Where is the “placebo” in for instance arsenicum 1x or 2x (1 to 10) or digitalis 3x?

Many wise men and women have turned to homeopahty over the past 200 years and they will continue to do so.

I don’t think you understand how vaccines work. You may want to consider talking to a microbiologist or other about them. ‘Like cures like’ is probably just an analogy used to explain how they work to the layman or a layman’s rationalization after noticing their effects.

A lot of science ends up being butchered that way and, of course homeopaths, and the like have no problem doing the butchering.

I’m glad to hear that your son is doing better. Are you using ABA with him?

As far as homeopathy goes, first I need to correct you regarding vaccines – they are not homeopathic. The only thing that vaccines share with homeopathy is the idea that like treats like. As was already noted by someone else above, vaccines work by using small amounts that are always present in every dose which trigger the body to create antibodies which match the physical shape of the virus. Homeopathic preparations, from what I have read, often do not have any of the original active ingredient in the final dose form, particularly at the higher potencies, such as 200C.

There are a couple other difference between vaccines and homeopathic solutions. First, with vaccines, it is possible to measure and see the actual method of action which leads to the therapeutic result. Homeopathic solutions, as yet, have no studies showing a clinical response that can be definitively linked to the active ingredient. Second, vaccines, which have been around for about the same amount of time as homeopathy, have an abundance of research supporting their efficacy and identifying just how they work. Vaccines are supported by a robust amount of research. Homeopathy lacks such quality research. Given that it has been around since the late 1700s, there should be some decent studies that identify how it supposedly works, identifying the method of action and establishing a clinically significant effect compared to placebo. A final difference is that vaccines must establish that they are safe and effective for their indication. This means that for any new vaccine, new vaccine formula or new dose form of a vaccine, the product must undergo years of testing to ensure that it is not going to harm the patient and that the product actually improves the patient’s condition. Homeopathic solutions are under no such regulation.

You also question how the placebo effect can occur with someone who cannot speak and does not know what they are taking. In these situations, the observer can skew the interpretation of any observations made. It is a different sort of bias that can creep into these kinds of tests and is why quality studies are double-blind. In other words, to get accurate results, neither the person taking the solution nor the person making the observations knows whether the patient is receiving the actual medicine or a placebo. In circumstances where the administrator of the medicine knows what is being given, their expectations can influence what they take notice of and what they ignore. For example, in the case of you and your son, you are aware that he is receiving a homeopathic preparation, which you expect will help him. This expectation is strengthened by your desire to find something that will work, combined with the research you have done that supports that desire. Due to this expectation, you may perceive an improvement, when in reality, nothing has changed. If you really wanted to find out if a homeopathic solution was working for your child, you would need to be unaware of the true identity of the solution you are giving him; it may be the “real” one, it may be a placebo, or it may be a completely different preparation. Someone else not involved in the preparation or administration of the solutions would have the key to unblind the study to find out what has been observed to make a difference, and what has been observed to have no effect. If you were to undertake such an endeavor, I suspect you will be surprised by the results.

@James Pannozzi

The reason that I mentioned that you have not done very well to demonstrate that there is anything to homeopathy is that all of your posts have suggested that you do, in fact, believe that there is something to it, and that you have been trying to convince us of this. However, with all of the research that is out there already, there has yet to be anything of quality that even suggests that homeopathy works. It has had over 200 years to gather some evidence. With the lack of quality research, the subject has reached and passed the point where it is reasonable to continue investigating it. Put plainly, at this point any further research into homeopathy is almost guaranteed to be a fruitless endeavor.

While there may be some flaws in studies that are critical of homeopathy, the onus is still on the proponents to provide evidence that it really works. Just because person A is wrong does not mean that person B is right.

So, again, if you think that there really is something worth investigating, here, by all means point us to some quality research. What you have provided so far does not suggest that there is anything going on.

Well said!

There is a great book on Homeopathy by a woman who had an autistic child and found great assistance from Homeopathy doctors – see “Impossible Cure the Promise of Homeopathy” by Lansky. I believe she has a web site (I do not have the link handy) which has some additional interesting material including some mp3 audio presentations by Homeopathic doctors.

Thank goodness that we still have freedom of medical choice which allows you to chose treatments best for you and the available resources that you have.

