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The US Government is Finally Telling People that Homeopathy is a Sham (vox.com)
Not a good news for people who trust homeopathic drugs. The Federal Trade Commission has issued an enforcement policy statement that requires over-the-counter (OTC) homeopathic drugs and products makers to disclose in their advertisement and labeling that there is no evidence that Homeopathic products are effective and also mention that modern medical experts don't recognize any claims of effectiveness only based on homeopathic theories. From a report on Vox: This FTC ruling is definitely a step in the right direction of raising awareness about the lack of evidence behind homeopathy. "This is a real victory for reason, science, and the health of the American people," said Michael De Dora, public policy director for the Center for Inquiry, a science-based advocacy and education group that's been pushing for more homeopathy oversight. "The FTC has made the right decision to hold manufacturers accountable for the absolutely baseless assertions they make about homeopathic products." But it doesn't mean these "medicines" will disappear from store shelves. The FTC only has the right to crack down on misleading marketing claims, and if the makers of homeopathic remedies clearly state that their products are based on no science, they can still sell them.
To the rest of us.. Years ago..
I've known a lot of people who try homeopathic treatments, some of them work but they always seem like a scam. We did a homeopathic wart treatment for my son. It worked great, but the $200 'tincture' was basically just alcohol with some herbs and shit in it. The next time he had a wart on the other foot, we did the same thing but instead bought a 99 cent bottle of alcohol to put on the bandaid and it worked just as well.
Website Just Down For Me? Find out
This is the agency that will fine you if you say lemons cure scurvy... Abuse one way verses abuse the other.
...it work for pets?
People who believe in homeopathy also tend to believe that the government, big pharma, and these "experts" are all working together to funnel money into their own pockets, so "of course they're going to lie and say that homeopathy is fake because they want us to buy their overpriced poisons!"
how the fuck is it "Not good news for people who trust homeopathic drugs."? so telling people the truth because it goes against their misguided beliefs is bad news? personally I will take a dose of truth over being continually deceived any day.
https://www.theguardian.com/sc...
Placebo effect works even if patients know they're getting a sham drug
So even if homeopathy is only a way of achieving a placebo effect, it is making a positive contribution to the health of the nation. The fact that it is mumbo-jumbo winds up scientific fundamentalists, who HATE the fact that placebos work. Let's stop buggering about targeting this sort of issue, and address the real scandals out there. (That said, homeopathic treatment for serious diseases where there is a mainstream cure ARE a public danger.)
Right! Airborne works because it was created by a teacher...
Essentially - and my wife is completely obsessed with one particular practicioner, which is why I got familiar with this - the whole homeopathic preparation is some small amount of a "good thing" like an essential oil. Then they put in so much distilled water that there probably isn't a single molecule of the "good thing" in the solution dose you get. The idea behind it is that there is some kind of spiritual residue of the good stuff in the resulting "solution". Then they package it - whether it's in a sugar pill or a little bottle of water with an eyedropper attached.
I stopped pointing this out to her because she believes in the person, not the process, and I can't shake that from her with words. Perhaps when the cat dies from his allergies that were unaffected by the distilled water he gets dropped in his mouth daily? Maybe then, but I wouldn't bet on it.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
No. There is a huge proportion of US society that is hoodwinked by these fake nostrums. The bloody veterinarian here in town sells that crap FFS. They're the only vet within 50 miles, too. There a store here, a "healthfood store" that sells all manner of that shite.
It's everywhere. I'm glad you're smart enough to know better, and yes, a lot of others are too, but that still leaves a huge proportion of the population. The government is very late to this party, and huge harm has been done because of that, but join the party they should -- it's important.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Vaccines are not like homeopathic preparations. The good stuff isn't dissolved into insignificance in them.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Yeah, I used to cut that slack to "homeopathy" but given what those running under that banner then proceeded to do, I think we can safely say the word has shifted meaning over time to refer exclusively to the bunk.
Someone had to do it.
It's about time!
I generally don't need the government, ESPECIALLY the Fed, telling me what I can or can't buy. But it is certainly reasonable to place warnings on things like this to inform the public.
Of course, in California, EVERYTHING seems to cause cancer if you believe the countless thousands of warnings they require on everything. Even the Christmas lights I bought last year have that warning for some unknown reason (I joke not.... and of course I don't live in CA). So there is a balance.
Is there any overlap there?
My built-in ideology meter says homeopathy people lean way left and Trump people mostly right.
Yet there seems to be kind of a similar level of denial of reality in both camps.
Vaccines have a mechanism of action that's well understood and makes sense. Homeopathy involves serial dilutions to the point where your odds of even getting a single molecule are astronomically low. There's no logical mechanism of action there, other than the placebo effect. You might as well see a faith healer, and many people do and get the exact same benefits... as long as they don't try to use it to cure cancer, because they they die...
Vaccines, where a small part of the disease causing agent is administered in accordance with the Homeopathic principle, work.
But everything else... totally a sham.
Vaccines are homeopathic medicine in the same way that controlled burns help with forest fires. Using a little bit of something harmful as a preventative measure does work. Adding it when the harm is already ongoing just makes things worse. Homeopathy would prescribe a vaccine to someone ALREADY sick with whatever virus was in the vaccine.
Though both probably have their share of people who just know taking this watered down juice/herb mixture will cure cancer/autism/republicanism in just 10 easy treatments for just $49.95!
