Which one is more scientific: Allopathy or Homeopathy?

Skepticism Junk Science and Alternative Medicine
21

I think I need to give an example:

Let’s say a patient is suffering from athritis. The patient has two choices.

Allopathy: Physician will prescribe a drug to treat arthritis. Plus any pain killer (let’s say aspirin) and give it to the patient. This approach is to treat the disease.

Homeopathy:

Case 1: If it is a layman or a skeptic like you who do not undersdtand Homeopathy, for them we simply say we have Belladonna, Bryonia, Rhus Tox, (etc etc) in Homeopathy for curing arthiritis.

Then skeptics asks for scientific explanation from me to prove it to them that these medicines/method/procedure have passed double blind because they consider everything unscientific if it has not passed through the lens of double blind studies. But they forget that double blind comes only in 1960’s, before that everything was emperical.

I argue with them up to a point because I know they would never trust homeopathy. They can have trust only in one case that they are being cured of their diseased condition.

I ask all skeptics to rely on your personal experience for a while, have you ever tried Homeopathic remedies before discrediting them (According to skeptics, homeopathy has zero effects, so they should not botherthat it is going to kill them)? The world is divided into the haves and have nots: those who have tried homeopathy and hose who have not. Those who have tried it–the 500 million people in the world who use homeopathy–know that it works. They didn’t decide that based on years of research. The people who discard homeopathy, have no personal experience with it. Homeopathic remedies are readily available. It would require no commitment for them to put a remedy where their mouth is. There is a proud tradition of scientists using their own bodies in research. Dr. Max von Pettenkofer drank a broth containing cholera and Dr. Jesse Lazear allowed mosquitoes infected with yellow fever to bite his arm. Surely you can try a little sugar pill. It would cost you a little. Otherwise you spend so much time and effort for so many years on Internet It seems absurd to argue about a point that can so easily be resolved.

Case 2: If it is patient or someo one who understands homeopathy, we will explore the case in this way

[b]a. Joints are red, hot swollen with throbbing pain is a possible Belladonna case.

b. Pain is worse from slightest movement. Better resting. Dry mouth - a possible Bryonia case.

c. Pain is worse at first motion, better afterward, stiff joints in moving - a possible Rhus Tox case. [/b]

A physician will go further into mind (mind symptoms)and other physical symptoms (the above three are just to make you understand).

Disease is not symptoms. It is disease in terms of symptomsIn homeopathy the physician has to go into more specific nature of a problem - many layers deep into any complaint.

22

This claim is so nonsensical as to defy categorisation: A “typical disease” is preceded by “quantum changes” in the body, and these changes can only be detected by a homoeopath, not by any “modern machine.” Have you any idea how ill-informed, even downright idiotic, that statement is?

Why on earth should anyone believe or even consider seriously a single thing you say when you constantly “answer” important questions with a deceitful shotgun approach and repeatedly show a willingness to distort the truth into various unrecognisable shapes? You are doing your cause, presumably promoting homoeopathy, much more harm than good when you adopt such underhanded strategies.

I, for one, will no longer respond to your posts until such time as you start being honest and answering questions truthfully.

'Luthon64

23

You should not get surprised by things if you don’t know about it, provided you have a scientific temparament. It is only due to myopic view that you are not able to understand. Open up your horizons and try to see the same things in different light.

The early symptoms of a disease are not detectable by modern machines. Suppose you get a hair in your eye. No amount of x-ray can detect that, but you can see and feel it.

Suppose you have a 1mm tumor in your liver. There is no way that an ultra sound or CT scan will pick it up. The detectable mass can be 2-3mm in diameter. There can be millions of cancer cells in this 1mm mass.

Cancer does not develop in a short time. It starts with unregulated mutations. If the person does not cure the problem it develops in 3-4 years into hyperplasia. If the excesses with the body keep on it develops into dysplasia in further 3-4 years. If still no corrective measures are taken it develops into in-situ cancer in 3-4 years. This in-situ cancer is detectable when it reaches the size of 3mm or more.

All this time the patient has been complaining of different problems. Headaches, menstrual problems, constipation, insomnia, fatigue, cough etc. etc. Since machines were unable to detect this life-threatening problem, the patient ended up with cancer.

24

Please answer the earlier question truthfully instead of simply jumping into a new topic.

Thank you.