I went down that road with my severely autistic son. Medicine has offered me crap. Put him in school, have no hope, blah, blah. I put him in school- what a joke. The teachers didn’t appreciate his outbursts when they couldn’t anticipate his needs (he doesn’t speak at almost 6 years old). She began asking me what to do and couldn’t handle him. I pulled him out of school (the end of the meltdowns) and he now goes to the school just for his therapies. Still, 2 years of school and no progress.

We tried some vitamins/herbs. Talk about expensive! Ridiculous expense and again- for us no progress. Out of desperation I turned to homeopathy. I read a lot about it before beginning. I found that homeopathy is widely accepted overseas and has been for a couple of hundred years, yet somehow it really didn’t make the trip across the ocean. There are still tons of homeopathic hospitals overseas and it is taught widely to medical doctors in many countries.

I learned there is a lot of quackery and “changing” of homeopathy in this country. It is sad, as people who try it often have little or no results because they are just taking it themselves or have a practitioner with a poor understanding of the principles. Remedies sold in combinations of many remedies are crap and not something based on homeopathic principles. You never take more than one at a time!

Classically trained homeopaths are the ones who should be following the principles laid out by Hahnemann, however many do not. The truest are those trained by Luc Schepper, David Little, or Robin Murphy. They all follow sixth edition organon principles.

I feel sorry for Madge above- panic attacks can be treated by homeopathy and I have treated them in my daughter. You need a good practitioner!

If arnica is CAUSING bruises, then it is being taken too often and proven. Did you just take it dry the same dose over and over? Never do that. Take one dose dry, if it helps then put it in half a bottle of water, shake and take a dose, if you need more it must be succussed before each dose- that is the banging on the hand you all spoke of. It should never cause bruises. Don’t take the herbal tincture- that is crazy!

Also there is potency. A low potency remedy for something acute will do little. Having a bad fall and taking arnica in anything lower than a 200C is going to do little or nothing. Health food stores generally sell only the 30C and it can be helpful, but again is a medium range strength. For a panic attack one would take a high strength.

One should only take a remedy again if the benefit has worn off. It is not like a pill you pop every few hours.

Yes, vaccinations are homeopathic. So is your stimulants treating hyperactivity in ADD patients- (Ritalin, Adderall). Those are the same principles. Like cures like.

For those who care, few of you I am sure, my son has greatly improved. He is now potty trained and using words. This is with therapy only once a week (we can’t afford further private therapy) and ongoing homeopathic treatment. (By the way, how can a placebo work with someone who doesn’t speak and has no idea what he is taking?).

I did not write this for you skeptics. No one can force anyone to believe anything, however if someone who is open to it and interested should stumble upon this blog I hope they will read this entry and consider it.

I do obviously believe in homeopathy and it has greatly improved my life and that of my family.

Glad I glanced back here one last time. Todd, perhaps I did not make myself
clear – my comments were directed at the irrationality of the attacks against Homeopathy, nothing more. I provided directions to some web sites which you acknowledge that you visited that clearly indicate the BBC documentary did not replicate her experiment despite understandably widespread belief to the contrary.
I believe you indicated agreement with their objections against the documentary though you wished that there was independent confirmation from non Homeopathy related sites.

I also provided reference to two journal articles, one of them from the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology which completely refuted, I believe, a Lancet 2005 meta analysis widely disseminated and accepted that claimed to show that Homeopathy operated no better than placebo.

Finally, I offered cites to current research which seems to show confirmation of Ennis’ (and others) experiment demonstrating biological effect from highly dilute solutions. These effects have been repeated and other researchers continue to get these unexplained results. NONE of these points proves Homeopathy and they are offered only as justification for continued research towards the possibility of a theory.

It is neither my intent nor mission to “prove” Homeopathy to you or anyone else.
That is the job for the researchers and as far as I can see, there is just enough evidence in their double blinded placebo controlled testing to allow them to continue, and, hopefully, make larger and better tests which will either confirm the Homeopathy curative effect, or else show that there never was one.

My only gripe was with people irrationally claiming it is all bunk at a time when the research has barely gotten off the ground, and the research instrumentation is just starting to be precise and powerful enough to give us a chance at getting at the mechanism of it. I then criticized those dismissing it as bunk who, it seemed to me, were adapting that as their premise and then drawing sweeping conclusions from it – not a good way to proceed.