Evidence, schmevidence. What does your faith tell you? You're not going to trust your life and your body to people who don't have the right feelings, are you?
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
This makes no sense. It has been proven that placebos work when people think they are getting "real" medicine.
I personally do not believe in homeopathic remedies but, if other people do, I would expect those "treatments" to have efficacy for them beyond taking no treatment at all!
The problem is ... things advertised as homeopathic are not always "just water." Sometimes, it's not diluted *that* much. And some "homeopathic" remedies include *non-diluted* ingredients that I've seen (e.g., herbs).
It gets confusing, because the real "homeopathy" with the whole "the less there is, the more powerful" thing is weird. But when "homeopathic" remedies include actual active ingredients that DO do things... that lends credibility to "homeopathy" if someone doesn't actually know any better.
It would be like marketing a "homeopathic" remedy for certain GI issues that "also includes" peppermint oil. Peppermint has an effect. The single molecule (if that) of Random Substance A? not so much. But look, a "homeopathy" worked!
if you believe in it.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
I'm sure that many followers of homeopathy will assume that Big Government is in collusion with Big Pharma here.
Also let's all make sure to keep the distinction between "herbalism", which is about natural-source drugs, and "homeopathy", which is about less being more somehow. They are often lumped together.
I read that as them saying that homosexuality is a shame.
Which would make for more sensation.
In my defence, it is close to midnight where I am at.
Fucking idiot
My last wife bought into that crap, and more.
I'm single now, but I now have a firm rule: I will not date or marry anyone who believe in alternative medicine (except possibly chiropractors for back pain). The whole thing is a giant scam, and suckers people into spending huge amounts of money on snake oil.
Contrary to what many in this thread are assuming, homeopathic "remedies" do not contain anything but water. Homeopathy is based on the crackpot idea that you can take something, potentially poisonous, dilute it, then dilute it again. and again until nothing is left other than pure water that happens to retain the "molecular memory" of only medicinal properties. It makes no sense. At least with "herbs and shit" you have actual chemical components that humans have been screwing around with for thousands of years. This does not change the fact that many so called homeopathic remedies are marketed as such while containing something other than water. Typically it is pure grain alcohol. I worked at a few GNC stores back in the 90's. On one day my boss and I got drunk off of a few drops of some flu "remedy". I made like $700 in commision that day.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
Like when you get bit by a rabid dog and the first thing doctors want to do is give you a Rabies vaccination?
the whole homeopathic preparation is some small amount of a "good thing" like an essential oil.
Nope. It's actually a small amount of a bad thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Why san't they just throw a lump of it in the sea and cure all known diseases forever?
No sig today...
It gets confusing, because the real "homeopathy" with the whole "the less there is, the more powerful" thing is weird.
Yes, catalysis is also weird, but not unreal.
You're assuming the homeopathic remedy is actually homeopathic. Given the amount of BS inherent in that industry, I wouldn't bet on it.
I once almost got some homeopathic eyedrops from Wal-Mart. I could hardly see (which is why I needed them) and they had homeopathic written in a tiny label on the bottle that I could barely read. I put them back and got real medicine.
What worried me is that they had "apis" in them, which is some undefined bee extract. Being allergic, that's the LAST thing I want to go near when I'm having allergy issues!
No, like when your brain is being rapidly destroyed by rabies but you get a rabies shot anyway . . . and die because it's too late.
So, you're saying that Homeopathy is like "normal" Medicine?
The active stuff, you mean. If it wasn't dissolved into insignificance it would be bad for you, not good. Hence those babies dying from the not-insignificant belladonna in their teething drops.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Furthermore, sometimes the other stuff in the potion can actually be bad for you. Studies have found homeopathic potions contaminated with heavy metals and microorganisms that could cause sickness or make it worse. Usually, the dose of this stuff is small enough that it probably won't hurt you, but the point is, the best that can be said about homeopathics isn't "at least it's just water."
I totally get that a lot of homeopathy is absolute BS quackery. But there is absolutely some potential with herbalism, even though you still have to avoid the quackery. Good materia medicas exist, but aren't cheap.
The key is rigorous study, and this is where it is difficult because there's not a lot of profit motivation behind putting together scientifically rigorous studies for plants that anyone can grow easily in the home. A pharmaceutical company on the other hand can make a new chemical, patent it, create an array of easily prescribable dosages, control it on the market for a period of time, and use that period of time to recoup the cost of research, development, AND funding scientifically rigorous studies. No one is going to pay for a study to show that chamomile is a mild relaxant, you know? And this isn't anti-pharma BS, this is just basic business. No one is going to spend millions on research for something you can't patent. So, you get left with a lot of "well, there's little research."
Another problem with herbs though - every plant is going to be different. Each flower could have differing levels of active chemicals, so what do you call a dose? I respect groups like USP, but I feel like it is almost a losing battle considering how easy most herbs are to grow.
My current GF (who is, of all things, an orthodontist) is into this shit. She's trying to get me off of my meds and onto "red rice yeast".
You'd think that someone who went to three major dental schools would know better.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
But it doesn't mean these "medicines" will disappear from store shelves. The FTC only has the right to crack down on misleading marketing claims, and if the makers of homeopathic remedies clearly state that their products are based on no science, they can still sell them.