'Luthon64

25

To: Dr. Nancy Malik. The saying is “One should have an open mind but not so open that your brain falls out”. Lots of people believe in a flat earth. The earth looks flat. Evidence howewer show us that the earth is round. We have to believe the evidence whether we like it or not.
Homoeopathy sound like a good idea, some people might even think it helped, but it needs evidence. Do yourself a favour and read Carl Sagan’s “Daemon Haunted World” and get yourself a “baloney detection kit”, or you can just grow up and stop believing in the tooth fairy and other fables.
I suspect that homoeopathy practitioners know it is hokes pokes but the money talks and that is why you urge people to have “open minds”.

26

http://www.drdooley.net/Book.pdf //beyond flat earth

27

A load of crock. At least the Publishers note states: “The ideas, procedures, and suggestions contained in this book are not indended as a substitute for consulting with your physician”.
No matter how many people believe in a flat earth it is still round. Just proof your methods and we will all believe you. Please, just one propper double blind test is all it will take.

28

Already mentioned here. Already examined here.

Please answer the earlier question truthfully instead of simply ignoring it by jumping into a new topic.

Thank you.

'Luthon64

29

What appears is not always true. I am here to answer your questions and ask questions from you.

30

Kleijnen J, Knipschild P, ter Riet G (Feb 9,1991). Clinical trials of homeopathy British Medical Journal, 302:316–323. This review of research assessed 105 trials, 81 of them positive. It was performed by two Dutch researchers, who were asked to assess the efficacy of various forms of alternative medicine. Although they were skeptics of homeopathy and alternative medicine generally, they reported, “Based on this evidence we would be ready to accept that homoeopathy can be efficacious, if only the mechanism of action were more plausible”, “the evidence presented in this review would probably be sufficient for establishing homeopathy as a regular treatment for certain indications”.

31

S

Same questions have same answers. What’s your question?

32

But you have neither asked nor actually answered any questions! Mostly, you simply make statements that in several cases are completely irrelevant and/or plainly wrong. When this is pointed out to you, you just change the subject.

Do you know the actual meaning of the word “answer?” Please pay particular attention to 1.a., 1.b., 2.a. and 2.b.; 5. should not be ignored, either.

My question is still the same one first raised here, and repeated here and here (twice), and here too. Despite a rich assortment of visual cues – bold and italic typeface, underscoring – that were added for emphasis of important specifications, you replied with this, which reply failed to address what was asked for, as shown here and also here.

'Luthon64

33

Call me a psychic but I think we are going to wait a while for a real answer…

34

I just read my tea leaves and they seem to concur with your psychic reading. :wink:

35

sorry for replying late.
Here’s some of the points (memory of water)which were under discussion

Dr. Manish Bhatia: let us suppose that water-ethanol aqueous solutions do have some ‘memory’ but then how do you explain the action of dry homeopathic pills and the medicines that are only triturated in sugar of milk? Clearly the same mechanism could not be working here – four different substances – water, ethanol, sugar of milk powder and cane sugar pills.

Dr. Lionel Migrom: What we do know about the ‘Memory of Water’ so far is that water and ethanol produce complex solutions and they do transmit information about the solutes through hydrogen bonds and lattice formation. But we also know that neither the hydrogen bonds nor the lattices are stable enough to store information indefinitely. The thermodynamic changes also do not last indefinitely. So what else could it be?

let us suppose that water-ethanol aqueous solutions do have some ‘memory’ but then how do you explain the action of dry homeopathic pills and the medicines that are only triturated in sugar of milk? Clearly the same mechanism could not be working here – four different substances – water, ethanol, sugar of milk powder and cane sugar pills

More details/Quoted from http://www.hpathy.com/interviews/Lionel-Milgrom.asp

36

Yes, that sums up homoeopathy very tidily: “Let us suppose…” and “What we do know…”. Repeatable, objective, clear-cut evidence somehow doesn’t quite cut it for homoeopaths.

'Luthon64

37

“memory of water” findings, first reported in NATURE in 1988

Much water has flown since then

Chaplin and others have repeatedely demonstrated that water has moemory. See for more details

http://avilian.co.uk/2008/08/scientific-research-and-homeopathy-water-memory/
www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/chaplin.html //memory of water
http://www.newdawnmagazine.com/Article/The%20Work%20of%20Dr.%20Masaru%20Emoto.html
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn3817

http://hpathy.com/homeopathyforums/forum_posts.asp?TID=8578 //memory of water
http://lkm.fri.uni-lj.si/xaigor/slo/znanclanki/instrumental.htm

38

(I suspect that your latest reply was intended to be posted here.)

