Knowledge vs. Experience, Higher vs. Lower Level, Etc.

[Kevin]

Hey there everyone.

A new issue that has come up is the question of Sifu Stier's knowledge versus his actual experience. I have to admit this topic has been in my mind for quite a while, after having read many of Sifu Stier's informative posts on this Forum.

I can rememeber many many times, when reading Sifu Stier's posts, thinking that it sounded almost as if he was reading and copying straight out of a book. Am I saying that's what I think he was doing? No, not at all. I honestly believe that Sifu Stier has all of this knowledge in his head from many, many years of learning about it. I agree with what Sifu Korahais said back in post #64 of this thread, that Sifu Stier seems to be an encyclopedia of knowledge on the subjects he speaks of. Knowledge..not necessarily experience.

Knowledge is different from experience. I remember classes I had in college in which I would study for the exams, have all of the information readily available in my head, and was able to easily repeat the facts verbally or on paper. But that's all it was..Knowledge, facts, etc. Anyone with a good memory can do that, especially if the topics they are reading about or studying truly interest them. If I had read about Topic X or Y, and had talked with people who knew alot about these topics, for many, many years, then of course, I could very intelligently speak about them and discuss them. That doesn't mean I have an ounce of actual understanding or experience in topic X or Y.

Having alot of knowledge on a topic or group of topics (as Sifu Stier undoubtedly does) does not equal or prove that there has been learning, or that the person with this knowledge in their brain has been able to understand and apply what they've learned on more than an academic level.
Knowledge does not equal experience.

Hope to hear more about this.

Kevin

[Sifu Stier]

Dear Mark:

The Forum 'Rules and Regulations' list Eight (8) Rules which are supposedly applicable to everyone who posts on this Forum. Please refer to Rules #2, #3, #5, and #6. Then re-read any of the many, many recent posts in which they refer to me by name in ways which directly violate these Rules.

Sifu Stier

[Mark Blohm]

These are the forum Rules and Regulations:

-You will not post any messages that are obscene, vulgar, sexually-orientated, hateful, threatening, or otherwise violative of any laws.
-You will not use the Shaolin Wahnam Discussion Forum to post any material which is knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, hateful, harassing, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise violative of any law.
-You understand that ad hominem and personal attacks are prohibited. An ad hominem attack is an attempt to discredit an argument by attacking the character of the opponent. Criticizing the ideas is allowed; criticizing the person is not.
-You will not to post any copyrighted material unless the copyright is owned by you or by the Shaolin Wahnam Institute.
-You agree not to use this forum to defraud others.
-You understand that flaming (i.e. online verbal assault) will not be tolerated. Members who verbally assault the character or person of other members will be banned. The moderator(s) will decide what constitutes "flaming". To give an example, "You are wrong" is not a personal attack; "You are wrong because you are an idiot" is a personal attack.
-You will respect the privacy of other members. You will not post phone numbers, addresses, or pictures of other members without express permission.
-You acknowledge that the owners and moderators of the Shaolin Wahnam Discussion Forum reserve the right to edit, move, close, or remove any thread or member for any reason.

I don't see how Forum Administrators or Moderators have violated any of these rules. I do see that Forum Administrators or Moderators have challenged arguments (in this thread and elsewhere)when they are incoherent or lack clarity, especially when the response is 'not true'(no evidence) or 'stop attacking me'(the legitimate criticism is said to be an attack).

I think some people are more coherent than others because they develop tactics and strategies(title of this thread ) so that they can better implement their techniques and utilize their skills.

What does everyone else think?