So essentially, you can still sell your homeopathic remedies as long you're willing to water down your claims as to their efficacy until those claims can no longer be detected.
But if watered-down homeopathy actually turns out to be the cure for homeopathy, won't that mean they were right all along?
Airborne works because they come from the sky without warning, and they bring lots and lots of guns and grenades and things.
Trust me on this. You do not want to go up against Airborne.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
You do know that Airborne isn't homeopathic, don't you?
Pot "used to be" a "homeopathic remedy" for a lot of things. Who owns the patent on medicinal marijuana right now? Oh that's right...
This should've been in the list of conspiracies debunked by Chapelle in Undercover Brother.
Sadly, I had a friend who used homeopathy.
He forgot to take it one day, and OD'ed.
"raising awareness about the lack of evidence behind homeopathy"
There is a lack of Evidence about flossing.
There is evidence that homeopathy does not work and can not work. Physics and Chemistry would need to be revised for it to work.
Lack of Evidence would indicate it just needs some research and may be it is true. It does not work.
I know a dentist who thought Chiropractors were a good thing. I had the misfortune of going along on a visit of his to one. The fellow had my friend lie on his side and started coming down with all his weight on him. And this C. was about 6'4" and easily 250 lbs. My friend had thrown out his lower back. The general advice by real doctors is take an analgesic to relax the muscles, lie on your stomach for a day, gingerly get back on your feet over the course of a week or two. He's lucky that C. didn't fracture his spine.
Don't date crazy. It never goes well.
Vaccines have the actual thing in them, to train the immune system to recognize it.
Homeopathy's "Like treats Like" doesn't work like that. An example might be Jaundice turns you yellow, and tumeric turns things yellow, so they'll proscribe a 30C dilution (That's diluted 30,000 times) of tumeric to cure your jaundice.
Good rule.
How much did you lose in the divorce, by the way? A firm "don't marry anyone" rule is a good way to avoid spending your final years in poverty.
Such labelling will make no difference, the people who buy into the homeopathy scam will see the labelling as just part of the Big-Pharma conspiracy.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
I wouldn't try that with smallpox. I'd rather have an easily shrugged off case of cowpox to get immunised...
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
http://drboli.com/2012/06/21/w...
Go into one of these quackatoriums, and get some homeopathic "medicine". When you get to the register, take out a vial of water, and explain to the cashier that you dipped a one dollar bill into that water, then diluted it 1,000 times. That should cover the bill.
Would be good if churches had to disclose this fact.
It gets confusing, because the real "homeopathy" with the whole "the less there is, the more powerful" thing is weird.
Yes, catalysis is also weird, but not unreal.
Gravity and quantum mechanics are also weird but real. Neither cures anything.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Yes. This is what marketers refer to as "communication", which is pretty much the polar opposite to what an engineer would consider "communication" -- the transfer of an unambiguous piece of information from one party to another.
In marketing "communication" is triggering behavior by exploiting associations people have. So while actual homeopathic preparations have at least one virtue -- they consist of harmless water -- what is marketed as "homeopathic" is in fact anyone's guess.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
You do realize red rice yeast was one of the starting points for modern statin medications to control cholesterol? It can mess with your liver just the same and has the potential to be more dangerous because the people using it are typically not under doctor supervision.
Agreed. I made that mistake once, and I'm not making it again. You may think acceptance of some alt-med stuff like chiropractic and homeopathy is fairly innocuous, but pretty soon that person is visiting New Age "counselors" and talking about the "Ascended Masters", "St Germain and the violet flame", and all other kinds of wackiness, plus insisting on spending inordinate amounts of money on it.
What I'd really like to see is a serious survey to determine if beliefs in this quackery are more common among women than men. I'll bet it is. Women are already known to be more religious than men, and beliefs in "medicine" not backed by evidence are basically like religion.
Therein lies part of the problem like so many issues, a consistent agreement on the definition. Somewhere along the way, "home remedy" and homeopathic began to be used interchangeably. At least it's not as confusing as the term Christian Scientist. For quite a while, I thought that it meant any scientist believing in Christianity, not a very specific sub-set belief.
Hypothesis, not theory.
You'd think that someone who went to three major dental schools would know better.
Did the first two not take?
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Gravity cures all diseases if you jump from high enough.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Alternative medicine doesn't work, because if it did... it would become medicine!
(from some late night comedian).
Only one of those things has actual evidence supporting it.
That's rather impious of you to say.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Religion is like homeopathy for the mind. It too is a scam. I await this pronouncement from the government but I won't hold my breath.
Government is a sham. Who says believing you are getting help doesn't contribute to actual recovery?
No no no. A vaccine is not administering a "little bit of something harmful". It's administering something that is NOT harmful (or has been made non harmful) but is still something your immune system will fight and learn from.
A vaccine is to your immune system as training with paint ball guns is to soldiers.
Pardon me. Two major dental schools.
UCLA - undergrad
Northwestern - Dental
Temple - Ortho
I kept adding UCLA into the mix.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
I would mod you up if I could.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
I think they're selling the placebo effect. The vet may actually be selling it to placebo (sorry for using it as an adj.) calm anxieties of the pet owner. I don't think placebos work as well if you slap a placebo label on a sugar pill.