Sweeping uninformed statements such as Julian makes, that “experiments trying to validate Homeopathy as a form of treatment have failed…. are refuted by a quick trip to google, even though his observation that those tests were poorly performed is partially correct in some cases.

Likewise Julian should make note that it was not I that invoked quantum mechanics.

Thanks
JP

See, the same utter nonsense used against Homeopathy can be used against any other scientific field with equal facility.”

My familiarity with the arguments of homeopaths is very low but I take when one of them starts invoking quantum mechanics it usually signals they have no idea what they’re taking about, right?

“Don’t you see the circular fallacy of your position? You’re PRESUPPOSING Homeopathy to be anti-science and debunked and THEN discarding any attempt to entertain any theories about it.”

There’s no circular reasoning involved. Experiments trying to validate Homeopathy as a form of treatment have failed, been poorly performed ect so the obvious position to take is there’s nothing there.

“You’re discarding the observational part AND the attempt to formulate theories of it based on those observational curative effects which are dismissed as “placebo” by some, despite the fact that the scientific research supports, for at least some conditions, its efficacy above placebo.”

and these instances would be?

“I rest my case.”

but you haven’t said anything…

didn’t you know that was all due to quantum “placebo” effect?

There isn’t any amount of quantum effects in a classical universe (but the reverse is obviously true) – so no, no underlying “placebo”.

I rather suspect from this that you don’t know what a placebo effect is, it is just a rhetorical tool for you, so you don’t have any tools what so ever to judge medicine (or homeopathy) with. But feel free to demonstrate otherwise.

You’re PRESUPPOSING Homeopathy to be anti-science

Nice try with sophistry, but I both started out with clarifying why homeopathy is demonstrable bunk and specified debunked antiscience.

you ignore the refutation which trashed the “no better than placebo” conclusion of the meta analysis of the Lancet 2005 article as worthless that I cited.

I didn’t ignore it at all, I specifically mentioned other commenters showing such studies to be bunk. Specifically Todd, who left off after doing so with 3 out of 4 suggested “refutations” with hoping to have time to look at the last one.

But as for me, that is enough to establish the pattern – that 3 out of 4 “works” on the same subject are wrong is unlikely to about two sigma (one-sided interval) if I’m not mistaken, against even chance of failure.

ridicule and innuendo

I surely hope so, as harmful antiscience can either be met by sadness, ridicule or humor to deflate it. I know what response I prefer to leave out.

Your case, thus far, has fallen rather short of demonstrating that there is anything to homeopathy.

Perhaps you can share some well-designed, placebo-controlled, double-blind research that shows that any particular homeopathic preparation does, indeed, have a clinically significant effect on the disease for which it is prepared. What you have provided, thus far, has not held any scientific validity for refuting the idea that homeopathy is bunk.

As I have already pointed out, the studies you shared which purport to validate some mechanism of homeopathy, only show a biological response, which may, in fact, be due to the substances used as the diluent, rather than the “active” substance. I would also ask you to provide a link to a study that confirms that the “active” substance really does “imprint” on the diluent. If this is true, then there must surely be a way to measure it, no?

I assume that if you want to make that argument, diluted amounts of insurgents have already been invading war theaters before, surely even Iraq. And supposedly the existing background amounts of troops, diluted or not, isn’t a problem for war homeopathy, or it wouldn’t “work” at all.

But I’m curious – exactly what is the ‘special, magical shaking’ in war homeopathy? Civilian protests? Friendly fire? Or having Bush as commander-in-chief?

“I’m not sure how “craziness” is a measure of research, but FWIW this shows your utter unfamiliarity with it. Modern EPR experiments happens AFAIK to be among the best substantiated of all empirical science due to their exceptional nature – I believe some potential non-quantum explanations have been refuted with over 20 sigma significance. (Ordinarily one may be happy with testing theories at 3-10 sigma or so.)”

I quite agree but… didn’t you know that was all due to quantum “placebo” effect?

See, the same utter nonsense used against Homeopathy can be used against any other scientific field with equal facility.