Sincerely,

Mark

[lordcunni]

I have no doubt that Sifu Stier is an experienced and genuine master. My opinion is based on information about him on the Internet. Here is just a small selection :

Gary Stier OMD
B.F.A in Music, M.S. & O.M.D.(H.K.) in Oriental Medicine, Reiki/Chi-Kung Master Master Instructor of Tai-Chi, Kung-Fu, Yoga

Dr Gary Stier began training in the Chinese martial arts in January 1961, initially studying Tang Shou Tao (Tong Sau Do) and Southern Shao-lin Styles (Nam Kune Siu Lum), notably Southern White Crane Styles (Fujian Bok Hok Pai). He than began training in the Shen Men Tao System (San Mun Do) in 1965. Dr. Stier is an Initiate Disciple of Shen Men Tao Grand Master Li Rong Hua (Lei Wing Wah) and the first non-Chinese practitioner of this System to be certified as a Master of Five Excelences in 1975 (Art, Music, Poetry, Healing Arts, and Martial Arts). The Shen Men Tao System includes Yang Tai-Chi Chuan, Sun Pa Kua Chang, Shan Si Hsing I Chuan, and Wu Tang Shan Chi Kung Forms. Sifu Stier was promoted to Grand Master in Spring 2002 following the promotion of his first student to become Master Instructor, Sifu Jordan P

Whitfield.

Sifu Stier practices and teaches Sun Lu-Tang Style Pa Kua Chang, specializing in 8 Animal Palms, Earlier Heaven 8 Trigram Palms, Later Heaven 8 Trigram Palms, 64 Hexagram Palms, and Pa Kua weaponry, with all Forms practiced exclusively with both forward and backward Circle Walking at either Slow Speed for Moving Chi Kung, or at Fast Speed for Martial application. Inquiries and questions are welcome!

If you want to see him in action consider buying this -


http://www.tai-chi.com/wproduct.php?id=566

He is no stranger to heated forum discussions either (!) -

http://www.dragonslist.com/discussio...cted-fist.html

Whilst he is entitled to his opinions about Wahnam kung fu/tai chi and chi kung, he has no first-hand experience of them. Consider his opinions - he is direct and honest, but be governed by Wahnam ideals. Similarly Wahnam members have no direct experience of Sifu Stier's martial arts. People may write that they are low level. How can they possibly know? It seems to me that there are plenty of opportunities to train with him if you really want to find out.

And finally, on a lighter note, check out Gary Stier's Cd - it's very good!

http://www.cduniverse.com/search/xx/...tier,+Gary.htm

[Sifu Stier]

Mark:

I think you better schedule an appontment with an Optometrist for a much needed Eye Exam! I have only allowed for "at least one good eye" to be able to see these things, which you apparently do not have. So call 'em today, buddy. Don't wait until you're totally blind!

Sifu Stier

[lordcunni]

I have no doubt that Sifu Stier is an experienced and genuine master. My opinion is based on information about him on the Internet. Here is just a small selection :


Quote:
Gary Stier OMD
B.F.A in Music, M.S. & O.M.D.(H.K.) in Oriental Medicine, Reiki/Chi-Kung Master Master Instructor of Tai-Chi, Kung-Fu, Yoga



Quote:
Dr Gary Stier began training in the Chinese martial arts in January 1961, initially studying Tang Shou Tao (Tong Sau Do) and Southern Shao-lin Styles (Nam Kune Siu Lum), notably Southern White Crane Styles (Fujian Bok Hok Pai). He than began training in the Shen Men Tao System (San Mun Do) in 1965. Dr. Stier is an Initiate Disciple of Shen Men Tao Grand Master Li Rong Hua (Lei Wing Wah) and the first non-Chinese practitioner of this System to be certified as a Master of Five Excelences in 1975 (Art, Music, Poetry, Healing Arts, and Martial Arts). The Shen Men Tao System includes Yang Tai-Chi Chuan, Sun Pa Kua Chang, Shan Si Hsing I Chuan, and Wu Tang Shan Chi Kung Forms. Sifu Stier was promoted to Grand Master in Spring 2002 following the promotion of his first student to become Master Instructor, Sifu Jordan P Whitfield.


Quote:
Sifu Stier practices and teaches Sun Lu-Tang Style Pa Kua Chang, specializing in 8 Animal Palms, Earlier Heaven 8 Trigram Palms, Later Heaven 8 Trigram Palms, 64 Hexagram Palms, and Pa Kua weaponry, with all Forms practiced exclusively with both forward and backward Circle Walking at either Slow Speed for Moving Chi Kung, or at Fast Speed for Martial application. Inquiries and questions are welcome!