"What I'd really like to see is a serious survey to determine if beliefs in this quackery are more common among women than men"
I observe this too, but I don't think it has anything to do with women's brains. It's the common feminine culture that makes women, above all else, incurious. This is why women not specifically trained in a technology tend to reject science and replace it with the 'feelings' of the nearest shaman.
Essentially - and my wife is completely obsessed with one particular practicioner, which is why I got familiar with this - the whole homeopathic preparation is some small amount of a "good thing" like an essential oil. Then they put in so much distilled water that there probably isn't a single molecule of the "good thing" in the solution dose you get. The idea behind it is that there is some kind of spiritual residue of the good stuff in the resulting "solution". Then they package it - whether it's in a sugar pill or a little bottle of water with an eyedropper attached.
I stopped pointing this out to her because she believes in the person, not the process, and I can't shake that from her with words. Perhaps when the cat dies from his allergies that were unaffected by the distilled water he gets dropped in his mouth daily? Maybe then, but I wouldn't bet on it.
I have been involved in actual medical trials, and I find it funny, being a type 1 diabetic, that I know that I know that I know when I get a sugar pill , because my blood sugar spikes in a predictable fashion... I have to quote Jabba the Hutt "Your Jedi mind tricks will not work on me boy!"
I think you're onto something there. And it's a product of Western (and esp. American) culture too, rather than being universal, IMO. I don't think Asian women, for instance, are like this, and I'm guessing eastern-bloc women probably aren't either; women in those cultures seem to be far more practical and grounded in reality. It really seems like we raise our women here to be Disneyfied idiots, who demand insanely expensive diamond rings and weddings and define their lives by these things, and who want to spend all their free time (at least while they're in their 20s-30s and childless) hanging out at bars and socializing and getting drunk.
Well crap, does this mean bottles of distilled vinegar will now contain labels stating it is ineffective against chemtrail fallout?
It overwhelmingly is. I also observe that new-age beliefs are more common among men who clearly have low testosterone levels.
Something about that higher balance of estrogen seems to make the brain less interested in boring old objectivity, and more interested in fantasies that make everything more magical (and all-around nicer).
There are, of course, exceptions. This is just a clear trend.
There are some really good chiropractors though.
I also, just like you, have some anecdotal evidence to prove my point.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
Oh they are quite curious, just about different things. They like to pry into the details of everyone else's love life, for example, and dirty laundry. Also they are quite happy to learn all about new ways in which the world is magical (and which will give them ways to get what they want without expending real effort).
They aren't, however, so interested in technical details, nor in putting forth the effort required to learn actual truths backed by actual evidence, nor in accepting truths that don't make the universe seem nicer than it is.
One belief system really popular among women is this "global new thought" nonsense, that basically tells them that their material wealth and luxuries are a sign of their spiritual superiority. Utter rubbish.
Like "Applehu Akbar" said in a parallel comment here, I think you're probably incorrect about it being biological. I don't see this kind of difference, and the greater interest in religion, in women from non-Western and particularly non-American cultures. Asian, Indian, Russian etc. women just aren't like this, AFAICT, and overall seem to be far more practical and grounded in reality than American women who seem to be happy to blow all their money on bullshit (whether it's homeopathy or a wedding).
Finally, how do you tell a man "clearly has low testosterone levels" anyway? Engineering and programming jobs are chock-full of men who aren't exactly "alpha males", and they're probably the least prone to new-age beliefs of almost any profession next to scientists (who also aren't known for being a bunch of alpha jocks). Engineers do tend to be more religious than those other two groups, however, but not in a new-age way, as they also tend to be very socially conservative.
Mike Pence hates that homeopaths are now allowed to marry other homeopaths. He'll straighten this out for us.
So, let me get you right. Because we don't know how something could work makes it not work?
Congratulations, you've just repeated the Ignacio Semmelweiss drama and could have been partly responsible for hundreds of thousands of dead woman, if you had lived in the 'right' time.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
LEt me first say- I am not a "believer" in homeopathy. That said- I used a product for years for my muscle/joint pain that was better then any OTC/Prescription product before I knew it was homeopathic.
And as someone with a good bit of experience in the drug world- many homeopathics fair no worse, and in quite a few cases better, then prescription meds in clinical trials. To be clear- a huge portion of prescription drugs fail dozens and even hundreds of trials- fairing far worse then the placebo controls. But "Big Pharma" has billions to invest- and they can learn from each failed trial how to better stack the deck for the next one. And can spend millions on failed trials to get the 3 better then placebo trials they need for approval.
Regardless- I find it ironic so many "intelligent" and "scientific" people condemn medecines that in most studies fare as well as pharmaceuticals. While remaining silent on the facts that many pharmaceuticals don't work. Carry high risks of side effects. And carry massive societal costs.
Bravo- our healthcare problems are solved...
Mostly you get two shots: One vaccine for (or rather against) rabies, one shot with antibodies against rabies. The latter will save you, the former protect you against future bites, if properly followed up with repeated shots of the vaccine.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
That's quite consistent with homeopathy - "like cures like."
Meaning that an agent that causes allergic reaction, in very small doses, will cure such a reaction!
Maybe we should give homeopaths a very small dose of lead which makes you stupid...
Yes yes yes.
They regularly use whole or parts of virus particles (attenuated, denatured, etc) or bacteria in vaccines.
