No, no, no.....

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-06-30 05:34pm

My aunt is using homeopathic medicine on my youngest cousin.

I guess the Stupidity Gene is stronger in my family then I had hoped. Should I try to convince her to abandon the shit, or just let her use it?

neoolong · Post by **neoolong** » 2003-06-30 05:35pm

What is it?

KK · Post by KK » 2003-06-30 05:37pm

Depends how much you like your cousin, and if you want to him/her to get better.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-06-30 05:47pm

Homeopathy is a branch of pseudoscientific medicine. It is based on the notion that like cures like; in other words, if you're suffering from malaria, get a specimen of something that causes symptoms like of malaria, like fevers, dilute the living hell out of it (I mean, REALLY dilute the hell out of it), and adminster the diluted water solution as medicine.

The idea is that minute amounts of the substance will stimulate the body's healing processes. This idea is not correct, obviously, but the notion that diluting with water until it is mathematically impossible for any of the original substance to still be in the water solution can produce a substance that will have any effect of the body is even worse.

Even worse, the new homeopaths claim that while it is mathematically impossible for any of the original substance to be in the solution, the water still remembers the curative properties of the "medicine" it once had in it (that's right, smart water). Suggest to a licensed doctor that homeopathy is valid medicine and he'll rip your head off.

Fortunately, the stuff isn't bad for you at all (it can't possibly have any physiological effect on you, in fact). And it does have a placebo effect. But it's still junk medicine, and people make money by selling it to stupid people.

Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi · Post by **Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi** » 2003-06-30 07:56pm

Tell her ot stop using it, and get a real medication. New age crap takes a backseat to proven cures. Homeopathic medicine is for selling to morons, not risking a family member's health on.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-06-30 07:58pm

I absolutely hate shit like this. Hide the damn medicine if you have to. Your cousin needs a REAL doctor.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2003-06-30 07:58pm

Actually, while homeopathy is a bloody stupid concept, the idea of curing diseases or preventing future infections by administering a small dosage of the disease is used even today. It's called a vaccine.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-06-30 08:04pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote:Actually, while homeopathy is a bloody stupid concept, the idea of curing diseases or preventing future infections by administering a small dosage of the disease is used even today. It's called a vaccine.

Vaccines are just based on small dosages. Homeopathy is inherently based on infinitesimally low dosages.

Cyborg Stan · Post by **Cyborg Stan** » 2003-06-30 08:53pm

Homeopathy is a semi-common topic for Mr Randi's Rants. Here's an interesting excerpt.

From the May 25, 2001 Commentary. (Emphasis mine)

Our recent presentation here of the actual incredible mathematics behind homeopathic "dilutions" has led to some interesting correspondence. Concerning "Oscillococcinum," the homeopathic remedy sold in drug stores and elsewhere for 'flu, we're told that it's prepared from duck liver. Oscillococcinum is an extremely popular quack remedy, on sale in every drug store I've ever looked over for these preparations. Knowing that there is always a group out there that will raise an alarm about the possibility of the duck species becoming endangered, Bob Park of The American Physical Society has assured us that "the duck population is in no danger, however ..." To check that claim, reader John Stone did some arithmetic, to discover that in one average ducks liver there is sufficient material to make enough 10 ml. vials of this product to fill the entire known volume of the universe .... plus some. Seems more than we can use, in my opinion. Ducks, relax, take hope!

UltraViolence83 · Post by **UltraViolence83** » 2003-06-30 09:42pm

Tell her to let out some of your cousin's "bad blood."

Placebo at best. Best take some real medicine.

Jawawithagun · Post by **Jawawithagun** » 2003-07-01 04:26am

Unfortunately I have seen it work where normal medicine failed (and I mean REALLY FAILED, like with my mum's allergies)

Tosho · Post by **Tosho** » 2003-07-01 04:34am

Durran Korr wrote:Homeopathy is a branch of pseudoscientific medicine. It is based on the notion that like cures like; in other words, if you're suffering from malaria, get a specimen of something that causes symptoms like of malaria, like fevers, dilute the living hell out of it (I mean, REALLY dilute the hell out of it), and adminster the diluted water solution as medicine.

The idea is that minute amounts of the substance will stimulate the body's healing processes. This idea is not correct, obviously, but the notion that diluting with water until it is mathematically impossible for any of the original substance to still be in the water solution can produce a substance that will have any effect of the body is even worse.