If you want to see him in action consider buying this -

http://www.tai-chi.com/wproduct.php?id=566

He is no stranger to heated forum discussions either (!) -

http://www.dragonslist.com/discussio...cted-fist.html

Whilst he is entitled to his opinions about Wahnam kung fu/tai chi and chi kung, he has no first-hand experience of them. Consider his opinions - he is direct and honest, but be governed by Wahnam ideals. Similarly Wahnam members have no direct experience of Sifu Stier's martial arts. People may write that they are low level. How can they possibly know? Members are jumping on the bandwagon, and adopting the party line - if it's not Wahnam, it must be low level. That is disengenuous and offensive to Wahnam and non-Wahnam students.It seems to me that there are plenty of opportunities to train with him if you really want to find out.

[Mark Blohm]

Mark:

I think you better schedule an appontment with an Optometrist for a much needed Eye Exam! I have only allowed for "at least one good eye" to be able to see these things, which you apparently do not have. So call 'em today, buddy. Don't wait until you're totally blind!

Sifu Stier

I think this falls under the category of 'not true'(no evidence) and is arguably a violation of

You understand that ad hominem and personal attacks are prohibited. An ad hominem attack is an attempt to discredit an argument by attacking the character of the opponent. Criticizing the ideas is allowed; criticizing the person is not.

and

You understand that flaming (i.e. online verbal assault) will not be tolerated. Members who verbally assault the character or person of other members will be banned. The moderator(s) will decide what constitutes "flaming". To give an example, "You are wrong" is not a personal attack; "You are wrong because you are an idiot" is a personal attack.

I am open to some intelligently structured arguments that would prove me wrong.

Also, I mentioned in my last post that

some people are more coherent than others because they develop tactics and strategies(title of this thread) so that they can better implement their techniques and utilize their skills.

I am still open to appropriate comments on this statement.

Sincerely,

Mark

[Sifu Stier]

Closed Eyes Open Mind!

Mark:

I was attempting to playfully tease you a bit for your totally prejudiced response to my earlier post, but apparently the ability to maintain any kind of a sense of humor is a very rare skill around here. As you were.

[HugoDarien]

strategy and tactics for combat

Don't wait until you're totally blind!

Sifu Stier

JAJAJA AGREED

[Mark Blohm]

As you were.

I would rather not.

[HugoDarien]

strategy and tactics for combat

Hi! mblohm ok no problem for me jeje

[Mark Blohm]

Hi! mblohm ok no problem for me jeje

I know, Hugo.

Mark

[HugoDarien]

strategy and tactics for combat

I know, Hugo.

Mark

Thanks

bye!

[Antonius]

I don't have time to answer all that has been said here. I also don't have time to split this into two threads, as it obviously should be. That will be handled later.

As for breaking our own rules, I have this to say: This is not a democracy. This is a traditional Kung Fu school that has embraced modern Internet technology in order to help preserve and spread the Shaolin Arts worldwide.

The suggestion that we are breaking our own rules is both untrue and inappropriate. I will not engage in a circular discussion on this topic. There has been no flaming, no abuse, no harrassing, and no defrauding by Shaolin Wahnam instructors. If anything, we are guilty of not enforcing the rules for all of our guests. To have these same guests now accuse us of breaking our rules is the height of irony.

Let me remind everyone that you are guests here -- guests who benefit directly from the generosity of Sifu Wong. There are no adds and no fees on this forum because it is payed for by the Shaolin Wahnam Institutue. Every day, Shaolin Wahnam instructors offer free advice not only for Shaolin Wahnam students (who need it least), but for students around the world who are desperately searching for honest answers. For several of us, running this forum requires many hours of work every week (much of it that members never even see). We do this out of respect for our teacher, Sifu Wong, and out of a love for the Shaolin Arts. We get paid nothing for our time. If anything, we lose money in the process.