....the fact that making homeopathic tinctures is far cheaper than harvesting snake oil. And safer to obtain.
Exactly what I said: something that has been made not harmful.
muh dilutions!
Those who believe in homeopathy do so with fervent, blind faith. The government is simply conspiring to suppress the truth, after all.
Homeopathic remedies are also marketed with the "100% natural" label a lot of times, thus a lot of people lump it in with other alternative natural medicines (also not effective). They don't actually think about what "homeopathic" means because it's one of those big confusing words that have several syllables.
So, let me get you right. Because we don't know how something could work makes it not work?
Congratulations, you've just repeated the Ignacio Semmelweiss drama and could have been partly responsible for hundreds of thousands of dead woman, if you had lived in the 'right' time.
It takes nothing to make a claim, actual work is required to cite a correlation between a disease state and factors which contribute or may have a causal relationship. From there the work of establishing whether a causal relationship exists between a particular disease state and the correlation you have cited is the next step along with experimentation that yields data explaining more about the disease mechanism.
Ignaz Semmelweiss did the right thing documenting his observations to establish a correlation between instances of childbed fever and instances of surgeons not washing their hands between patients. The problem came because there was no accepted mechanism that explained to the doctors in question how the disease could be transferred from patient to patient on their hands and they did not want to believe that they were the problem. The fact of germs existing and causing disease had not been proven so there was only correlation but no mechanism to explain causation in that case. Semmelweiss's work was based completely on his collected data and even though it was not shown before his incarceration in a mental institution and his death that he was onto a procedure of what would eventually become evidence based medicine (think the Doctor House approach) He was ostracized and treated as a charlatan. In retrospect Semmelweiss deserved better treatment. We can right this wrong a little by making sure that we use carefully collected data to confirm or deny claims of mechanisms of disease causality and or treatment, but it takes work and in a lot of cases money and the acceptance of peer groups. this is however one area that a known approach (known as the scientific method) can be used to cut through a load of quackery and wrong ideas. In the words of Carl Sagan, "Intellectual brilliance is no guarantee against being dead wrong". This simple fact is why we need the scientific method, to keep ourselves from jumping to conclusions without examining the evidence in a formal fashion if needed to get as accurate of a description of a piece of physical reality as we can.
I don't think Asian women, for instance, are like this, and I'm guessing eastern-bloc women probably aren't either; women in those cultures seem to be far more practical and grounded in reality.
There is plenty of that kind of crazy in Asian and Eastern European cultures. More likely it is circumstances. The ones stuck with that mindset are in other circles and don't interact with you.
And clearly fan-death has fertile ground.
Maybe you just don't know the right questions to ask.
it's a mind-body system thing. Something we don't fully understand yet - but we're working on it, and that's cool.
A corpse feels no pain, right? When? How soon after death does a corpse feel no pain? 5 minutes? 20 seconds? Less? More? Think about it.
Nor can a corpse HEAL. 20 seconds or whatever ago, depending on the manner of death, that presently ex-carbon-based life form (or is that carbon-based ex-life form?) was capable of all manner of healing functions.
What exactly is the difference between a corpse and a living body? I know - it's like duh.... but anyway, think about it. Not like a week later, but like a minute after death. What is the difference?
This is the kind of area where homeopathy, placebo effects, and sugar pills can come in handy.
We DON'T know why homeopathy works. There doesn't appear to be any scientific reason (perhaps aside from placebo) for it to have ever worked. But for many people, throughout history, it has had beneficial effects.
It's like suddenly, we're technologically advanced enough to realize that this stuff doesn't really work (couldn't possibly scientifically work), it's all in our heads. But people have been using it successfully for quite some time (late 1700's).
Today, we're smart enough to realize that it should have never healed anyone of anything, and that any healing that it might have done was "all in our heads".
Gotta love it. Today, we place our faith in tech.
Oh! they're entangled....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Nearly half of your population just elected a clown as president who has been making clearly false statements ad obviously untenable promises.
To be honest, I'd prefer those to do homeopathics rather than psychopathics -- far less harmful.
Tim Minchin's Storm the Animated Movie
Link directly to 3:05 for a likely source to your quoate
Considering how little faith the US people have in its "establishment" and how much they despise everything that comes out of Washington, this pretty much doubles as advertising for quackery.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"insignificance"
I don't think you know what this word means.
If all the homeopathy users ditch their medicines and then drink some water, they'll all die of a massive overdose!
Homeopathy and religion have a lot in common. If you think it works then it does!
Homeopathy is not a sham perse. Homeopathic drugs are in fact completely harmless due to the attenuation.
Secondly, the effect of the drug is due not to the drug but to the placebo effect.
But putting the label on the so-called remedy they reduce the beneficial contribution of the placebo effect, and thus the label has the direct effect of making the so called "drug" or placebo less effective for the small groups who take them.
Therefore, IMHO, leaving off the label is beneficial to those relying on Homeopathy. Homeopathy is safer than other similar placebos people take such as smoking nicotine and such. Who believe's the purple pill anymore? What can be safer than water?
The highly intelligent already know it's just a placebo! Well slightly stronger than a normal placebo, because
1. Many believe it, and placebo is boosted by belief quotient.
2. No drug is working against the placebo, some placebos have ingredients that can negate the placebo effect, homeopathic drugs do not
So yes the gov't is on the right track and sort of correct, but perhaps making the wrong move here.
