Can Humans Really Have Superhuman Strength?

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The discussion centers on anecdotal accounts of extraordinary human strength, particularly in life-threatening situations, such as a mother lifting a car to save her child. Participants express skepticism about these claims, suggesting they are often urban legends rather than scientifically supported phenomena. Some mention personal experiences of increased strength during adrenaline rushes, while others question the plausibility of such feats. The conversation also touches on the role of training and genetics in strength, with references to competitive strongman events and individual lifting capabilities. Overall, the consensus leans towards viewing these extraordinary strength stories as largely exaggerated or mythological.
  • #151
jarednjames said:
You film them measuring the internal dimensions so you know it has the required capacity and then without cutting the recording they fill it with water (giving us as many angles on the box - inside and out - as possible to show the water isn't just in gaps) and then again without cutting it shows him lifting.

I understand it's not the ultimate solution but if there's no signs of tampering it would at least provide an initial piece of evidence to work with.

Hmmmm... I still would say that a live stream where instructions have to be given and rapidly followed is a better test.
 
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  • #152
nismaratwork said:
Hmmmm... I still would say that a live stream where instructions have to be given and rapidly followed is a better test.

As much as everyone here will agree that evidence must be subject to as many checks and balances as possible to ensure its authenticity, it isn't possible or required to launch into things with such a bull in a china shop attitude.

Start small, use a basic test with simple controls to identify if there's a valid claim. Once we have this, then we can request stronger controls be placed on the tests to start building a stronger case.

This is exactly how James Randi operates - and for good reason.
 
  • #153
jarednjames said:
As much as everyone here will agree that evidence must be subject to as many checks and balances as possible to ensure its authenticity, it isn't possible or required to launch into things with such a bull in a china shop attitude.

Start small, use a basic test with simple controls to identify if there's a valid claim. Once we have this, then we can request stronger controls be placed on the tests to start building a stronger case.

This is exactly how James Randi operates - and for good reason.

True, but this is suffiently outlandish, and matched with an inconsitant story about weight, and... Kal El... a guy who names himself superman. The preponderance of the evidence points to an outright exaggeration or fabrication; so, why skirt around... cut to the quick.

Remember Mythbusters?... not a bit of broken china, even with 2 bulls. :wink:
 
  • #154
Why don't we just wait until Kal-El posts again. No need to get too worked up about it until he gives us something to look at.
 
  • #155
berkeman said:
Why don't we just wait until Kal-El posts again. No need to get too worked up about it until he gives us something to look at.

Good point, good point.
 
  • #156
Kal-el2010, please understand that simply because you say that you did these things doesn't mean (to us) that they are true. Saying that I have to add that I can believe its POSSIBLE that you have done these things. I've seen some stuff where certain people are built differently that allows them to do things others can't do. Something like denser muscles, different makeup of tissues, something like that. Now if you can provide some proof then you would go a long way towards convincing people that you have done these things. Grab anyones cell phone with a camera if you don't have one and then upload it on Youtube. Pretty easy way of proving this stuff.
 
  • #157
Jared, no attitude, just raw honesty, I'll say it once again, I don't need to lie. #shrug and don't touch the spiritual topic...but anyways, done. I'll do it and post it soon.

nismaraidfnasidunvidsnf: #shrug Sarcasm is not your friend bub...

"Wait & See" like I said.
 
  • #158
kal-el2010 said:
Jared, no attitude, just raw honesty,

Maybe it is, maybe it isn't - without evidence there is no reason to entertain your claims.
I'll say it once again, I don't need to lie.

Just like the people promoting perpetual motion machines have no reason to lie?
I'll do it and post it soon.

Good, Good. I await the results laid out exactly as detailed by me in the above post.
"Wait & See" like I said.

I'd also like an answer to my question regarding how you lifted it.

Did you lift it so the only thing touching it was your hand (it wasn't in contact with the floor or anything else)?
 
  • #159
Jared...sarcasm aside. No need for it.

When I first lifted it, it was a 500 pound dresser, with a high attached mirror that stood vertically...I couldn't hold it any higher otherwise it would have went through the ceiling and my grandmother would have had a fit. This time, I'll do it outside or in a more roomy area.

Can you give me a link on where to find one of these containers? I've been looking already...
 
  • #160
kal-el2010 said:
Jared...sarcasm aside. No need for it.

No sarcasm (yet), only serious comments on what you and others have said.
When I first lifted it, it was a 500 pound dresser, with a high attached mirror that stood vertically...I couldn't hold it any higher otherwise it would have went through the ceiling and my grandmother would have had a fit. This time, I'll do it outside or in a more roomy area.

I'm still interested how you lifted it.