As Mike said, this is not the "World Internal Martial Arts" forum. It is the Shaolin Wahnam Discussion forum. We feel that we are extremely fair. We let opposing voices be heard, and we even take the time to address them in detail. But in the end, we will take care of enforcing our own rules. If you do not trust us (and this includes Sifu Wong) to run our own forum, then you should not be here.

This thread will be temporarily closed until the moderators have a chance to clean things up and split the posts into more appropriately named topics.

[Andrew]

OK -- I'm back again

I temporarily re-opened this thread to make this post. It took me a long time to compile it and I think it is of much use --- I also promised to add it yesterday so will keep my promise as always.

Michael,

This is the third part of my "longer response" to your request.

The impression I get from your posts .... is very much that you dislike him (Sifu Stier) ..... and that you are doing your utmost to find fault and be as vocal and aggressive as possible about it.

Sorry to disappoint you Michael. Despite the many heated encounters between Sifu Stier and members of Shaolin Wahnam, and in all honesty, we in Shaolin Wahnam do like Sifu Stier. We may consider his concepts low level, and he may say that I have a lot to learn (which is true of course), but as I stated often enough we have absolutely nothing against him as a person.

One nice attribute Sifu Stier displays is that although he may get angry and sometimes be rude, he is never malicious and he doesn't bear a grudge. This is indeed a very admirable characteristic of Sifu Stier's. After all the heat and fury, Sifu Stier says, "Let us sit down and have tea". Honestly, many of us would like to sit down and have tea with him one day.

If you think that we tear our hair out and bang on the desk when we write our posts, you are very mistaken. We often write with a smile on our faces, sometimes with chuckles, and sometimes with a laugh. We have benefited a lot from taking part in the discussions with Sifu Stier and are thankful for the unexpected lessons that he gives. But the most important reason why we still keep on responding to his posts is because he find him a likeable person.

And what I have observed consistently is that usually those who are challenging and criticizing his posts are doing so in a very narrow-minded fashion.

This is your opinion, Michael, and of course you are entitled to it. On the other hand, in my opinion (which I am just as entitled to), is that you have become extremely narrow-minded.

Had you been more open-minded, you would have been able to see the shallowness of Sifu Stier's concepts as I explained in my previous two posts. You would, for example, question how much direct experience of internal force a practitioner has if he emphasizes physical training. You would question how wise a piece of advice is if it advocates that you cannot predict what you opponent will do or say.

Everyone currently in conflict with Sifu Stier has also praised him . And yet you question his popping into and out of threads like he was the only person whose consistency could be questioned?

You said it yourself, Michael. We praise Sifu Stier when he deserves it. We criticise him when he becomes rude and aggressive. We take up his challenge when he threatens us with words or actions. We show him our worth when he questions our abilities. We believe what we do is honourable.

We did not question his popping into and out of threads like he was the only person whose consistency could be questioned. In fact we welcome him back to our forum when he reappears. We appreciate the unexpected lessons we et from him.

We did not question his inconsistency. There is no need for this. We know for sure he is inconsistent. There are so many instances to justify this opinion. For example, on a couple of occasions he said it was his last post -- and soon after he started posting again. He asked us not to expect to see his posts any more, yet his posts appeared quickly enough. He issued challenges and then said he didn't. He made it very clear that the encounters would not be friendly sparring, then said otherwise.

We are not worried about this inconsistency. The fact is that we want to have and like having him be back in our forum. If we really disliked him, we could easily just remove him from the forum (which we have obviously not done). There would have been more than enough reasons for us to remove him. But in fact we wouldn't even have to give a reason. As the forum hosts, it is our privilege.

In the past, when things were good, you did not criticize Sifu Stier. ..... However, Sifu Santer invalidated this logic in a very childish way when he made public the fact that he and other Shaolin Wahnam Instructors had been criticizing Sifu Stier.

You are grossly mistaken once again. This is another example that demonstrates that your mind is closed.

We criticised Sifu Stier long ago --- and at the same time we also praised him when praise was due.

The Zen-Tao thread way back in 2004, and the Breathing Control thread are two great examples.

