Homeopathy

[corydoras]

What I am suggesting Ken is that, a man who has lived to 90+ and is "well educated", would be more likely to come to terms with his demise, and accept the facts of nature, than a man/woman of a much younger age would. I'm not saying that his will to survive would not come into it.

After all it is a 'scientific fact', that on average, humans don't live that long.

 

The thing that surprises my about this thread, is that those who say they're beliefs are guided by science, have such closed minds. If every scientist had the same outlook then (barring a few accidents, where an experiment lead a different way) there would be little progress made.

I'm not a scientist, or even an academic, but I thought that science was about pushing the boundaries of mans knowledge.

Surely a better way would be to find out why these complementary treatments appear to work for some but not others, rather that dismissing them out of hand.

Or do you feel we have reached the pinnacle of mans knowledge about the workings of mans body and psyche, and we should not even attempt to investigate further?

 

John.

John

Read this link, it is not a very long document, then tell me that you think that homeothapy is deserves to be funded on the NHS.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A954740

 

Having an open mind does not mean blind acceptance.

 

Nice to see you are an atheist John, something else we have in common.

Edited September 2, 2007 by corydoras

[Ken L]

I'm not a scientist, or even an academic, but I thought that science was about pushing the boundaries of mans knowledge.

Surely a better way would be to find out why these complementary treatments appear to work for some but not others, rather that dismissing them out of hand.

Or do you feel we have reached the pinnacle of mans knowledge about the workings of mans body and psyche, and we should not even attempt to investigate further?

 

Well, first off, neither am I. I only trained in sciences to "A" level standard but this was enough to give me a general appreciation of the methodology that scientists employ and cause me to acknowledge that this is an immensly powerfull tool to use when looking at any aspect of nature or human endevour.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method

 

Where does that leave us ?

Well, in the case of homeopathy, it is basically old science. It was assumed that it did work and that the explaination for why it worked was correct. However, whilst the assumptions that underpinned the doctrine of homeopathy may have had some currency in it's day, they have been disproved and disgarded over time. nontheless, the practice of homeopathy remains and it is now so far from the accepted way in which the world works that it is presented as some sort of bizzare "alternative" or "compliment" to science and is no longer recognisable as science at all.

 

Things have now got to the point where practioners and proponents of homeopathy are so far out of sync with the mainstream that the onus is on them to prove that what they are saying is demonstrable in a controlled, repeatable and explicable way (rather than on the rest of us to show that it doesn't work), and they can't. When they claim that they can, their methodology has been shown to be faulty - see the links provided by Crydoras.

 

The scientific world view is not fixed in doctrine, it is in a constant state of flux as it disguards old ideas that have been disproved and replaces them with newer more robust models of how reality works. Sometimes, it even abandons a current model and goes back to a previous one when the data fits.

Sometimes, these models are totally alien, counterintuitive and almost impossible to understand (like Quantum theory) but the fact is that they work as a "best explaination" of real world phenomena and make predictions that are consistently shown to be right.

 

For homeopathy to be accepted back into the scientific fold, you would ultimatly need to:

* Show that it works - but they can't.

* Explain how it works - but the explaination that they give relies on lots of other assumptions that we also know not to be true and they can't support a single one of them with evidence.

* Integrate their expaination of how it works into a wider world view and use this to make testable predictions - again, no joy here.

 

Something as simple as demonstating that water has the claimed "memory" and postulating an explaination for how this might work would be enough to cause a major shift in the perception of homeopathy and the world we live in as a whole, but I can't see it happening any time soon and in the meantime, I don't think we should be spending huge amounts of public money on something that can't be shown to have a physical effect.

 

Finally, it's all very well saying "have an open mind", but in the absence of some sort of filtering mechanism for what you believe, you end up in the relm of magic and superstition.

[corydoras]

Nice post Ken, much better than I could do at this time on a Sunday. I too am not a scientist, but use the Scientific Method and Critical Thinking as tools to help me work out what is real and what is not.

