Absorb What is Useful

[Fungus]

.........allows us to be in two places at once? Cool. I can land both a front kick and back kick on a guy at the same time.

Not quite, but it forces our opponent to adjust their strategy that takes into account that we at any given time could be in two possible places. And that strategy is different than randomly choosing a strategy that assumes we are in either definite position. This does not follow from newtons mechanics. The uncertainty is to our advantage.

 

[Taiji Rebel]

Are we testing martial arts scientifically, or just applying scientific theory to techniques and strategy?

Is it possible to use scientific theories to improve our martial arts, and if so how does one do so?

 

[isshinryuronin]

Not quite, but it forces our opponent to adjust their strategy that takes into account that we at any given time could be in two possible places. And that strategy is different than randomly choosing a strategy that assumes we are in either definite position. This does not follow from newtons mechanics. The uncertainty is to our advantage.

At any given time one can be in a number of possible places (positions) due to a number of variables such as personal tactical preference, strategic doctrine, physical capability, opponent's position and movements, even his state of mind.

This is the whole point of tactics which are intended to control and manipulate the opponent: Control his mind and manipulate his body. This will limit the possible positions (based on natural human reactions and his observed behavior as well as physical restraints you place on his movement) he can be in and give a higher percentage chance of him being where you want him at any given time (usually just before you smack him). This gives us the ability to some degree of dictating the action and thus predict likely outcomes.

Other than knowing that a bunch of squiggly threads of energy are involved in current quantum theory, I'm not clear how it can be applied to such a dynamic and variable system such as found in the "entanglement" of combat.

 

[Fungus]

Are we testing martial arts scientifically, or just applying scientific theory to techniques and strategy?

Is it possible to use scientific theories to improve our martial arts, and if so how does one do so?

What I was doing was simply to abstract two superficially totally different fields, dynamics of combat/fighting and dynamics of physical interactions, and seek a commmon abstraction for their dynamics - what determines the physical law vs the laws of combat. Mainly for fun and to see how insights from one field can give new perspectics to another field, via a common abstraction - game theory in this case.

Combat can be though of as a game between the fighters, where dynamics can be understood in terms of mutual expectations and actions.
In certain interpretations (quantum bayesianism) the same can the though of physical interactions.

I just enjoy the common abstractions simply because I like both physics and MA. But this is maybe a too geeky association for most.

I get more insights of physics, from the analogy, than the opposite. For example, it is difficuly to put your self into the shoes of beeing an electron, but it is easier to put yourself into the role of a fighting agent, then intuition can be mapped back to physics. So physicists will learn more from the analogy, than MA artists will learn from "insights" from physics and mapp back to MA.

 

[Fungus]

Even allowing that studying the mathematical basis of physics may help someone tweek their MA by 1 or 3%, using that time to study tactics and combat psychology and practicing the moves will better oneself 10 or 20%.

I guess this is what triggered my post. I agree that study "combat psychology" is far more likely to help your MA, than to study "newtons mechanics", but then i went further to suggest that modern physics and quantum mechanics, hold common abstractions with combat psychology from a game theoretic perspective.

Thus there is no contradiction between studying mathematical basis of physics and studying combay psychology. On the contrary do I see many interesting connections, but the exists on a foundational philosophical plane only. They are not hands on in any way.