There’s hardly any scientifically acceptable evidence listed among those references so I’ll concentrate on the little that is there. Most of what is listed lacks plausible objectivity.

What Martin Chaplin says about water memory: “Although there is much support for water showing properties that depend on its prior processing (that is, water having a memory effect), the experimental evidence indicates that such changes are due primarily to solute and surface changes occurring during this processing. The experimentally corroborated memory phenomena cannot be taken as supporting the basic tenets of homeopathy although they can explain some effects.”

What Martin Chaplin says about homoeopathy: “If an acceptable theory [of how homoeopathy works] was available then more people would consider it more seriously. However, it is difficult at present to sustain a theory as to why a truly infinitely diluted aqueous solution, consisting of just H2O molecules, should retain any difference from any other such solution. It is even more difficult to put forward a working hypothesis as to how small quantities of such ‘solutions’ can act to elicit a specific response when confronted with large amounts of complex solution in a subject.”

What Martin Chaplin says about water memory vis-à-vis homoeopathy: “Note that, for homeopathy, ‘memory of water’ effects (if proven) not only require the solution to retain information on dilution but require this information to be amplified to negate the effect of the dilution. It is also of importance to note that non-specific mechanisms of action, such as activation of a non-specific immune response, may give rise to effects with specific health consequences. Much research work remains to be undertaken if these real and observable facts are to be completely understood.”

What Martin Chaplin says about the claimed water memory effect in the Rey paper: “Rey’s rationale for water memory seems most unlikely … most hydrogen bonding in liquid water rearranges when it freezes.”

The bottom line is that even if “water memory” was to become fully vindicated physics, there is still the profound problem of showing how it provides an explanatory mechanism for homoeopathy – analogous to showing how Kepler’s laws of planetary motion result from Newton’s laws of motion and Newtonian gravity. The fact remains that there is no repeatable, objective, clear-cut evidence that homoeopathy works anything like its proponents wish to claim.

'Luthon64

39

Unified Theory of Homeopathy and Conventional Medicine

Introduction: Could theoretical links exist between homeopathy and conventional medicine? In homeopathy there is the ancient concept of a self-regulating Vital Force (Vf), disturbance of which results in dis-ease as observed in multi-levelled symptom expression. Treatment attempts to aid the Vf as it attempts to restore holistic balance.

Conventional medicine (allopathy) takes a more deterministic view, considering external agents (viruses, bacteria, etc) or internal biochemical imbalances (e.g., genetic abnormalities) as causes of disease. Treatment is therefore geared towards eradicating these causative factors, sometimes at the expense of the homeostatic immune system.

Method: A previous mathematical metaphor described the Vf as a quantised gyroscopic ‘wave function’, equating strength of symptom expression to degree of Vf gyroscopic ‘precession’. Diseases and homeopathic remedies are interpreted respectively as braking and accelerating ‘torques’ on Vf ‘angular momentum’. Here, approximations applied to the Vf ‘wave function’ provide insights into why conventional medicine dismisses the action of highly potentised homeopathic remedies. In addition, a simple geometric force diagram provides another mathematical metaphor for allopathic drug action and immune system reaction.

Results: The two mathematical metaphors converge on the same result: that from a conventional medical perspective, homeopathic remedies potentised beyond Avogadro’s number should exert no clinically observable effects.

Conclusion: Following the logic of these metaphors, conventional medicine could be seen as a special case of a broader therapeutic paradigm also containing homeopathy.

Lionel R. Milgrom. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. September 2007, 13(7): 759-770. doi:10.1089/acm.2006.6369.
More details/Quoted from http://www.hpathy.com/research/milgrom-unified-theory.asp

40

Memory of Water: Dr. Martin Chaplin

the lifetime of hydrogen bonds does not control the lifetime of clusters

the equilibrium concentration of any clusters are governed by thermodynamics not kinetics.

An extraordinary paper authored by Nobel prize-winning Luc Montagnier has shown memory effects in aqueous DNA solutions that depend on interactions with the background electromagnetic field. These effects require the prior processing and dilution of the solutions and are explained as resonance phenomena with nanostructures derived from the DNA and water

Water does store and transmit information, concerning solutes, by means of its hydrogen-bonded network

Water is not just H2O molecules. It contains a number of molecular species including ortho and para water molecules
More details/Quoted from http://www.hpathy.com/research/chaplin-memory-of-water.asp