Homeopathic 'Medicine'

Originally Posted by Link

AS IT STATED BEFORE! It does not "Cure" the sickness. It helps it take care of it along the way. It's sort of like riding a bike. You start off with your parent/parents helping you out at first, but in the end, you are riding without help.

Then why use something that merely "helps you" when you could use something that completely cures you?

Originally Posted by Link

She was out of bed and had no fever (Temp: 102) in 20 minutes...



http://www.amazon.com/More-Natural-C...e=UTF8&s=books

Tryed his methods, they worked...

That's not a study. I'm asking for an actual clinical trial that showed homeopathic 'medicine' doing better then a placebo.

That's why you don't trust everyone... My grandma has worked with remedies for a LONG TIME, she has studied every single one, went to college for it.

That doesn't matter. What dilution do you use? If it's above 1:10 you're simply getting water.

You don't just say, "Well, I got a stomache ache, what remedy should I take?" That's the wrong way...

Right way:

Me: Grandma, I got a very terrible bug...
Grandma: Have you been Vomitting?
Me: No
Grandma: Any sore throat, nausea, stomache bloating?
Me: I got a little sore throat, and some foods that I like will make me nausus... Also my stomache feels like it will explode sometimes...
Grandma: Diaria?
Me: Lots
Grandma: Ok, I'll check what I got...
*Grandma checks for 1 minute*
Grandma: Alright dear, there you go!
Me: Thanks...

I take it right there, and then the next day, my bug is gone... I got no stomache ache, the foods I like smell good again, and I'm myself again...

Stomache problems tend to be pretty transient, here one day, gone tomorrow or the day after.

AS IT STATED BEFORE! It does not "Cure" the sickness. It helps it take care of it along the way. It's sort of like riding a bike. You start off with your parent/parents helping you out at first, but in the end, you are riding without help.

-Link

Which doesn't actually make sense, since there is nothing in any homeopathic 'cures' that would boost your immune system, especially not in the concentrations they use.

Heck, if all it does is 'help' then why do you claim that it cured your mother and yourself?

Originally Posted by GDwarf

That's not a study. I'm asking for an actual clinical trial that showed homeopathic 'medicine' doing better then a placebo.

http://nccam.nih.gov/health/homeopathy/#q8

I still don't agree that it works. Mostly it didn't do better than a placebo.

Originally Posted by dann

http://nccam.nih.gov/health/homeopathy/#q8

I still don't agree that it works. Mostly it didn't do better than a placebo.

That actually sums up my argument quite nicely. The (very few) trials that showed homeopathic medicine doing slightly better then a placebo had errors in the experiment, or so that seems to be saying.

Originally Posted by GDwarf

That actually sums up my argument quite nicely. The (very few) trials that showed homeopathic medicine doing slightly better then a placebo had errors in the experiment, or so that seems to be saying.

Yes, basically, there is no such study in favor of homeopathic medicine.

Though I don't believe something must always be proved by science to actually work.

In this case all that's going on is this:

They get, say, 50 similar people with the same illness (at about the same stage of development). They give 25 of them a homeopathic remedy, and 25 nothing but water or a sugar pill.

They then see how many are cured by each. It turns out that homeopathic medicine does just as good a job as the sugar pills.

I'd say that pretty much totally destroys and credibility the field has.

Originally Posted by ChrisHoulihan

When I am suffering from heart ache I eat heart shaped leaves, it works! And When I have a head ache all I have to do is eat my own toenails, drink some water and take a nap and I feel better when I wake up. Wearing a red silk scarf cures my stomach aches. All of these things are non-medical remidies but they work!

Ok, now that I don't believe. You're probably going through something that makes you believe mentally that you have these illnesses, and that's probably why they go away when you do what you think will get them to go away

Originally Posted by dann

I really hope you're joking.

From what I've read about homeopathic medicine, most of it seems mental to me. As in, giving a person something that's supposed to cure them makes you feel better, but doesn't actually do anything.

Of course I'm joking! unless these methods of healing are prooved to work, than I wouldn't use them. Also we really don't have to nderstand how they work for them to work.

Originally Posted by unbearabledead

Ok, now that I don't believe. You're probably going through something that makes you believe mentally that you have these illnesses, and that's probably why they go away when you do what you think will get them to go away

Its the same thing with so called "faith healers" people either belive they are sick or believe that they are better when in reality nothing has really happened.

