Understanding Scope in the Martial Arts

When I was High School, I was the science stream and invariably studied high level abstract mathematics. I mixed with all the student groups at school, so many of my friends were the in the baseline mathematics stream. During one afternoon break, a friend of mine found out I was in the science stream and asked for help with his mathematics homework. I was happy to oblige, but wasn't really prepared for what he showed me. His class was covering addition and subtraction with large numbers. I taught him how to do the sums, but at the back of my mind I was developing the realisation that this was the highest level of mathematics the majority of people were ever exposed to.

To be fair, beyond high school 99.99% of the population don't use anything more complex than simple arithmetic. It simply isn't necessary for most jobs. If had shown my mathematics homework to my friends it would have all been jibberish and hieroglyphics. The scope of my friends mathematics education were the bare essentials.

Now, most people get exposed to mathematics in school, so they know the basics. In contrast, the majority of the population have never been exposed to martial arts outside of the media. If you have ever watched a mathematics inspired movie like 'Good Will Hunting' or 'A Beautiful Mind', you will see the characters doing 'mathematics' inspired things like writing a formula on a whiteboard or applying a concept. These actions have been dramatised for film, but they are just about as useful for understanding mathematics as an action scene with martial arts choreography is in a martial arts movie.

Continuing on with the analogy, the martial arts the general population are familiar with are 'brands' of martial practice. Unfortunately, mathematics is a far more advanced field than martial arts, where the practitioners have pretty much agreed on the fundamental concepts. Martial arts, on the other hand, is still at that developmental stage where a dozen cultural 'styles' are still arguing about who is the 'best'. In reality styles like Judo, Gures (Turkic wrestling), Amateur wrestling, Pankration (Greco-Roman wrestling), Shuai Jiao (Chinese Wrestling) and Pehlwani (Indian Wrestling) are more or less the same, with similar techniques, strategies and training methodologies. All these styles fall under the 'grappling/wrestling' term (being mainly distinguished by how much clothes you are wearing). 

If you were to place grappling in the martial arts curriculum, it would hold the same place as Arithmetic in Mathematics (literally the bare essentials). So, anyone who has ever watched an action movie and two people wrestling have experienced the equivalent of watching somebody add 2 + 2 and writing the result (without understanding how it was done). That is how base level a Judo throw is in the scheme of things. 

Karate, Aikido, Muay Thai, Boxing, Kendo and so on are simply different ways of adding and subtracting numbers. Some people like doing it with arabic numerals, others use roman numerals (not anymore), some like the sums in rows while others use columns. Some methods work better, but overall its just manipulating integers.

So, where is the rest of it? What does the equivalent of algebra or calculus look in martial arts terms. Well, when people think of martial arts they think mainly of hand to hand combat with fists, but that is just the very basic level. At higher levels pyrotechnics, stealth, grand strategy, siege, construction, education, weapons, logistics, maintenance, psychology and so on become part of the curriculum.

Like advanced mathematics, most people don't need this stuff unless its part of their job, so that is why it isn't taught anymore. The problem with that thinking is, although you can branch out into specialties in mathematics (geometry), unless you have built yourself up in all other areas, the very highest levels will be beyond understanding (or difficult to learn).

The true scope of martial arts is huge and complex. There is more to learn than could fit into a hundred lifetimes, but that shouldn't stop anyone from trying. Explosives may seem like at the opposite end of the spectrum to throwing somebody on the floor, but for a leader or a general, these different fields become critical to the overall plan. 

Most people don't expect to start scaling castle walls or organising army logistics when they sign up for martial arts lessons, but these skills are just as valid and important to the organisation as being able to evade a punch.