Catalysis doesn't work when you reduce the amount of catalyser to none, which is what homeopathy does.
Tell this to my girlfriend. She has really bad skin outbreaks and only her homeopathic prepares help her keep her skin outbreaks under control.
Get out while you still can (easily). Assuming you eventually marry her and have kids, do you want either arguments over whether to medicate your kids if they truly need some medication prescribed by a doctor or here secretly withholding medication from your kids and giving them quack remedies instead?
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.
Yeah, you haven't traveled, have you.
Asia (thinking of China and India as examples) have their fair share of gold and diamond-loving women. I'll grant that I don't have numbers to back me up, but I'd guess they are even more obsessed with those things than the average westerner.
As far as not believing in snake oil...I think it is fair to say that MOST people in Mainland China believe MORE in "Traditional Chinese Medicine" (aka hippie nonsense, random herbs and general feel-good non-scientific garbage) than they do in scientifically-developed treatments, which they refer to as "Western Medicine".
Granted, a FEW of those treatments have effects, such as acupuncture, but NOT for the reasons given by practitioners (you don't have lines of magic energy flowing through your body and actual scientific studies have found that acupuncture works just as well when practiced by relatively untrained people who put needles in the "wrong" places).
PEOPLE EVERYWHERE ARE DUMB. It's not a western thing or an eastern thing. It's a people thing.
Would be getting bull shit off the market.
Which is why they sulk because there is - as I mentioned my other response - a tendency to want to reject homeopathy despite its powerful placebo effect rather than embrace its success as a placebo.
Homeopathy is part and parcel of all naturopath "schooling" and with it, anti vaccination stances. I hope that relationship works for you two, because in my case these differences about childcare spelled disaster.
Or in short, people didn't really have any idea what the hell was going on but nevertheless believed they knew enough to dismiss Semmelweiss' data.
You can see this pattern being repeated over and over, not only in the medical community and it shows an unbelievable level of arrogance and ignorance with respect to peoples' own weaknesses.
But don't let that stand in the way to say "It can't possibly work because I don't know how it would".
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
It doesn't matter.
nope they are all quacks, and dangerous
Homeopathy works via the placebo effect. For many maladies, placebo is almost as effective as drugs judged to be "effective" by FDA. An efficacy trial might show that placebo reduced symptoms by 10%, while the real drug reduced them by 15%. So, the real drug is more effective than placebo. But, placebo is still effective on its own, and has no side effects.
For example, iirc placebo can increase endorphin levels, or oxytocin levels, cortisol levels, etc. Psychology affects physiology.
The kicker is that there are results that indicate that placebo works even when the patient is told it is placebo. I am not shitting you.
Except the one that cured my friends neck. He wasn't able to turn his neck without the greatest of pain, but after a 15 minutes session with a chiropractor it suddenly was painless.
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
It's a right mess out there that is for damn sure! You are not wrong! Societal stigmatization of the cisgendered male is a problem, much of which stems from absent or abusive fathers of females in all the previous generations, on and on.
There is a definite wavelength to relationship inertias and western civilization has pandered to female desires and empowerment while allowing men to be denigrated and subjugated.
There is a difference between freedom and abuse of power; women having the vote and the credit card and equal education and employment opportunities are rational desires from civilized women. But culturally we have allowed commerce and capitalism to wreck the notion of family value, respect, honesty, transparency. Combined with our loss of industrial capacity from misguided trade agreements, and a general denigration of national service by electing a bunch of draft dodging president goofballs, means we are at a scary tipping point.
This bullshit about UBI is a bunch of entitled children thinking that government handouts (and I have state insurance and snap benefits myself that I am very thankful for) will provide for them. The human race is quite capable of building such an infrastructure, but these shielded and fleeced consumers don't realize the reality of land ownership or what the reality of true human competition can look like. We were lucky we didn't nuke ourselves back to the stone age already. Who's going to own all these robots that are going to make UBI come true for everyone? It's a nice idea to think that people will suddenly turn generous but there is no denying a limit on resources and the reality of maintenance expenditures etc.
Any specific technology might be relatively achievable. We are very far off from having all of the technologies developed aligned and implemented, let alone any sort of universal idea of what the right thing to do is! It is the human condition to have our own opinions. I fear that greed will lead to a bunch of children standing around getting high and playing on their computers (hmm, starts to seem to familiar already) while drones violently extract resources to continue enabling an easy life. Already happening. So how do we bring more worldly experience and education to our society? Unfortunately it seems likely to be more comfortable to attempt to remain insular to the suffrage of others. Obviously people are starving and warring across the world as is, today. What is the answer? Gamified education on government subsidized smartphones? Who's going to do all the real work to set this system up and have it provide limitlessly for everyone? That is nearly impossible unless mana from space rains down everywhere, otherwise we have obvious targets even if there is good intent, and that's not to say everyone wants to have robot factories covering the planet instead of a more natural existence as we've had in the past thousands of years.
