close
more_vert

Squid Tempest wrote:
I'm going to stick my head above the parapet here.

I never trusted homeopathic medecine due to the scientific arguments already mentioned here. However, I have a very good (and intelligent) friend who suffers from a very serious condition (I won't go into details here as it is another's health I'm talking about). For some years now homeopathic remedies have provided her with the only relief she has been able to get - conventional medecine did nothing for her. Apparently for her it really works, and in ways that it is hard to fit in with the placebo effect. real, physical differences.

I was as cynical as the rest of you until this. Now I'm really not so sure. Could it possibly be that there is something going on here that science has yet to suss out?

Well this is the point. I can understand the rationalist's argument completely, but I quiver on the cusp just like Pascal lest there is a phenomena acting that science has not yet discovered. I hedge my bets because animals have been known to be cured. In fact I remembered my mother rescued Snoopy in 1970, our dog from the pound from being put down. She cured his distemper using homeopathy, no placebo effect there; and then there is the anomalous and mysterious nature of the water molecule.

Seems to me that there is a simple solution here... sell the homeopathic remedies, but put a disclaimer on them that states that they are not shown to be effective under double-blind clinical testing.

At the same time, make sure all 'legitimate' medicines are also labeled with information about their efficaciousness under the same standards, and full disclosure of their dangers via side effects, dangerous interactions with other drugs, etc.

My personal view is that the public at large is far too willing to blindly trust whatever Merck or Pfizer shoves onto the market, because they bear the 'legitimacy' of being products of big pharma. In the USA, testing has been truncated and safeguards lowered to satisfy the profit rationale of those companies. As a result, drugs hit the market that kill people before they are withdrawn. Let's not even talk about the dangerous drugs that are dispensed to deal with nebulous maladies like 'social avoidance disorder' or whatever.

Medical errors made by the establishment kill more people every year than just about every other cause combined. At least homeopathic remedies by themselves aren't packing the sort of hideous side effects and potent dangers of many 'legit' drugs that merely mask symptoms or provide minimum relief for maximum profit.

Deepinder Cheema wrote:
Squid Tempest wrote:
I'm going to stick my head above the parapet here.

I never trusted homeopathic medecine due to the scientific arguments already mentioned here. However, I have a very good (and intelligent) friend who suffers from a very serious condition (I won't go into details here as it is another's health I'm talking about). For some years now homeopathic remedies have provided her with the only relief she has been able to get - conventional medecine did nothing for her. Apparently for her it really works, and in ways that it is hard to fit in with the placebo effect. real, physical differences.

I was as cynical as the rest of you until this. Now I'm really not so sure. Could it possibly be that there is something going on here that science has yet to suss out?

Well this is the point. I can understand the rationalist's argument completely, but I quiver on the cusp just like Pascal lest there is a phenomena acting that science has not yet discovered. I hedge my bets because animals have been known to be cured. In fact I remembered my mother rescued Snoopy in 1970, our dog from the pound from being put down. She cured his distemper using homeopathy, no placebo effect there; and then there is the anomalous and mysterious nature of the water molecule.
Unsinkable Rubber Ducks (as Chris Brookmyre would say)

If you believe in this rubbish, no amount of proof will lift the wool from your eyes - good luck with it if you get heart disease, cancer, or ANYTHING that wont go away on its own!