Ch’i Energy

• Each person must nurture the Ch'i (air, breath) that has been given to them. Taoists strongly promote health and vitality.

• Tai chi as an art of the balance of forces

• Tai chi works on all parts of the body, to "stimulate the central nervous system, lowers blood pressure, relieves stress and gently tones muscles without strain. It also enhances digestion, elimination of wastes and the circulation of blood. Moreover, tai chi's rhythmic movements massage the internal organs and improve their functionality."

• Traditional Chinese medicine teaches that illness is caused by blockages or lack of balance in the body's "chi" (intrinsic energy). Tai Chi is believed to balance this energy flow.

Acupuncture & Meridians

Y/Y and the Five Elements

Chinese acupuncture• Cultural “incommensurability” (‘no

common measure’) between Western and Eastern explanations of pain.

• Ch’i energy travels throughout the body along channels, or “meridians”.

• The method of selecting points along for acupuncture anesthesiology: "where a meridian traverses, there is a place amenable to treatment.”

• This doesn’t jibe with Western explanations; from the Western perspective, its success is an “anomaly.”

CTM & Western Medicine• Different attitudes to acupuncture

highlight contrasting views of the the physician. The “gardener” and the “mechanic.”

• Mechanic: structure determines function, and structure is purely physical. Focus on parts to be fixed.

• Gardener: Patient is viewed as a complete integration of body and mind.

• Theory-dominant vs. practice-dominant orientations. The Chinese generally more concerned about efficacy than about explanation.

• CTM is “holistic” in directing itself to the person as a physiological and psychological unity. Analyze not the sickness but rather understand the sick person to restore balance and health.

• “Eastern medicine’s traditional view of the body takes the body’s mode in the opposite direction from modern medicine’s procedure of anatomy first, then physiology, and only finally psychology.”--Yuasa