We know you only use one arm (how you gripped it is where my curiosity is currently at) but I also want to know if any of the dresser was still on the ground?
Can you give me a link on where to find one of these containers? I've been looking already...

Now sarcasm, 'a shop'.

Seriously though, any clear plastic container that measures the specified dimensions will suffice.
 
  • #161
Say this is the dresser from a front view: |____________|
I held it up from the end: |___|
The other end was on the ground...I lifted it from one end.
 
  • #162
kal-el2010 said:
Say this is the dresser from a front view: |____________|
I held it up from the end: |___|
The other end was on the ground...I lifted it from one end.

That's what I was looking for.

You didn't lift the whole weight of the dresser. Claim dismissed.

Simply tilting a heavy object is a case of leverage and using moments to your advantage.

The higher you lifted your end, the less weight you were supporting. Until the point you are simply acting as a balance and all weight is acting through the point still in contact with the ground. In other words, the higher you lift the lighter it gets for you.

If we take a really simplistic approach, at the point it left the ground as you lifted you were supporting approximately half of the weight of the dresser. As you lifted this becomes a smaller and smaller percentage of the overall weight until it reaches ~0 when you are at 90 degrees to the ground.

This means the most you were ever lifting was half the weight ~250lbs, but even this is on the high end of estimates.

Still an impressive feat of strength, but nothing on the super human scale.
 
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  • #163
kal-el2010 said:
Say this is the dresser from a front view: |____________|
I held it up from the end: |___|
The other end was on the ground...I lifted it from one end.

Damn it man... LEVERAGE... one of the first things I said earlier. You could have just been frank at the outset.
 
  • #164
Hey guys, I once carried 1250kg of gravel over a 70m distance.

I only had to make ten trips with the wheelbarrow.

Do I win?
 
  • #165
Forget the leverage, I'm still wondering how he knew how heavy the dresser was without knowing how to weigh it.
 
  • #166
brewnog said:
Forget the leverage, I'm still wondering how he knew how heavy the dresser was without knowing how to weigh it.

That was going to be one of my questions, but I figured he was going to take enough grief for this before bringing that into it.

I don't think "superman" is ever going to live this down!
 
  • #167
jarednjames said:
That was going to be one of my questions, but I figured he was going to take enough grief for this before bringing that into it.

I don't think "superman" is ever going to live this down!

Oh... I can guarantee that. :biggrin:
 
  • #168
Happy to see this tread pop up again. Recently seen a TV show with Dennis Rogers, where in scientists measure the electricity from his brain to his muscles and find it much stronger than usual tested athletes and this because he use all muscle fibres at once. He is named the strongest man in the world compared to body weight and rips playing card deck as a kid, now bending iron tools. Probably this man was natural born with ability like some other may achieve in many years serious training of "hard qigong"?

The guy who here claims lifted a 500 lbs dresser in one side and other stuff, that's pretty believable also if he had claim it done onehanded the whole dresser of floor. Other people, even old timer "strongmens", did onehanded lift several hundred lbs. This mostly seems as deadlift with good hold in the hand. If the dresserlifter find a very good hold on it, it are physically possible for a very strong man. However now turned out to be only maximum 250 lbs (one side), the best way to proove it will be to rig a barbell at a gym by whitnesses and get to youtube.

By the way, I think there is very different level of superhuman strength. One with adrenaline and fibres and "qi power" electricity, like Dennis Rogers, theoretical up to a certain limit where things snaps and broke apart. Then come nothing and more nothing. Then come a different higher level of real superhuman feats, perhaps in a whider range of combination with anti-gravity levitation or true reality changes in a way hardly understandable by only physical science. Maybe something out of the "dark matter" that supposedly fill the universe 5 times more than the normal matter, or something originating from use of "zero point energy"? In some video I had seen a guy estimate that if one cubic centimeter of space energy get total transformed to mass, then it will give mor mass than we now is aware of in the known universe. Well, the latter part of my post here is speculation expected to not fit in this forum but hopefully the first part is, about Dennis Rogers and muscle fibre brain electricity :)
 
  • #169
pafrya said:
The guy who here claims lifted a 500 lbs dresser in one side and other stuff, that's pretty believable also if he had claim it done onehanded the whole dresser of floor. Other people, even old timer "strongmens", did onehanded lift several hundred lbs. This mostly seems as deadlift with good hold in the hand. If the dresserlifter find a very good hold on it, it are physically possible for a very strong man. However now turned out to be only maximum 250 lbs (one side), the best way to proove it will be to rig a barbell at a gym by whitnesses and get to youtube.

Such a claim is not believable - as I have already pointed out, the worlds strongest man competition deals with weights less than this and those guys are really struggling with the maximums. I believe the heaviest they deal with is the dead lift of a car (500kg) but that's in the same scenario as above - one side on the floor.

