I was once watching a PBS show and the host was questioning a historian as to the veracy of the historical claims made for the acts of the Saints. The reporter asked if they were ascribing the reports as a type of mass hysteria or made up magic tricks, or simple overstatements; and the historian said something very interesting. The historian stated that people then did not have science to tell them that they could not do something. That anything was actually impossible to do. The historean said that because no one told the individuals involved that it was impossible, the the people there existed the possibility of preforming such acts. they in effect created their own reality. That today it is the reality of science we ascribe to that dictates our limitations upon ourselves. Because the people then did not have any reason they could not do these things, they just did them anyways; similar to the increased capability found under hypnosis today or in times of great need...
I realize that its a sort of "the bumble bee doesn't know it can't fly, so it flies anyway" sort of thing,
[famous quotation: laws of aerodynamics state a bumblebee does not have the aerodynamic capacity to fly- but since the bee never studied aerodynamics, it goes ahead and flies anyways]
perhaps what we believe to be true as our ultimate capacities for endurance will be far from what they truly are. Think about it. Your weight watchers and science suggest that it takes about a year to lose thirty pounds or so. ( sixteen weeks in a year, at two pounds a week) but every sports season chubby idle pro atheletes are whipped into game shape, some dropping as much as fifty pounds in a few short weeks. are they losing muscle? no, these blokes gain muscle like crazy. Are they weak and enervated from the physical stress of such weight loss and conditioning? um can we un-enervated bystanders play a 90 minute half?
I really believe that our understanding of physical capacity is rudimentary at best.
anyways the report I referred to in the previous post is in Macclean's magazine; a Canadian weekly news-magazine.
I realize that its a sort of "the bumble bee doesn't know it can't fly, so it flies anyway" sort of thing,
[famous quotation: laws of aerodynamics state a bumblebee does not have the aerodynamic capacity to fly- but since the bee never studied aerodynamics, it goes ahead and flies anyways]
perhaps what we believe to be true as our ultimate capacities for endurance will be far from what they truly are. Think about it. Your weight watchers and science suggest that it takes about a year to lose thirty pounds or so. ( sixteen weeks in a year, at two pounds a week) but every sports season chubby idle pro atheletes are whipped into game shape, some dropping as much as fifty pounds in a few short weeks. are they losing muscle? no, these blokes gain muscle like crazy. Are they weak and enervated from the physical stress of such weight loss and conditioning? um can we un-enervated bystanders play a 90 minute half?
I really believe that our understanding of physical capacity is rudimentary at best.
anyways the report I referred to in the previous post is in Macclean's magazine; a Canadian weekly news-magazine.