 

Brushing up on your Logical Fallacies helps in spotting the BS too.

Edited September 2, 2007 by corydoras

[Ken L]

I don't disagree !

I've known plenty of intelegent and knowledgable people who believe the strangest things,and being intelligent, they are able to construct a world view that still allows them to belive in things despite a massive amount of contrary evidence.

 

Sometimes I wonder whether schools should be investing a little more time and effort into teaching people how to think and maybe just a little less in teaching them facts and formulas to base their thinking on. Afterall, without a framework that allows you to utilise what you know and detirmine whether what you are being told is consistent, there's little point in learning at all.

 

BTW, Here's a fun site http://www.fallacyfiles.org/index.html

Edited September 2, 2007 by Ken L

[gozzer]

Thanks for the links about homeopathy, but I did say in an earlier post that my concern was the debunking of all complementary treatments along with homeopathy.

One of my posts covered the use of complementary therapies to help people cope with their illness, and this aided the effectiveness of the accepted conventional treatments. This too was debunked.

 

With this in mind, this section of the article caught my eye;

 

This is probably where conventional medicine went wrong and where homeopaths got it nailed down. People who are sick do not want to be poked and prodded, and presented with incomprehensible medical jargon and a bottle of 'just take this and come back in two days if your condition does not improve' medicine (usually delivered with a degree of impatience). They want to know what is wrong with their bodies, how it could have happened, how the medicine will cure them. These patients need counselling and comfort, which they will not get from the typical harried doctor who has 20 other patients to see.

 

On the other hand, you have the homeopath, who not only readily listens to your complaints and problems, but takes the trouble to discuss them. He then prescribes some medication that he probably knows has no curative value, but it does not matter - the patient, by peace of mind from the counselling, has already initiated his own healing process. Doctors should maybe take a lesson or two from these people about psychology.

 

This seems to confirm my own belief that the power of positive thinking, (no matter how it is achieved), can and does aid treatment.

 

Maybe I'm being gullible in believing this, but what the hell?

 

John.

[Ken L]

John, I don't disagree that the typical 6 or 8 minute time slot that the NHS allocates your GP for a typical consultation is simply not enough to explain to people what has gone wrong with their bodies and how the doctor proposes to fix it.

 

Unfortunatly, a lot of the time, so called alternative therapists are more than willing to step in and fill this very real need for an explaination with something that is less than useful ("Your Yin is out of phase with our Yang", "Your aura has shifted to far into the green" or "Your humours are dark") and then offer a bogus solution - at a cost.

 

Undoubtedly, there is a psychological benefit to understanding what has gone wrong (whether accurate or bugus) and maybe there is a role for medically trained councilors who can sympathetically explain this to people as well as dealing with theur psychological needs.

[corydoras]

Thanks for the links about homeopathy, but I did say in an earlier post that my concern was the debunking of all complementary treatments along with homeopathy.

One of my posts covered the use of complementary therapies to help people cope with their illness, and this aided the effectiveness of the accepted conventional treatments. This too was debunked.

 

With this in mind, this section of the article caught my eye;

 

 

 

This seems to confirm my own belief that the power of positive thinking, (no matter how it is achieved), can and does aid treatment.

 

Maybe I'm being gullible in believing this, but what the hell?

 

John.

John, my french mother-in-law is a true believer in homoeopathy, i have given up trying to change her mind because I value my relationship with her too much. One thing she said once did strike a note with me. She said that homoeopaths were much nicer people than normal GPs.

[Guest Brumagem Phil]

John, my french mother-in-law is a true believer in homoeopathy, i have given up trying to change her mind because I value my relationship with her too much. One thing she said once did strike a note with me. She said that homoeopaths were much nicer people than normal GPs.

 

I think she makes a very interesting observation.

 

Faith healing I believe is all about the positive energy (for want of a better expression) being passed for one person to another. Some people in life are naturally negative to be around whereas others can make one feel better simply by placing a soothing hand on ones shoulder. I don't think we fully understand quite how that works but its far from hokum.