“Science is the observation of testable non-contingent facts triumphing over so called learned or imagined contingent “common sense” or “craziness” values.”

I quite agree!

“What would be crazy for a scientist is to entertain the later concepts or debunked antiscience such as homeopathy.”

WHOOPS!! But to this I disagree. You just said that science utilizes observation of testable non-contingent fact triumphing over … “common sense” or “craziness”.

Don’t you see the circular fallacy of your position? You’re PRESUPPOSING Homeopathy to be anti-science and debunked and THEN discarding any attempt to entertain any theories about it. You’re discarding the observational part AND the attempt to formulate theories of it based on those observational curative effects which are dismissed as “placebo” by some, despite the fact that the scientific research supports, for at least some conditions, its efficacy above placebo. Denying that, you ignore the refutation which trashed the “no better than placebo” conclusion of the meta analysis of the Lancet 2005 article as worthless that I cited.

You’re allowing the craziness of the damned thing to trump your reason, short circuit your thinking and ZAP shut down all consideration of attempted research.

Worse, you allow you already subverted thinking on this issue to be
hijacked by others via ridicule and innuendo. Tsk tsk, very unscientific.

I rest my case.

Thanks everyone for hearing my opinion!

Carroll shows that a fundamental way (there are others) to avoid Boltzmann Brains in cosmology is to have the QM Hilbert space infinite dimensional. (If I understand Carroll correctly we know BB’s can’t occur as often as the thermal equilibrium scenario suggests, as the rest of the local universe isn’t in such an equilibrium. So we have to understand why that is so.)

Among other things Carroll’s proposal nicely implies that time is real, QM ambiguities when combined with gravity notwithstanding. But it dawned on me when pondering the thread now, that as it also supports using the universal wavefunction it is supporting an MW tool if I’m not mistaken. And I assume there is sufficient (but perhaps not necessary) self-consistency in MW endlessly branching on an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space without running into local repetitions now and then. Nice, I guess.

Secondly, “like cures like” so in order to apply hom to Iraq we’d need to send in a homoeopathically diluted amount of insurgents while getting rid of the ‘allopathic’ troops that are already there.

people who say that Homeopathy is bunk are spouting bunk.

This is so much … bunk. Homeopathy is shown to be bunk. The expected effect of ingesting vanishingly diluted water solutions is to work as a placebo. According to commenters here it does, so already known chemistry is tested as explaining the effect.

To push everyday trusted chemistry end-over-end, homeopaths have to come up with a predictive theory and better than placebo results. After decades of “work”, they can’t.

[As a note to those arguing for accepting constraints for test, I would argue that it isn't how science usually work this. It is enough to show that the general mechanism doesn't work in any case, as BA does.

I'm quite sure that I have seen debunking papers also treating "tap and shake" procedures, diverse chemicals used, et cetera. But as there AFAIU aren't any proposed mechanisms to test there, that is so much harder to work with, with no gain in understanding.]

[...] the science [...] researching [...]

If there isn’t any peer reviewed work or theories presented among chemistry and medicine research, there isn’t any research nor science here. I’m afraid your pretensions must be dismissed as spouted bunk.

try ridicule against the EPR experiment in Quantum Mechanics, or the many worlds theory – far crazier

I’m not sure how “craziness” is a measure of research, but FWIW this shows your utter unfamiliarity with it. Modern EPR experiments happens AFAIK to be among the best substantiated of all empirical science due to their exceptional nature – I believe some potential non-quantum explanations have been refuted with over 20 sigma significance. (Ordinarily one may be happy with testing theories at 3-10 sigma or so.)

And MW “theory”? Please, it is claimed to be the preferred QM interpretation among theoretical physicists working in cosmology nowadays, close to BA interests btw. Look at the papers, reviews and interviews of physicists Sean Carroll and Max Tegmark for some substantiation of that.

Btw, QM interpretations are currently not “theories” in any shape or forms, as they don’t make distinguishing predictions. Which is why you can choose freely among them, they are empirically equivalent, no one “crazier” than the others. (Well, some add extra assumptions, which is “crazy” from a parsimony view. But then MW is making fewest assumptions, fewer than instrumentalist “shut-up-and-calculate” independent axiom usage even as is easily checked by axiomatizing them, so by that standard it is least “crazy”.)