We requested evidence for this because of how unbelievable it is.
 
  • #170
jarednjames said:
I believe the heaviest they deal with is the dead lift of a car (500kg) but that's in the same scenario as above - one side on the floor.

We requested evidence for this because of how unbelievable it is.

You should not talk about strength if you don't know the situation today in the sports. Claiming that such weights are only lifted "one side on the floor" is pretty much bull. For example, the biggest recorded PL squat is 567 Kg, a record done by Vladislav Alhazov.
Go tell him that that's done with one side on the floor :P
 
  • #171
DanP said:
You should not talk about strength if you don't know the situation today in the sports. Claiming that such weights are only lifted "one side on the floor" is pretty much bull.

For example, the biggest recorded PL squat is 567 Kg, a record done by Vladislav Alhazov.
Go tell him that that's done with one side on the floor :P

1. Please point out where I specified "the sport" and not the worlds strongest man competition.

2. Please show me where I said those weights are only lifted with one side off the floor - outside of the competition.

3. I watch said event each year and I checked it with the wiki article just to make sure I was on the right lines:
Dead Lift – Lifting weights or vehicles up to about 1,100 lb (500 kgs) straight off the ground until knees lock in a standing position. Lift is for either maximum weight or maximum repetitions with a fixed weight. In recent years, a similar keg-loaded apparatus to that described above for the squat has been used.[13][14]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_Strongest_Man#Competition_format_and_commonly_contested_events

In the above case, one end is left on the floor during the left (there's a pivot on the barrel setup).

The heaviest lifts they do where they carry the entire weight is ~250kg region.

I have never denied that people lift more, I was simply pointing out that in said competition these men who train for this exact task are hardly breezing through it. And to believe the kal el (who you can see in the video he posted) could match these guys (especially with as much ease as is implied) is plain ridiculous.
 
  • #172
Dont split the hairs in 4. Do your homework on what weights are handled by men.

You could at least watch strongest man competitions before talking, and actually deadlift something yourself, before talking and relay on Wikipedia to tell you what it is or how it is done.

Look, a 468 Kg hummer tire deadlift in a strongest man competition. One side on floor, yes ?



jarednjames said:
And to believe the kal el (who you can see in the video he posted) could match these guys (especially with as much ease as is implied) is plain ridiculous.

What do I care how a man looks ? Yes, humans which never set foot in training hall in their life tend to throw idiotic statements around, like "look how it looks, its ridiculous ". Bull. Go lift something.

Look how the man who squated 6 times his bw looks. Now go ridicule him for looks.

 
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  • #173
DanP said:
Dont split the hairs in 4. Do your homework on what weights are handled by men.

Again, where do I reference outside of that competition? I used a recognised competition as a benchmark, if you have a better source please do share.
What do I care how a man looks ? Yes, humans which never set foot in training hall in their life tend to throw idiotic statements around, like "look how it looks, its ridiculous ". Bull. Go lift something.

I don't care how anyone looks, but why don't you show me something where a person of kal els build lifts 500lbs off the ground with one arm (and preferably with relative ease as per his attitude, but I'll accept it without this) and back up what you claim?
Look how the man who squated 6 times his bw looks. Now go ridicule him for looks.



What about him? What about his looks? The guy is strong - his build isn't the same as kal els so drop the crap.

So, why not show me something as I request above (and I'll gladly retract what I've said) or if you'd prefer to just give attitude then I'll simply leave it here.
 
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  • #174
Your late edit:
DanP said:
You could at least watch strongest man competitions before talking, and actually deadlift something yourself, before talking and relay on Wikipedia to tell you what it is or how it is done.

Look, a 468 Kg hummer tire deadlift in a strongest man competition. One side on floor, yes ?



I've never denied they lift heavier weights, again I'm not seeing your point.

As above: show me something where a person of kal els build lifts 500lbs off the ground with one arm (and preferably with relative ease as per his attitude, but I'll accept it without this) and back up what you claim? (This would be a good point to actually watch his video before coming back at me with a guy built like a brick privy performing the task.)
 
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  • #175
jarednjames said:
The heaviest lifts they do where they carry the entire weight is ~250kg region.

Man, you don't even know what a deadlift is, or what events are done in such a competiton. DO yourseolf a favor and at least watch the competitions. Again:




468kg.

jarednjames said:
The guy is strong - his build isn't the same as kal els so drop the crap.

Yeah, I drop it. When you don't have any idea even what a deadlift is and its variations, you ought to shut up. Like I said, move your self in a gym and youll see ppl looking like ambulant skeletons pulling up extremely good lifts.

Judging somone's strength about how it looks alone, that's bull. Bull done by humans who never lifted anything.
 