 

My homeopath/alternative practitioner is just one of those people, Jan de Vries his name is (he's on the net) and I saw him for quite some years. I felt better after seeing him even before I took any of his potions!! By the way he was no money grabber either. I'd normally drive overnight from Birmingham to see him in Ayr and was usually his first patient of the day. First of all he'd stick me in a cubicle with the needles in me for half an hour to recover from the drive and give me a bit of energy for the day, then he'd manipulate my neck (I've always had a neck/back problem) and then discuss my other health issues at the time and prescribe me any necessary potions. He always waived the fees due to how far I travelled and only ever charged me for the potions which was usually about a tenner or 15 quid.

 

I have to be honest and say the homeopathy didnt seem to work for me, although other complimentary treatments have helped me. What I do object to though is you and ken virtually calling people liars because YOU don't believe it works. The bottom line is, I believe we as organisms have an amazing ability to heal ourselves and there are many ways to achieve this, but overall hope, faith and belief are essential for success and whether that comes from a drug, a sugar pill or even some old fashioned prayer, who are you or I to deny someone that chance of recovery? As for the NHS funding it......well we pay to help people recover from lots of self inflicted injuries/diseases, so why not fund other areas of healthcare?

[chesters1]

I think she makes a very interesting observation.

 

Faith healing I believe is all about the positive energy (for want of a better expression) being passed for one person to another. Some people in life are naturally negative to be around whereas others can make one feel better simply by placing a soothing hand on ones shoulder. I don't think we fully understand quite how that works but its far from hokum.

 

My homeopath/alternative practitioner is just one of those people, Jan de Vries his name is (he's on the net) and I saw him for quite some years. I felt better after seeing him even before I took any of his potions!! By the way he was no money grabber either. I'd normally drive overnight from Birmingham to see him in Ayr and was usually his first patient of the day. First of all he'd stick me in a cubicle with the needles in me for half an hour to recover from the drive and give me a bit of energy for the day, then he'd manipulate my neck (I've always had a neck/back problem) and then discuss my other health issues at the time and prescribe me any necessary potions. He always waived the fees due to how far I travelled and only ever charged me for the potions which was usually about a tenner or 15 quid.

 

I have to be honest and say the homeopathy didnt seem to work for me, although other complimentary treatments have helped me. What I do object to though is you and ken virtually calling people liars because YOU don't believe it works. The bottom line is, I believe we as organisms have an amazing ability to heal ourselves and there are many ways to achieve this, but overall hope, faith and belief are essential for success and whether that comes from a drug, a sugar pill or even some old fashioned prayer, who are you or I to deny someone that chance of recovery? As for the NHS funding it......well we pay to help people recover from lots of self inflicted injuries/diseases, so why not fund other areas of healthcare?

because people are being denied proven treatments due to lack of cash ,i got no problem people taking alternative medicenes as a complimentory treatment but like anything else you have to pay for it if you want over and above everyone else,mrs jones cant get treatment for X because mrs smith (who already gets what mrs jones cant) wants her ying yanged ,i cant see a problem with the NHS supplying details of alternative stuff but pay for it as well

just a few leaflets will do mrs jones has rights as well to medical help.

 

As for the NHS funding it......well we pay to help people recover from lots of self inflicted injuries/diseases, so why not fund other areas of healthcare?

 

most of what the NHS does is treat self inflicted injury .forget smoking and drink ,theres road accidents ,accidents in the home ,riding accidents etc etc ,had they (the injured) not done what they were doing perhaps they wouldnt get injured.

when you start discriminating against a section of the population you get on a slippery slope and end up treating only natural diseases which in the majority are age related or cancer ,show everyone else the door?

most A&E on the weekend are full of drink related "problems" ban drink? try yinging the yang of a drunk and youl be in hospital or in the bog cleaning barf of your trousers

Edited September 2, 2007 by chesters1

[Ken L]

Hmmmm.

I suspect that we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this issue.

We don't afterall wan't this thread heading down the same road as the consessions thread.