People need to work towards more individual self sufficiency I think. Everyone I encounter is so specialized in their fields of interest or work that they are entirely reliant on society. Which would be all fine and good if society was somehow universally fair, all seeing, all knowing, infallible. But the truth is the world is full of fools and even smart men will twist themselves backwards and around again over a pretty little princess, especially if she is worldly enough to know how to fully work her assets and has no compunction to using and abusing men. There are a lot of daddy little monsters out there. Be careful. MAKE YOUR TRUST REQUIRE BEING EARNED AND DON'T STAND FOR BULLSHIT. And follow through with words and intents. If capitalism is going to drive global decisions, human self preservation will require developing compelling profitable business opportunities that consider global ecology and social welfare.
FWIW, Red Yeast Rice is not a homeopathic cure. It appears to be a naturally occurring statin, though I don't know of any clinical trials for it. My doctor (regular certified GP) recommended to try it. He said if it worked, keep doing it. Cholesterol measures before and after 30 days revealed about a 5% drop in LDL levels in my case, so I keep taking it. My Cholesterol rises each year I'm tested: it's clearly a genetic problem in my family. Red yeast rice bought me an extra couple of years before moving onto the stronger pharmaceutical stuff (Lipitor, etc.). That said, taking up rowing and getting fit again reduced the levels by about 10% a couple of years later. Exercise worked better for me! But don't confuse homeopathy with "natural" or "herbal" remedies.
"what an engineer would consider "communication" -- the transfer of an unambiguous piece of information from one party to another."
Which is pretty much nothing like what every philosopher or sociologist would even begin to consider "communication" to mean. There is no "piece of information" as such, and even an engineer (a good one at least) would at least have to think twice before using the term "unambigious" in this context (which, by the way, introduces the problem of ambiguity by negation, which, in itself, does not get rid of it).
No "piece of information" exists on it's own, its meaning magically derived from some sort of otherworldy logos (that, my fellows, is the real scam here, that we all fall for, being indoctrinated by the most dogmatic, self-righteous and cruel religion of our times -- "modern science" and its magic, mind-numbing numbers).
Communication may simply mean to send a message that alters the state of the system receiving the message. Let the term information slowly melt on your frontal lobes in this context.
Why is the kneejerk-response of this crowd to dismiss the idea of homeopathy upfront simpy because it is not accepted (nor even considered, since it is not easily quantifiable) by mainstream science? Isn't the homeopathic theory much simpler? Has Ockham taught you nothing? Onions cause mucus to flow, and they also stop it -- ask grandma, or better yet grand-grandma. And they sure didn't ask what theory it does or does not prove.
The trouble is, once the scientific method automatically bans any non-quantifyable theory into ridicule, the game is over, and the scharlatans and snake-oil-sellers quickly inhabit the niche (where the fools scream the looudest) -- dragging it all down into obscurity, esoterism and attracting the tree-hugging-part-time-hippie-alternative-mom-crowd of today. And boom -- anyone thinking of himself as a postmodern, sober, scientific "sceptic" is barred from mere consideration in fear of looking like a fool to his peers. It's a shame. What a sorry state this world is in.
It is interesting that recently in the news several articles about the fact that our health care System is third behind cancer and heart disease in killing people in the United States and that is ok. For some reason we applaud the fact the drug companies kill thousands and thousands of people with properly prescribed medications and that's okay. What is considered alternative medicine and methodologies today is what kept humans alive for thousands and thousands of years before modern medicine. We would not have the medicines available today if it wasn't for Mother Nature. However Mother Nature doesn't make billions of dollars and pay stockholders and make lots of corporations and people weathly.
"Red yeast rice products that contain substantial amounts of monacolin K can lower blood cholesterol levels."
Source: https://nccih.nih.gov/health/redyeastrice
Sounds like your girlfriend might be on to something. Did you actually research this, or did you just assume that it was bogus?
I'm not real sure how you got from a discussion about problems with (or complaints about) American women to ditching the UBI, but I'll explain it best I can from my perspective, with the caveat that this is a rather generalized, high-level discussion since no one has actually implemented a real UBI yet to try it out, and like any totally new system (whether it's a social services system, or an engineered technical system like a computer or a network), there's going to be kinks and failures in the initial R&D before you come up with a system that is well-designed and stable.
You mention having SNAP benefits you're grateful for. That's a government handout that many people would love to take away from you in the name of libertarianism. Under UBI, SNAP would probably disappear, since it would no longer be necessary. Along with it would go many other government welfare benefits; if you're already giving people $X every month just for being a citizen, there's no reason to means-test people and give them more. The US (which isn't really the most generous nation with social welfare benefits anyway) spends a large portion of its tax dollars on social programs like this, with only part of that going to the actual recipients, while the rest goes to a bunch of paper-pushers with cushy government jobs. All those people can be fired and all those benefits removed, and all replaced with the UBI. You don't need a big administration any more when you're not mean-testing people and looking for "cheaters".
Who's going to own the robots? Companies of course, just like it is now. (Who do you think built your smartphone? It wasn't a human, for the most part. Electronics are all made by machine now.) The problem is distribution of wealth: letting the corporations keep all their profits (and then get loans or handouts from the government when they fail) isn't sustainable when more and more labor is mechanized. The UBI should solve this. How? Taxes, obviously. Companies will simply have to pay more in taxes than they do now, to redistribute wealth down to the bottom. This will have the bonus effect of giving them more customers.