Marcus (Sifu Santer) did an excellent job of explaining what you considered tob be the "childish" role he played. What is so "childish" about Shaolin Wahnam instructors discussing fundamental issues related to their teaching and training among themselves fundamental issues related to their teaching and training? And what is so "childish" about Marcus letting forum members, especially Shaolin Wahnam students, know about the discussions as they concern their training? Michael, I am afraid that you are not only narrow-minded, you seem to use words without knowing their meanings!

Now what I am going to say is of particular significance to Shaolin Wahnam members. What we discussed were fundamental issues related to our training and teaching. It was a sign of responsibility - not childishness - to do so. Our discussion was not limited to Sifu Stier. We discussed and practiced, for example, what some world known masters claim such as that chi does not exist, and kung fu patterns can't be used for fighting --- and found their claims to be untrue.

We found that many of the concepts and techniques Sifu Stier wrote in our forum were in conflict with what is taught in our school. Whilst we welcome and appreciate participation from non-Shaolin Wahnam members, a major objective of this discussion forum is to disseminate information to our students. When a grandmaster of another school continuously and verbosely writes about concepts, techniques and values which are in direct conflict with our own, it would be very easy for our students to mistake them as authoritative.

We, the senior members of Shaolin Wahnam, were faced with a dilemma. Should we tell our students in the forum that Sifu Stier's concepts, techniques and values were in conflict with ours? If we did, we could predict what our students would ask (although you, Michael, by following Sifu Stier's advice mentioned in my previous post, couldn't). They would ask how, or why. We would then have to explain in public that we considered his concepts shallow and techniques low level. We could also predict that our students would ask us for substantiation.

We chose to keep quiet. As Anthony (Sifu Korahais) has mentioned, we bent the rules -- not for ourselves but for Sifu Stier. We believe this was an act of tolerance and courtesy to Sifu Stier, although you, Michael, with your different standards and values, might call it "childish".

We were also confident that our students would see the difference between Sifu Stier's concepts and techniques and ours. An important methodology in Shaolin Wahnam is first to experience the result, then talk about the underlying principles. We were confident, for example, that our students would find out from their own direct experience that they did not have to perform a whole Kung Fu set before they could experience chi flow, as Sifu Stier advocated, but they could generate a chi flow with just one single pattern. They did not have to reduce the size of their patterns to make them combat effective although it could be advantageous in particular situations to do so. They would find out from their own direct experience that in fact in some situations it was necessary to have big movements to effect their combat function and that reducing the size of the movements would cause numerous disadvantages.

Then why do we now publicly say that Sifu Stier's concepts are shallow and his techniques low level? We are pushed to do so - ironically by Sifu Stier himself and, of course, by you!

Sifu Stier not only questioned Marcus' credentials as a Sifu, but explicitly said that there were many Sifus on this forum who did not deserve their titles. Sifu Stier might not have meant us, but it is a fact that the largest number of Sifus on the forum come from Shaolin Wahnam. Sifu Stier also explicitly stated that most people on the forum were of such low level that his high level material would be beyond their comprehension. Again, Sifu Stier might not have been refering to Shaolin Wahnam students, but the fact is that Shaolin Wahnam students form the majority of forum members.

Indeed, despite the insults showered on us and our students in our own forum, we were prepared to remain passive. Then, however, Sifu Stier started issuing challenges. Then you came along, Michael, and demanded to know why we did what we did. As it is part of our culture to not tell lies, we have to say the truth as it is.

Michael, you probably think that you are doing Sifu Stier a great favour by championing his cause. This is another example of your confusing false for real. Frankly I think you are doing Sifu Stier a great disservice. You are relentlessly pushing us to disclose information that we would prefer to keep to ourselves - not that we have anything to hide, but that we really do not want to embarrass those involved.

But, in conclusion, I would like to repeat what I said earlier. Despite everything, we still like Sifu Stier! We value his presence here, and appreciate his contributions to the forum, even though we may not agree with what he says.

And now, my family and my weekend off call.

Andrew