From: leung@DSG.Tandem.COM (Steven Leung)
Subject: Re: Everyone should change his major to Qi Gong major
Originator: leung@bittemple
Organization: Tandem Computers
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 00:42:45 GMT


Is qigong a religion? I don't think so. At least it does not have the major
element of any religion - a theory about after life. Just because some 
religious-prone people craze about it won't make it a religion.

Is qigong a science? Not yet, although some people have attempted to raise
qigong to be qualified as a decent science. But unfortunately, in the process,
some people like YX just use the effort as a sale tactic for his personal
gain. We obviously should not negate the efforts to advance the understanding
of qigong just because the existence of YX and the like.

So, what is qigong? At the present state, I think it's a special type of
exercise like Yuga, which aims at improving one's physiobiological functions
through exercise. In this respect, qigong does have its value.

I think beating on Yan Xin is a waste of time in that it doesn't improve our
knowledge about qigong. So, how about let's discuss the meaning of qi?

The term Qi is quite an important concept in our chinese culture. No matter
you talk about confucius, taoism, buddism, chinese traditional medicine,
you would encounter this qi. In our daily life, we talk about tianqi,
renqi, diqi, zhengqi, xieqi, huoqi, shuiqi, ganqi, feiqi, shenqi, xieqi, ...
I think it basically refers to energy in a qualitative term. Why are
there so many types of energy? Well, I think it's because the ancient folks
don't have the means to investigate the mechanisms that energy generated/
consumed in various situations. This is particularly true in tranditional
medicine. People noticed certain food/drug has special effects on a specific
organ - either boost or suppress the organ's functioning. So it's convenient
(remember, we chinese are very practical people) to lump all the material/
process/functioning into a vague concept of qi and then classify it according
where it takes effects. This reminds me about the history of chemistry when
people don't understand oxidization and attempt to explain the phenomenon of
burning in terms of something called ran2su4 (burning element, don't know the
english term). In the history of scientific endeavors, there are lot of such
stories.

Furthermore, the vagueness of the concept of qi might have its own advantage:
because it masks out many details, so that it's possible to focus on the global/
macro picture. This is particularly true when you look at the difference between
the western medicine and the chinese traditional medicine. In chinese medicine,
the focus has been on the _interactions_ of the internal organs, not the _exact_
anatomy/mechanisms of individual organs from the very beginning. The theory about
the interactions between the five major internal organs (liver, heart, spleen,
lung, and kidney) has been developed based on the doctrine of five elements more
than 2,000 years ago, well before we have detailed knowledge of individual 
organs. The successful application of the chinese medicine theory certainly
reinforces the concept of qi.

Anyway, qigong in my view is a special type of exercise that aims at controlling/
guiding/adjusting/tonifying the energy level of various internal organs thru
concious efforts. This type of effort I think is only found in oriental world
- both India and China have long tradition and history on this. I believe
this may be the most valuable aspects of qigong. And only research focusing on 
this area will be productive. As to claims of issueing qi to change atomic 
structure etc., that's pure nonsense. Don't even bother to look at it.

Steven
-- 
328. Seek opportunity, not security. ...
        - Life's Little Instruction Book by H. J. Brown, Jr.

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