Originally Posted by GDwarf

In this case all that's going on is this:

They get, say, 50 similar people with the same illness (at about the same stage of development). They give 25 of them a homeopathic remedy, and 25 nothing but water or a sugar pill.

They then see how many are cured by each. It turns out that homeopathic medicine does just as good a job as the sugar pills.

I'd say that pretty much totally destroys and credibility the field has.

That probally depends of the homeopathic method they are testing. I'm sure they haven't tested them all. There are a lot of "old remides" that actualy do work. Look at eastern medicine compared to western medicine. I belive that half of these herbal remides don't work, but I'm sure at least some of them do.

So, truly, homeopathic medicine is just an imaginatory healing process that involves the use of the thought process to help the body heal itsself. Not the use of actual medicine that relieves a sickness because of the medicine's chemical properties.
That makes a lot of sense.

So far science makes things sparkle and make big flashes and make things work. When you take a vaccine, you are not ALWAYS immune to the virus/disease/sickness. It will come back, and then your vaccine comes back. You take it and it makes you LESS IMMUNE. That's because your body needs to work by itself, not have a foriegn source to it for you. It just makes your body almost as bad as having AIDS...

Preposterous! I can tell you right now (as one of the innumerable recipients of multiple vaccines) that my body is categorically not wracked with any of the terminal afflictions of a person suffering the effects of AIDS. That you could even make such an assertion damns your credibility on this matter utterly. And vaccines do let your body fight its own, they just familiarise the immune system with with what it might have to fight. It isn't an injection of little mercenary cells that roam around inside you making sure that measles isn't trying to set up camp.

Science is not a matter of "sparkle" and "flash", it is a process of dogged empirical research and proofs.

A question for those of you advocating homeopathic medicine:
Why not just drink water?

If you look at my first post you'll see that that homeopathic 'cure' you're using can't be anything but water, so why not just drink water?

For those of you that don't, a mole is 6.22x10^23

No big deal, it was probably a typo, but Avogadro's constant is 6.02 x 10^23.

It just so happens that a 'mole' of water takes up 18ccs.

What unit is ccs? I've never come across it before.

If you ask me, homeopathic medicine is a regular placebo, but it just becomes reinforced by the ignorance of the person taking it. They have an upset stomach one day, and decide to take 'some of that stuff' which the crazy neighbour next door recommended. They don't expect anything to happen but wake up the next day feeling fine, so what do you know? Hey, the stuff really works (!)...and so the next time they have any sort of illness they visit the homeopathist. Later, after being 'cured' a few times, they swear by the 'medicine', whether by this point they even really continue to feel better after taking it or not. After all, what does that matter? They have their past experiences to go by.

My teacher told me a joke not long ago, about the homeopath who forgot to take his medicine and died of an overdose.

Originally Posted by T-Nemesis

No big deal, it was probably a typo, but Avogadro's constant is 6.02 x 10^23.

Erm, yes.

What unit is ccs? I've never come across it before.

Cubic Centimeters, it's the same as a mL.

Placebo effect, anyone?

This a short reply but GDwarf seems to have gotten the information spot-on for the claims of homeopathic medicine. I'm reminded of an account I read, I believe through James Randi, the owner of the "Million Dollar Challenge" for anyone who can experimentally prove the effectiveness of paranormal activities/abilities and homeopathy, among a few other things.

The basic idea was that a number of prominent Belgian physicians had decided they were going to engage in "homeopathic suicide" by drinking a cocktail of arsenic, turpentine, toluene, and various other similar substances. Well, they drank it. Aside from some minor water related urination issues the whole lot survived.

James Randi explains homeopathy. Just found the link, and it's quite amusing.

Alleviating symptoms is different than getting rid of the cause. I wouldn't write it off as being unable to do the former.

Originally Posted by oizys

Placebo effect, anyone?

Because, of course, that's the answer to everything medicine can't correlate scientifically.

Originally Posted by LexLionHart

Because, of course, that's the answer to everything medicine can't correlate scientifically.

Not at all. But when something is tested, and turns out to have the exact same success rate as placebos...

Originally Posted by LexLionHart

Alleviating symptoms is different than getting rid of the cause. I wouldn't write it off as being unable to do the former.

What symptoms can it alleviate?

Originally Posted by Link

So far science makes things sparkle and make big flashes and make things work.

the science of homeopathy

although, I must point out that calling homeopathy a science is a bit of a stretch....