Can Humans Really Have Superhuman Strength?

  • Thread starter Ivan Seeking
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In summary, the television show "Real TV" showed a large man lifting a small helicopter with someone trapped inside it. Even as I saw it with my own eyes, it didn't look possible. Now mind you, it was just a small chopper (Bell 47G, if I remember correctly), and he didn't exactly lift it over his head, just rolled it enough for the trapped pilot to be pulled out. Still, this is looked like something that shouldn't be possible.
  • #281
ThomasEdison said:
They aren't the same circumstances. Only the exact same lift can be compared to the exact same lift.

And this is also blatantly false, btw. Each of those lifts (no matter is an odd lift, like a truck pull or rolling an atlas stone or a snatch can be easily reduced to a mechanical system and the forces required can be easily determined. Human movement can, and it is, reasonably precise modeled and described through physics. Human neuromechanics laboratories are found in many universities studying how the neuro-muscular interactions produces movement and coordination. They deal with physical models of human movement on a daily basis.

I can only guess guess that a side effect of watching circus is making some humans forget elementary physics.
 
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  • #282
DanP said:
No one contests they are different. But you claim that a random person can lift more than a weightlifter by placing their hand and feet differently.

You cant. Get a grip on reality. Try it. Try to lift a barbel overhead from floor, or any other objects, placing your hands and feet in any way you want. Use the leverage of your body in any way you want. You will fail to lift half the weight those man and women lift. Enough with theory.

And BTW, powerlifting in not an Olympic sport. Weightlifting is.
No, that wasn't his claim. You misinterpreted what he wrote.

His claim was that, with the same person lifting in both an official and unofficial setting, they would be able to lift more in an unofficial setting because they have more freedom with the placement of their hands and feet. He wasn't comparing a random person in an unofficial setting to a professional in an official setting, but to a random person in an unofficial setting to themselves in an official setting.

I don't know how accurate that claim is, but I just thought I'd set it straight.
 
  • #283
personally i think this is possible because as a child i was attacked and sent the man flying 30 feet back slamming against a wall.
 
  • #284
morteck581 said:
personally i think this is possible because as a child i was attacked and sent the man flying 30 feet back slamming against a wall.

It's more likely that you don't remember the events the way they happened.
 
  • #285
It would be nice to think that superheroes exist. They don't. As I posted something like 18 pages ago, the only incredible feat here is the general failings of human recollection. Study after study have shown that memory is fallible and all to easy to influence. The 90lb lady who rolls a car off her child in an emergency quickly becomes the 90lb lady who lifted a 2000lb car off her child. It just sounds better as a tale to tell. Before long she's heard the myth about what she did so many times her recollection of the event changes to fit.
 
  • #286
morteck581 said:
personally i think this is possible because as a child i was attacked and sent the man flying 30 feet back slamming against a wall.

:rolleyes:

Drakkith said:
It's more likely that you don't remember the events the way they happened.

:approve:

EDIT: Personally, I think it's possible because, as a child, I was attacked and (luckily) I had a can of spinach in my hand. I was able to squeeze the sealed can so hard that the spinach was propelled upwards, out of the can, and directly into my mouth. As a result my forearms grew to an immense size, deforming my anchor tattoos, and I was able to fend of Bluto.
 
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