A friend of mine told me that it was relatively easy to tear off a human ear, but does anyone know just how much force is required on the average adult male? Any documented cases available?
According to my Kung-fu sifu, ten pounds of concentrated force will do it. I have no idea ih he’s right on that, but I DO know he really tore off someone’s ear once.
I don’t know, but if the ear is cauliflowered, as in the case of former pro rassler Yukon “van Gogh” Eric, a knee drop to the side of the head is enough to do the trick, as Killer Kowalski showed him in a 1954 match.
At least I read that Eric’s ear was already cauliflowered. I only ever saw the “after” pictures.
Depends on how sharp your teeth are…
Which is really cool, because according to my former Tai Kwon Do teacher, ten pounds of force was exactly the amount needed to hyperextend and break an elbow in the opposite direction of the normal flex. I have since also heard that ten pounds of force is exactly the amount required to do the same to a knee, an ankle, and many other things. (I’m serious, I’m not mocking the author of the above quote.)
From this, I’ve always wondered: 1) what sort of wierd laboratory studies have people been doing to discover this; 2) much like the description of the Phi ratio in the Da Vinci Code, is ten pounds of pressure some form of golden number for hurting things; and 3) could it be that martial arts people are the type to believe bullshit made up urban legends?
Of course, it is quite possible that all of these things need ten pounds of pressure. I just think it unlikely.
Ouch!!!
You guys!!..
…I shouldn’t have looked!
I don’t think that 10 lbs of pressure will do it. I know that anecdotal experience doesn’t equal factual evidence, however–
I was in a fight where I ended up getting kicked in the head just in front of my left ear. This opened up a cut starting about the 1st “notch” of my ear (from the top) and extended about 1 inch and around the curve of where the ear attaches. A short time later the guy then grabbed the top of my ear and jerked downward. This managed to rip the cut across the top of my ear and around to the backside (about 2.5-3 inches from the top notch around the circumference of the ear). I think his hand slipped off due to the blood. The inside of my ear never tore during the whole time but my top of the ear was kind of flopping down–rather like Dumbo.
Now, I’m not sure how many pounds of pressure he used but I am pretty sure it was more than 10.
It depends on how you do the tear. If you grab along the outside edge by clamping it between your 4 fingertips & palm, then pull straight out to the side, you probably couldn’t tear it off at all (the ear would just end up slipping from your grip, or you might scrape off a few little lanes of surface skin).
If you grabbed the top “flap” in between your thumb and side of the index finger, then sharpley twisted and pulled straight down really hard… well I don’t really know but I don’t like thinking about it. Then there are all the variations of ear-yanking technique in between.
I too have heard the X-pounds of force to cause Y nasty injury. It has to be estimated… I just can’t see it actually being measured or if doing so would even be legal:
“OK Mr. Jones, we’ve got the PSI gauge all calibrated, and will now use this hydraulic press to start applying lateral force to your knee cap. The test is over when it dislocates… oh, and when you roll out through the lobby in your new wheelchair, would you tell volunteer # 125 to come in?”
Ahh yes, just before I post a nasty-sounding ear-pulling technique that I don’t like the sounds of, someone posts a story of having it done to them… shudder.
Half of Mick Foley’s (Mankind’s/Cactus Jack’s/Dude Love’s) ear was ripped off in a match and it wasn’t cauliflowered at all. Cartilage is “tougher” than skin or fat, but on the ear it’s not really that thick so it has the potential of being really fragile.
It was also under more than 140 lbs. of pressure: Mick Foley weighed around 280 lbs. at the time of WCW’s German tour, and the ear was torn off when his head caught between the ring ropes as he hung on the outside of the ring; the ropes were cutting off the blood flow to his brain, so he was actually pushing on the ropes to escape, rather than holding himself up.
He’d also performed the ‘hangman’ numerous times before the incident without ear-loss, so I’d say 10 lbs. is way low.
I’ll bet anyone here that I can not only hang ten pounds from my ear but i’ll also wager my knee can take ten lbs of pressure. Same goes for my shin bone and all the other innane " pressure" points all the YMCA self defense student have informed me of.
Boys and girls let me tell you, this kind of misinformation is dangerous. A weekend course at the Y does not prepare you to fight a thug who has been strong arming people for years. Ten years in serious competitive martial arts or boxing maybe. but get serious.
And to think I read this thread thinking someone actually knew the answer. Call me naieve but I expected a cite where some one hung weights of a cadavers ear until it pulled off. my Guess was some where around 150 lbs.
Apparently, the studies weren’t very rigorous. I just went outside and balanced a twenty pound dumbbell on the elbow of my rotated and outstretched arm; no damage was done.
I can easily press close to 100 lbs. of pressure with my hand, which I have measured with a scale, and I am certainly not musclebound. Pulling on my own ear must create twenty to thirty pounds of force, possibly more, with nothing going wrong (or right, depending on what I am trying to accomplish). Just as other posts have indicated, more than 100 pounds of force must be neccesary to rip off an ear.
Clearly you are the exception rather than the rule; you have incredibly strong ligaments, or your dumbbell is inaccurately weighed. My Tai Kwon Do teacher and several martial arts loving friends could not be wrong about this; each of them knows someone who knows someone who has broken someone’s elbow with very little force applied.
I still don’t believe it, especially since you are referring to “friend-of-a-friend” stories. “Very little force” to a very strong person or a person trained well in the martial arts may be significantly more than 10 pounds.
ten pounds of pressure per… in[sup]2[/sup]? cm[sup]2[/sup]?
A mere 10lbs in general, I’m not buying.
Anyone who’s ever butchered an animal, (or dissected one), can tell you that ripping cartilage isn’t that easy. This is why there’re sharp knives involved.
There’s a chap known as Mr. Lifto, whose been known to lift impressive weights with various body parts. I won’t post any links, because they might not be work-safe, but you can find stuff about him on the net. (But be careful about doing that from work, too, since it could hit a firewall and get somebody’s attention.)
Dude, I’m joking. I’m with you, I think it’s stupid too. I’m mocking the kewl kung fu people who tell bullshit stories like that.
Yea but now how are gonna catch the cat to put it back? 