments I have placed before you, by plainly and solely appealing to 'protocol' as an escape. Read above: Alexander Dumas and Benjamin Franklin were self-published. So they are "not a good fit for Wikipedia" because "they have no editorial control" and "are not academic"?... This is beyond silly. These two gentlemen, and the many others I have listed and linked to above, were self-published before they were famous. Which means, that they gained fame, and rightfully so, because society was not bickering over the fact that they were self-published, but rather judged them by the contents of what they wrote, said and did.

Much as "anyone can publish on CreateSpace" (which is not entirely true, by the way), anyone with something that sells well can have their work picked up by a big publisher. A porn star with no gray matter (and no offense to the smart ones among them) can get anything printed through a publisher if she is famous. Anything. As a matter of fact, unlike self-published authors, he or she would often who not even have to write the book themselves. Thus, a self-published author who is an expert in a field of interest, has much more credibility with respect to facts as compared with an author with a big publisher who was selected due to their fame.

Then what of this statement of yours, that "if something 'non-academic by nature' it may not be a good fit for Wikipedia". Are you kidding me? You just ruled out the existence of pages concerning Jimmy Hendrix, Recreational Fishing, Carpentry and Stamp Collecting. Something does not have to be 'academic' to be on Wikipedia.

Furthermore, this appeal to 'fact-checkers' is an entirely new fashion, not even 5 years old. Are you truly proposing that we negate Chinese cultural traditions which are thousands of years old because they have to give way to 'fact-checkers'? Again, this stinks of cultural racism, mind you.

Then when you say "our policies"... Excuse me? This is a free enterprise for all people. This website does not belong to you or to them, it belong to us - to me as well. This is not a privately owned business, and neither is it intended solely for academics. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 03:03, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

I would like to point out several additional arguments as to why this section on Discipleship is relevant and important for this page:

1. The Discipleship section is directly preceded by the section on Wu De - Martial Morality. I have not chosen that location on the page by coincidence. Wu De is a concept which is strongly linked with the institution of the Shifu-Tudi discipleship relationship. One is usually required to abide by Wu De to become a disciple, and is expected to be an exemplar of Wu De after having become a disciple.

2. Chinese Culture is inherently a Confucian Culture, a fact agreed upon universally by all East-Asian scholars. The Shifu-Tudi relationship of discipleship is dictated by Confucian values and social norms and expectations.

3. The institution of Discipleship is intrinsically woven into the history of traditional Chinese martial arts, and is the source of much lore and political intricacies.

4. Lineages of traditional Chinese martial arts are based on the discipleship model. This is apparent and exemplified, for example, in Xing Yi Quan, Bagua Zhang and Taiji Quan, and discussed on their respective pages on Wikipedia.

5. Several of the teachers mentioned in the extant section of 'Notable Teachers' were disciples, such as Ip Man, Gu Ruzhang, Yang Luchan, etc.

6. Discipleship is a main theme in the literary genre of Wuxia, which was already previously mentioned and referenced on this page.

7. Discipleship is a main theme in the cinematic genre of Kung fu Films, which was already previously mentioned and referenced on this page. 187.244.113.106 (talk) 04:46, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Yes, you are correct, I am not engaging with arguments that are not based on Wikipedia policies. They amount to special pleading. If you think the policies are no good, you can get them changed, but you cannot just filibuster on the talk page and then ignore them. - MrOllie (talk) 11:09, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Your bureaucratic megalomania with which you are trying to eliminate prominent and important aspects of traditional Chinese culture, is most improper. As I have noted before, this borderlines cultural racism. It is like suggesting Baseball should not be on Wikipedia.

There are now as references:

* 10 Books and 6 articles - only a minority of which are self-published, but are nonetheless valid and useful. All of the books and articles were written by experts, and I challenge you to refute that.

* 12 films and 2 television series whose plots CENTER around the concept of Discipleship in Traditional Chinese Martial Arts. You cannot pretend that films and series which were watched by hundreds of millions of people worldwide, are not sufficient evidence for the existence of a phenomenon.

* 3 famous actors who portrayed disciples in several films: Bruce Lee, Jet Li, and Jackie Chan.

What else do you need as proof in order to cease your trolling? Why should he general readership on Wikipedia suffer from a campaign to hide useful and important information about Chinese culture, because a self-appointed bureaucrat thinks he can forgo mountains of evidence out of personal spite? 187.244.113.106 (talk) 17:18, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

I have opened a discussion about this at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Self_published_books_and_racial_bias so hopefully more editors will weigh in shortly. - MrOllie (talk) 17:19, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Fictional films can be RS for the plot, not for that plot being factually correct. If that were true Ares fought in WW1 and Chinese Gordon was an Amercian.Slatersteven (talk) 17:40, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

And let us not forget the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise... ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 18:46, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Mr IP, are you associated with the Blue Jade Society or Jonathan Bluestein in any way? - MrOllie (talk) 23:26, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

Training

Have 3 kids need training no phone to contact need them to become experts JoeanaLGarza (talk) 02:48, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Unsourced Material has not Been Addressed

Many moons ago i contributed to Wikipedia almost daily, I enjoyed doing so and it was therapeutic for a person who had just discovered I will be disabled for life. Then it became an arduous and anger inducing chore because of the dogged manner in which Wikipedia's self-appointed police would pock every sentence with citation needed tags and the entire page would be marked for deletion. Now it is common to find unsourced material, pages that have been flagged as containing: unsourced material, self published work, citation needed etc. some of which date back years and yet nothing is done about it. Why? 2600:1700:8A90:ECF0:5456:2293:933F:B3B0 (talk) 05:00, 4 December 2021 (UTC) Perhaps in bad etiquette, I am responding to my own talk topic. I completely understand now why no one addresses these issues, it is insanely difficult to comprehend the instructions for nomination for deletion, or even to nominate for discussion of deletion. This is absolutely absurd and completely counterintuitive to what Wikipedia is supposed to be about. Before i finally published the above paragraph I self-edited an entire paragraph about how difficult it had become to continue contributing to Wikipedia, after trying to wade through all of the B.S. on how to nominate an already flagged for unsourced material article for deletion, I wish I had kept the entire thing in. Wikipedia has become it's own worse enemy by making it nearly impossible for the average person to even begin to figure out how to do anything for or to an existing article, that is other than to get frustrated and vandalize the damned thing. And Wikipedia has the audacity to ask me for a donation? The damned thing tells me this is the 2nd time we've interrupted you please give $2.25 For what? Nearly everything I personally look up is cited for unsourced material! As far as i am concerned Wikipedia was a great idea, then it became a monster, and now it is a failed experiment. Best of Luck to You All.

Cantonese and Mandarin

This article speaks as if Chinese is a language and it would be nice to specifically state Cantonese or Mandarin for the etymology aspects. 12.149.115.58 (talk) 02:26, 21 May 2024 (UTC)