Even worse, the new homeopaths claim that while it is mathematically impossible for any of the original substance to be in the solution, the water still remembers the curative properties of the "medicine" it once had in it (that's right, smart water). Suggest to a licensed doctor that homeopathy is valid medicine and he'll rip your head off.

Fortunately, the stuff isn't bad for you at all (it can't possibly have any physiological effect on you, in fact). And it does have a placebo effect. But it's still junk medicine, and people make money by selling it to stupid people.

That's one of the most moronic ideas I have ever heard.

Post by **haas mark** » 2003-07-01 04:36am

Admiral Valdemar wrote:Actually, while homeopathy is a bloody stupid concept, the idea of curing diseases or preventing future infections by administering a small dosage of the disease is used even today. It's called a vaccine.

Normally you don't give someone a vaccine after they've contracted the disease...

~ver

InnerBrat · Post by **InnerBrat** » 2003-07-01 04:54am

DISCLAIMER: you should probably already know that I scoff at new age crap, but:

recent research has shown that the hydrogen bonds within water do seem to chaneg when something infantessemally small is dissolved in it.

If you can't access the page, then have a transcript:

Lionel Milgrom, in New Scientist wrote: Is this evidence for memory of water?
New Scientist vol 178 issue 2399 - 14 June 2003, page 22

CLAIMS don't come much more controversial than the idea that water might retain a memory of substances once dissolved in it. The notion is central to homeopathy, which treats patients with samples so dilute they are unlikely to contain a single molecule of the active compound, but it is generally ridiculed by scientists. Holding such a heretical view famously cost one of France's top allergy researchers, Jacques Benveniste, his funding, labs and reputation after his findings were discredited in 1988.

Yet a paper is about to be published in the reputable journal Physica A claiming to show that even though they should be identical, the structure of hydrogen bonds in pure water is very different from that in homeopathic dilutions of salt solutions. Could it be time to take the "memory" of water seriously?

The paper's author, Swiss chemist Louis Rey, is using thermoluminescence to study the structure of solids. The technique involves bathing a chilled sample with radiation. When the sample is warmed up, the stored energy is released as light in a pattern that reflects the atomic structure of the sample.

When Rey used the method on ice he saw two peaks of light, at temperatures of around 120 K and 170 K. Rey wanted to test the idea, suggested by other researchers, that the 170 K peak reflects the pattern of hydrogen bonds within the ice. In his experiments he used heavy water (which contains the heavy hydrogen isotope deuterium), because it has stronger hydrogen bonds than normal water. After studying pure samples, Rey looked at solutions of lithium chloride and sodium chloride. Lithium chloride destroys hydrogen bonds, as does sodium chloride, but to a lesser extent. Sure enough, the peak was smaller for a solution of sodium chloride, and disappeared completely for a lithium chloride solution.

Aware of homeopaths' claims that patterns of hydrogen bonds can survive successive dilutions, Rey decided to test samples that had been diluted down to a notional 10 -30 grams per cubic centimetre - way beyond the point when any ions of the original substance could remain. "We thought it would be of interest to challenge the theory," he says. Each dilution was made according to a strict protocol, and vigorously stirred at each stage, as homeopaths do.

When Rey compared the ultra-dilute lithium and sodium chloride solutions with pure water that had been through the same process, the difference in their thermoluminescence peaks compared with pure water was still there (see Graph). "Much to our surprise, the thermoluminescence glows of the three systems were substantially different," he says. He believes the result proves that the networks of hydrogen bonds in the samples were different.

Martin Chaplin from London's South Bank University, an expert on water and hydrogen bonding, isn't so sure. "Rey's rationale for water memory seems most unlikely," he says. "Most hydrogen bonding in liquid water rearranges when it freezes." He points out that the two thermoluminescence peaks Rey observed occur around the temperatures where ice is known to undergo transitions between different phases. He suggests that tiny amounts of impurities in the samples, perhaps due to inefficient mixing, could be getting concentrated at the boundaries between different phases in the ice and causing the changes in thermoluminescence.

