Know That Vs. Know How

In his book “An Introduction to Daoist Philosophies,” Steve Coutinho notes that philosopher Gilbert Ryle about 50 years ago formulated an important distinction between “knowing that” and “knowing how.”

The first category contains those things that can be described as cognitive knowledge, or what we can know solely by the intellect. You can know that two plus two is four, for example, or that you had granola for breakfast.

The second kind of knowing involves not just the brain but also the body. This category includes such things as knowing how to ride a bike and knowing how to swim.

Of course, a person could have a merely “knowing that” knowledge of riding a bike or of swimming, such as “I know that riding a bike involves pushing pedals” or “I know that swimming requires leg and arm motion to propel through water.” But a person with only a “knowing that” knowledge of riding a bike or of swimming will not be able to ride a bike or to swim. Those activities require practice and experience, which teaches nerves, muscles and sinews how to cooperate with the mind to accomplish the task.

Tai chi is very much a “knowing how” kind of knowledge. For sure, it has a strong theoretical foundation that must be understood for a student to progress, but if you only know the theory, well, you only know the theory. You can’t do tai chi.

Balancing the cognitive aspects of tai chi with the experiential ones can be tricky. Tai chi has been called the “thinking man’s martial art” (yes, until recent decades it was taught mostly to men) because its robust theoretical underpinnings attract a lot of intellectuals. But while a keen intellect can be an advantage in learning tai chi, relying too much on it can be a liability.

Some intellectuals filter virtually everything through their intellect, trusting only their thoughts. When practicing tai chi, those thoughts can override feeling, which is the language through which a person can communicate with various parts of his or her body.

The foot does not tell the mind in English, Chinese or even Latin, “Hey boss, I seem to be on solid ground here, so you can put your full weight on me.” Rather, by projecting your attention on your foot, you feel whether or not your contact with the ground is firm. Likewise, when you launch a punch, you need to feel the connections from your foot to your fist that will allow you to put your full body into the movement.

Tai chi tradition describes the chain of command involved in any movement as this: The yi (mind intention) moves the energy, the energy moves the body and the body performs the technique. At a very advanced level, though, that chain of command becomes tightly compressed in time, if not transcended.

Performance at that level is described as “yi dao, qi dao, li dao, fongfa dao,” which translates as “mind, energy, physical strength and technique all arrive at the same time.” That level is also sometimes described as “mysterious” power, the third and perhaps highest level of martial ability.

The other two levels are “obvious” power, which derives mostly from physical strength, and “hidden” power, which results from the cultivation of energy and the ability to express it martially. “Mysterious” power, in contrast, is said to be a direct expression of mind/spirit.

Further complicating the traditional explanation of movement are such terms as “the educated palm,” which suggests that intelligence can be developed in parts of the body beyond the brain.

Modern science prefers to keep all aspects of the mind contained within the skull. Its explanation of human movement is nicely summarized in the fine book, “Taijiquan: The Art of Nurturing, The Science of Power,” by my tai chi brother Yang Yang, who holds a Ph.D. in kinesiology.

 He notes that the central nervous system is organized in a hierarchy, at the top of which is the cerebral cortex, which “is responsible for higher-level cognition, including motor planning, attentional control, conscious awareness, intention, and emotional and social judgment and understanding.

“Tucked underneath the cerebral cortex are a variety of subcortical areas such as the medulla, pons, midbrain, cerebellum and diencephalon. Information processed in these regions does not necessarily reach conscious awareness. Electrochemical signals travel along nerve pathways between the cerebral cortex and these lower levels of the hierarchy, all the way to the spinal cord, where the peripheral nervous system will carry them to the other parts of the body involved in the movement. The nerve pathways stop at different “relay stations” in the brain where clusters of cell bodies bring together different types of information to influence the messages that go out. Some of these relay stations include the medulla, the pons, and the cerebellum, all of which are engaged in sensory and motor processing.”

This model may resemble the corporation you work for. Once the CEO and middle managers in the head thrash things out, mostly behind closed doors, nerve signals are sent to the workforce to initiate the proper musculoskeletal contractions that move the body joints and result in a particular motion.

Whether you prefer the traditional tai chi explanation or the modern scientific one, clearly there is a lot more involved in the movement process than you can capture in your thoughts. So don’t over-think it, and keep practicing.

Enough said.