Who will do the "real work"? Employees, of course, just like now. Why would they do this? (This seems to be a big point that anti-UBI people just don't understand.) Because they make money for it, just like now. I don't know about you, but if I can sit on my ass and get $15k/year, which relegates me to a tiny apartment with roommates and eating ramen noodles, or I can go work for RobotCo as an engineer and make $150k/year (plus the $15k/year UBI, for a total of $165k), I'm going to take the latter even though it's more work. I rather like having a nice place to myself, a car, being able to afford nice stuff and eating out, etc.
How do we pay for UBI? Simple: more taxes, and eliminating redundant social programs that we're already paying for (as I mentioned above). So for instance, if I'm making $150k working at RobotCo, then obviously I don't really need that $15k UBI like some poor guy who got chronic illness and is no longer able to work at RobotCo, and whose job I took. So under the UBI scheme, my taxes at that income level will be adjusted so that I'll be paying that UBI right back. If we switch to a UBI system, someone making, say, $100k, should not see a significant change to their taxes if it's done right. Someone making $25k should get a nice boost. Someone making $500k should be seeing a bigger chunk of their pay taken. Also, corporations should be paying more, and not being able to hide profits offshore through twisted schemes (though we should also reduce the corporate tax rate to be competitive with other industrialized nations, so there's no advantage to keeping it in Europe for example). That's how you pay for it. After eliminating most of our existing handouts, it really shouldn't be that much. Note that not all social programs can be eliminated; you still need things like CPS since child abuse isn't solved by throwing money at people. Also,
Sounds to me like someone has been bought out by the Pharmaceutical Gods.
I once knocked over a display stand in a homeopathy store by "accident". By which I mean "On purpose because you're a liar and a thief". I also tipped off health and safety people to a "possible rat infestation" at one, by which I mean "I threw some rats into your garbage and sicced them on you because you're a liar and a thief".
Snake oil salesmen deserve nothing short of the rope.
pure luck, and your friend is lucky he didn't end up paralysed
Essentially - and my wife is completely obsessed with one particular practicioner, which is why I got familiar with this - the whole homeopathic preparation is some small amount of a "good thing" like an essential oil.
No, you got that wrong. The idea behind homeopathy is to use some bad stuff that produces the same results as the actual illness and dilute that. The idea here being that your body learns to defend itself against the illness. To quote Wikipedia:
Homeopathy (Listeni/homipi/) or homoeopathy is a system of alternative medicine created in 1796 by Samuel Hahnemann, based on his doctrine of like cures like (similia similibus curentur), a claim that a substance that causes the symptoms of a disease in healthy people would cure similar symptoms in sick people.
What you are talking about has absolutely nothing to do with homeopathy. I'm not sure what you'd call that other than a scam.
Homeopathy (Listeni/homipi/) or homoeopathy is a system of alternative medicine created in 1796 by Samuel Hahnemann, based on his doctrine of like cures like (similia similibus curentur), a claim that a substance that causes the symptoms of a disease in healthy people would cure similar symptoms in sick people.
(Wikipedia) BTW: Animal testing works roughly the same way, so it's no wonder that does not really produce any reliable results either.
Pure luck and/or placebo effect. It is scientifically fairly clear that the whole thing is basically a scam.
I will not date or marry anyone who believe in alternative medicine (except possibly chiropractors for back pain)
Chiropractors are basically scam artists too, with the added threat of crippling or killing you thrown in for good measure.
It's another area where a large number of people in the US appear to give credence to an absurd set of beliefs based on pseudo-religious beliefs rather than scientific evidence.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
But the actual proposed mechanism of action is the same, right? Dilute the crap out of it and administer...
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Yep. We've raised a whole lot of spoiled, empty-headed princesses over here in the west.
I find it disturbing because just as there is remedies that do not work, there's an equal amount of legit medications that don't. Or the flip side, can cause harm.
I think of black walnut hulls. Do you know that squirrels don't have Lyme disease problems yet humans do?
Pure luck and/or placebo effect. It is scientifically fairly clear that the whole thing is basically a scam.
In additional to medical quackery, chiropractics also do physical therapy and joint manipulation, which I think is what the GP was indicating.
Stop! Dremel time!
You need to go argue with this "beastofburden" guy that I had an argument with a while ago about chiropractic:
https://slashdot.org/comments....
I can't even get away from the pseudoscience advocates on a "news for nerds" website!
BTW, it's not just the US plagued with this. China of course is famous (infamous?) for Traditional Chinese Medicine, but over in Germany, which you'd think would be immune to this idiocy, they not only use homeopathy a lot, they're specifically licensed by the state! Several other western European nations are the same.
If that wasn't the quackery part, then what do they do that you call quackery?
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
I'm afraid it's too simple to attribute it to only luck and placebo.
Can you point me to a scientific paper, published after peer review, that proves 'chiropractics' is 'a scam'?
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
If that wasn't the quackery part, then what do they do that you call quackery?
A belief that every disease is caused by spinal misalignment, I would consider quackery. Stretching of muscles and spinal adjustments when someone is presenting with back pain I would not consider quackery.
As an example, I was digging up sod and carrying it around my yard a couple years ago to make a garden, and strained something in my back. After a few days of pain, I went to a doctor (MD), who took x-rays, and recommended resting and seeing a chiropractor. I visited a chiropractor, who did some back cracking and recommended some stretches, nothing weird. After a couple days of this I was doing much better.
Stop! Dremel time!
Homeapathy: treatment based on the belief that if you don't care whether it works, you'll get better.