But thermoluminescence expert Raphael Visocekas from the Denis Diderot University of Paris, who watched Rey carry out some of his experiments, says he is convinced. "The experiments showed a very nice reproducibility," he told New Scientist. "It is trustworthy physics." He see no reason why patterns of hydrogen bonds in the liquid samples shouldn't survive freezing and affect the molecular arrangement of the ice.

After his own experience, Benveniste advises caution. "This is interesting work, but Rey's experiments weren't blinded and although he says the work is reproducible, he doesn't say how many experiments he did," he says. "As I know to my cost, this is such a controversial field, it is mandatory to be as foolproof as possible."

I'm nt syaing it prooves anything, but it can't hurt anyone anyway. Just make sure she uses real medicine as well.

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2003-07-01 05:03am

Homeopathic "medicine" = Placebo

Look at randis site, he asked them to give him proof. Non of the "labs" dared to.

So BBC did a doubble blind thest of Homeopathic stuff and came up with absolutly NO proof whatsoever.

If you vant to waste your cash go rite ahead but be sure to use medicine with a proven record also. Your health is to big a gamble to use nonproven psedoscience crap on it.

Hobot · Post by **Hobot** » 2003-07-01 05:47am

Cyborg Stan wrote:Homeopathy is a semi-common topic for Mr Randi's Rants. Here's an interesting excerpt.

From the May 25, 2001 Commentary. (Emphasis mine)

Heh, scroll down to "Sylvia's Clock - Update" on the home page. The number of days is 666

Hethrir · Post by **Hethrir** » 2003-07-01 06:36am

Remember also that the strongest product is the most watered down, and the weakest is the least watered down. That alone is Uber-Quakery.

h0rus · Post by **h0rus** » 2003-07-01 07:39am

innerbrat wrote: I'm nt syaing it prooves anything, but it can't hurt anyone anyway. Just make sure she uses real medicine as well.

Fuck that. The last thing that is necessary in this world is another 'ooh. yes it worked!'. This bullshit needs to be stamped out completely. The only thing that would be useful is confronting that authority figure with the facts and forcing her to choose between actually helping that person or leaving them ailing. This kind of apathy to the situation is precisely what sustains the passing of traditional cures and such, which don't fucking work.

InnerBrat · Post by **InnerBrat** » 2003-07-01 08:31am

h0rus wrote:
innerbrat wrote: I'm nt syaing it prooves anything, but it can't hurt anyone anyway. Just make sure she uses real medicine as well.
Fuck that. The last thing that is necessary in this world is another 'ooh. yes it worked!'. This bullshit needs to be stamped out completely. The only thing that would be useful is confronting that authority figure with the facts and forcing her to choose between actually helping that person or leaving them ailing. This kind of apathy to the situation is precisely what sustains the passing of traditional cures and such, which don't fucking work.

You mean like thethe known fact that placebos are highly effective or the fact that scientific research is beginning to suggest there might be something in it? I do wish you'd read my post before commenting on the last paragraph.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2003-07-01 08:35am

The article was interesting but I'm still skeptical. I would like to see the experiment reproduced.

InnerBrat · Post by **InnerBrat** » 2003-07-01 08:36am

Durran Korr wrote:The article was interesting but I'm still skeptical. I would like to see the experiment reproduced.

Fair enough - even the people who came up with the results were skeptical.

Traceroute · Post by **Traceroute** » 2003-07-01 07:31pm

If it failed a true double-blind test, then the point is made ... It's not scientifically viable. If you want to try homeopathy, fine, but you certainly should not do so before trying conventional methods.

That's not to say there couldn't have been errors in the study though; anyone know who the BBC contracted to do the study, or if that lab has the full results posted anywhere?

Even so, modern medicine has a proven track record in the majority of cases. Gambling with your life just seems a bit silly to me.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-01 10:28pm

If water retains a 'memory' of whatever has been dissolved in it (never proven), then, logically, seawater should be one of the healthiest substances you could possibly drink.

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2003-07-02 01:51am

Shadowhawk wrote:If water retains a 'memory' of whatever has been dissolved in it (never proven), then, logically, seawater should be one of the healthiest substances you could possibly drink.

Not really. Consider: where do marine wildlife urinate and defecate?

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2003-07-02 01:56am

Even if water retains a "memory" of salt, how many ways can you possibly fiddle-fuck with hydrogen bonds to it can "remember" complex compounds and mixtures like duck's liver extract?