Science is the observation of testable non-contingent facts triumphing over so called learned or imagined contingent “common sense” or “craziness” values. What would be crazy for a scientist is to entertain the later concepts or debunked antiscience such as homeopathy.

an experiment which clearly shows biological activity being stimulated by high dilution solutions with no molecules left of the stimulant

What this experiment suggests to me is that the diluent is probably responsible for the stimulation. Again, the experiment was flawed from the start because it lacked proper controls.

On the contrary, Chris, people who say that Homeopathy is bunk are spouting bunk.

When certain groups including a major news organization manage to get it wrong about Ennis’ experiment – an experiment which clearly shows biological activity being stimulated by high dilution solutions with no molecules left of the stimulant – and when researchers are recently clearly confirming this fact, then that is not bunk.

I don’t really care if you chose to ignore the science which currently only offers the possibility of an explanation, or if you care to deny it but these kinds of sweeping statements that it is all bunk or all a fraud will NOT go unchallenged by me and other – particularly when dedicated people, real scientists, real MD Homeopaths and real Homeopathic physicians are working, researching and curing people every day.

You are welcome to your opinion but I urge you to become more informed.

If you still feel compelled to attack science, try ridicule against the EPR experiment in Quantum Mechanics, or the many worlds theory – far crazier than Homeopathy if that is your measure of things, but supported by many respected scientists.

But Phil, as a science fiction fan, you should know that it works exactly like that! Ever notice how large groups of soldiers and whatnot get wiped out immediately, while it’s the teeny-weeny crack team – or lone Time Lord – that saves the universe?

Heheheheheheh.

Well, we’ve got a war. Soldiers cause wars. Repeatedly dilute and shake and tap the soldiers. Result: solution to cure war.

It is, perhaps, a fine point. But just the sort of thing a homeopath will cite to bolster their case that mainstream science doesn’t understand what they’re doing, and thus has no right to criticize. A bit like astronomers who argue that astrologers should include Ophiuchus as a zodiac sign, failing to realize that the astrologers’ definition of constellations is different than theirs.

Thank you for your statement of the obvious. My point wasn’t in regards to some identicality between vaccination and homeopathy. It was that broad-brush dismissal of one for having some of the same broad-brush characteristics of another (that deserves unbridled support) is deleterious to both arguments. It is sort of like hating peas because they are green, while supporting the greeness of lima beans. Now it is your turn to exhaustively explain that peas and lima beans come from different plants.

Old Geezer, JPP

Thank you for the added information. I noted that in the Ennis-related material, it was mentioned that the studies did not look at homeopathy at all, but examined high dilutions of histamine, according to Ennis. Although I’m loathe to simply accept the accounts on the two web sites you directed me to, as they are pro-homeopathy sites rather than neutral third parties, there’s nothing that screams that the accounts were made up. At best, the BBC program’s experiment failed to replicate the methods used in the Ennis study. This does not, however, validate Ennis’ study.

The Lorenz study was not about whether or not there was a biological stimulation in response to highly dilute substances. It started with the assumption that there would be stimulation. The question, rather, was what differences there would be with different dilutions. So, yes, it did not look at whether or not homeopathy was effective, but it seemed from your original post that you were providing it as evidence that homeopathy actually works. Regardless, the abstract of the study made no mention of any controls (e.g., diluent without any histamine from the beginning), nor whether the same batch of diluent was used to make all of the different preparations used, or whether there was some variation in source materials that could introduce contaminants.

Likewise, the Sainte-Laudy studies had similar failings. I will agree that it is not a study showing that homeopathy actually works, so it can’t be used in any arguments that homeopathy is a valid treatment. Like the Lorenz study, no mention is made of any controls, so again, the study is flawed in that it cannot demonstrate that the preparations used differ in any meaningful way from a placebo or other non-homeopathic preparation.

Though you appear to be very supportive of the idea that homeopathy actually works, you have yet to provide any evidence supporting an efficacy claim. Instead, you have shared studies that have flawed suppositions and lack of controls that look at one purported aspect of homeopathy, but not at the effectiveness of homeopathy itself, and critiques of studies that question the efficacy of homeopathy.

I haven’t had time yet to look at the Lancet issues, but if I can, I’ll take a look at it.