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  • #176
DanP said:
Man, you don't even know what a deadlift is, or what events are done in such a competiton. DO yourseolf a favor and at least watch the competitions. Again:

468kg.


That's very pretty, but my 250kg reference was a one handed lift.
Yeah, I drop it. When you don't have any idea even what a deadlift is and its variations, you ought to shut up. Like I said, move your self in a gym and youll see ppl looking like ambulant skeletons pulling up extremely good lifts.

Judging somone's strength about how it looks alone, that's bull. Bull done by humans who never lifted anything.

Attitude it is then.

I'll await a video as requested above, until then I'm out.
 
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  • #177
jarednjames said:
That's very pretty, but my 250kg reference was a one handed lift.

No it wasn't, you mentioned the car dead-lift specifically. And you mentioned 500kg, not 500lbs. This is how they do it:

This is a 330kg with a single hand, this is how is done , grip variations will influence weight:



jarednjames said:
Attitude it is then.

Yes, attitude. You never lifted / dead-lifted anything in your life, so cut the crap.
 
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  • #178
In response to your late edits:
DanP said:
No it wasn't, you mentioned the car dead-lift specifically. And you mentioned 500kg, not 500lbs. This is how they do it:



Yes, I mentioned 500kg for the car lift - and after that 250kg not related to the car lift.
This is a 330kg with a single hand, this is how is done , grip variations will influence weight:



And he's kal els build is he?
Yes, attitude. You never lifted / dead-lifted anything in your life, so cut the crap.

Never said I had.

For the third time: show me something where a person of kal els build lifts 500lbs off the ground with one arm (and preferably with relative ease as per his attitude, but I'll accept it without this) and back up what you claim? (This would be a good point to actually watch his video before coming back at me with a guy built like a brick privy performing the task.)

I'm not trying to argue with you here, I just find it hard to believe a person of his build could do the above. I'm not saying they can't, only that I'd like to see it to believe it.

Either there is something I can be shown to convince me, at which point I'll accept it or there's not and I'll remain sceptical.
 
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  • #179
DanP said:
No it wasn't, you mentioned the car dead-lift specifically. And you mentioned 500kg, not 500lbs. This is how they do it:




This is a 330kg with a single hand, this is how is done , grip variations will influence weight:





Yes, attitude. You never lifted / dead-lifted anything in your life, so cut the crap.


Whoa... I've read this through... 3 times now...

Dan, in context I can't see that Jared was talking about anything except a one hand lift, no leverage, like lifing a basketball. That's the scenario that was originally laid out, compared to one using leverage instead.

Maybe Jared doesn't know a dead lift from a dead fish, and I know that's pissing on your territory, but you're ripping him for something that doesn't change what Kal-El was originally claiming. I watched everything you posted, and what Gardner did is impressive as hell, but nothing like the claim being made in this thread.

If you want to debate lifting, it probably should be in a lifting thread... most of us don't know much abuot power-lifting. We don't need to though... "The other end was on the ground...I lifted it from one end. " (Kal-El)... that's leverage.

Now... are you right about this stuff... yeah, but you're angry out of all reasonable proportion here. Kal-El's claim was unbelievable as originally presented, and once clarified, none of us doubted it... honesty yes, but not that you can tilt things.

Remember... this isn't about the sport of lifting, it's about claims of super-human strength, and recently an absurd claim. A professional powr lifter, as you would be the first to tell me... is a PROFESSIONAL, an athelete... they live one thing: LIFT. If Kal-El said, "Hey guys, I've been lifting for years, and here's my new mark!"... that would be pretty cool.

He didn't... he blew smoke, and in the end conformed to none of the norms of lifting. Take your Plate Load Lift... that is a precisely balanced machine, and the weight you lift is a known function of that; nobody is going to say a PL-Lift = what they can grab with one hand and lift overhead. If they did, you'd kick them in their nuts!

Claims made: Knowing the weight, without knowing the weight. Changing stories about lifts, that end in a mundane activity far from super human. Training and training to jerk something up for a second is a far cry from hauling an unbalanced load in one hand, like a comic-book hero, right?

Please, from someone who once fought with you, and now tends to talk with you instead, this is an argument across purposes. You're arguing about a sport, Jared about a random guy who made a laughable claim. You've taught me about sports medicine and more, but not by telling me to hit the gym, right? This is S&D... testing claims central... no assumptions allowed (in theory). This isn't an attack on lifting, fitness, or what a very few people can do with training.
 
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  • #180
I was just wondering if anyone has heard of of a man/women being possessed by ghosts and at some times the person that is possessed goes out of control and lifts HEAVY objects and smashes them around like they are weightless which unfortunately includes other human beings as well i am sure some of you must have heard of such incident.
 

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