Comments on "Homeopathy: Frontier Science"

These some selected wordpress comments on http://goodscience.wordpress.com/2007/11/24/hello-world/

Homeopathic remedies is the only way I treat
my animals when they are ill. Infact just recently
a remedy saved my cats life who had
two strokes in one day. I use remedies on
all my animals, they are much more successful
then “chemicals” because the problem is cured,
not masked. I encourage people to try the
natural way, the homeopathic way, before they
go the chemical route.

Sue
November 25, 2007

First off - Normal medicine does not mask symptoms. There isn't even any proof that painkillers block pain. Encouraging people to go the "natural way" is irresponsible.

I applaud this blog as a voice of truth in the darkness of our ongoing health care crisis. Homeopathy offers an unparalleled healing opportunity for both acute and serious chronic illness through an understanding of the complex tapestry of body & mind that has long eluded practitioners of “western medicine”. As the fastest growing alternative health care medicine in the world, it benefits us all to be open minded to the possibilities that lie beyond our current level of reasoning. Remember our predecessors who were so certain that the world was flat; the earth revolved around the sun, and that blood letting and leaches were the cure for removing ill humours of the body.

I've got some news for you: Medicine has changed since the 1850s. Oh, and like cures like is an understanding of the complex tapestry whatever? WTF?

It never ceases to astonish that intelligent, well-informed and educated human beings feel it is their prerogative to berate something they know absolutely nothing about. If only those who malign homeopathy could experience its effects.

There are people who know more about homeopathy than you, and they aren't the homeopaths.

Nancy, I for one have actually been treated by a qualified homeopathic practitioner as a child.
She was exceptionally good at talking to me as a patient, and at reassuring my anxious parents who had brought me there. I expect that were she to retrain as a counsellor she would do very well.
However, I remain unconvinced by the remedies themselves.

That's brainduck, by the way

Sue, conventional drugs do not “mask” symptoms. Antibiotics, for example, kill the bacteria that are causing an infection.

Nor is homeopathy “natural”: that would be herbal remedies which contain active ingredients, unlike homeopathic remedies.

Wendy Pollock, homeopathy is also “Western”; Samuel Hahnemann was a German & when I last looked, Germany was in Western Europe.

Woot! More skeptics!

Nancy is right– it is amazing the level of discourse of people.

All these posts debating semantics, definitions are frankly typical of critics who don’t know what they are talking about. Whether you think homeopathy is natural or not is BESIDE the point. Conventional medicine kills. Period. It can cause secondary problems which result in taking MORE drugs for the secondary problems the first drug creates.

There is too much interest in the world in protecting a system that has LOTS of problems. Why are you critics so afraid of trying something new in response to a system that doesn’t work?

Conventional medicine SAVES LIVES. Period. How would you like to not have conventional medicine with diabetes or pneumonia?

I am enjoying this blog. Here is my positive experience with homeopathy:

I am a mom of four kids ranging in age from 10-30 years so you can see I have been very busy raising them these last many years. I am also a former registered nurse who discovered homeopathy 26 years ago to help my second born who was suffering from severe eczema.

To say that I have witnessed first hand the incredible benefits of homeopathy is an understatement. I have seen kids who were too young to know about placebo effect healed from ear infections and coup, as well as flues and fevers, allergies, a pilonidil cyst, extracted wisdom teeth needing no pain killers, bronchitis, pneumonia, to helping with their various emotional difficulties- sleep problems, temper tantrums, among others.

Because of my medical training, I carefully evaluated their responses to the remedy, and took them to my local GP for the serious infections. She was willing to “wait and watch” as long there was improvement. I am happy to report that none of the kids EVER needed to take antibiotics or even pain killers nor fever reducers- homeopathic remedies were effective They are all happy and productive young adults, and the youngest is doing well.

I, too, have experienced the wonder of a good remedy. There is nothing quite like the deep feeling of well-being and peace that occurs after taking a well- indicated remedy. I have weathered the storms of menopause and now at 55 years of age am fit, healthy, no menopausal symptoms, and feel excited about my life and the next many years ahead of me. I am saddened as I read ads for all the various drugs, and their potentially severe and sometimes fatal side effects that people have to take for conditions that homeopathy could help them with.

For the BadScience people, I feel that you are telling me that if I venture beyond the horizon that I will fall off the flat earth……..and imagine my knowing that in fact the Earth is a wonderful green-blue sphere spinning and whirling through space because I have seen it from above.

OK, YOU DO NOT NEED TO KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THE PLACEBO EFFECT IN ORDER FOR IT TO WORK. Should I get out my caps lock again? I hope not. And oh wow, homeopathy made your childen smarter? Wow!! And why do people go on about side effects? And how would homeopathy help? And how do us members of the "bad science cult" believe in anything remotely like a flat earth. Sorry, but really, YOU SHOULD ACTUALLY THINK BETTER ABOUT YOUR METAPHORS! (oh no, I hit caps lock again)

Gimpy,
Its good that the gloves are off and you are showing your real self- one that is full of hatred, prejudice and serious nastiness. Instead of the bad science treacle.

Now, Gimpy- have a question for you- read on another blog this:

“The fatal flaw of thinking by Bad, Simpson, et al is this:

SURGERY

I have yet to see a successful double blind, placebo controlled study on surgery!

Techniques have been developed through trial and error and even anecdotal. Is there a problem with that? Should we stop all surgery because it is not to your gold standard of purity, Simpson?

What is your answer to this?

WHAT?! So now the homeopaths are doubting surgery? WHAT?

Gimpy says……..

“I have taken goodscience off the list for refusing to condemn claims that homeopathy can cure autism, aids, cancer and several other diseases. I will not have sites promoting such nonsense in my blogroll.”

AAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW Gimpy!! NNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

*lolz*

By now the comments have turned into a huge flamewar. See the original article.

Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

Homeopathy: Frontier Science
I can't stand homeopath blogs. I just can't, especially when they post complete and utter crap.

Much to the dismay of many people cured by homeopathy around the world, a recent wave of strong opinion held by a very few asserts that homeopathy is not scientific, or, at the very least, is ”bad science”.

Where's the proof that these people were actually cured by homeopathy?

Unfortunately those writing blogs claiming that Homeopathy is bad science have a very closed view of what science truly is and what the future of science may look like.

So in the future, diluting everything to one part whatever to 10^60 parts water will be considered science. "...what science truly is..." That's rich, coming from someone who is not actually a scientist.

Much of their postulating is borne out of fear. Fear of what they do not understand, and fear of a perceived threat to the scientific status quo from which they derive security.

Oh help me, help me, I'm scared of this great thing called homeopathy!

Hence, they vehemently attack a form of health care that has profoundly helped thousands of people all over the world.

As I said - WHERE'S THE F*CKING PROOF!?!

These recent attacks on homeopathy rely heavily on misunderstanding and selective misinformation. The constant cry is that homeopathic remedies are placebo and can therefore do nothing. When homeopaths assert that remedies work on animals and therefore cannot be the placebo effect, they blame the biased observer. Tell that to my sister who was able to cure her entire herd of sheep sick with highly contagious pinkeye with the use of a homeopathic remedy.

"Selective misinformation"? Meh. Oh, and we have talking animals that report on their symptoms now?

Not only is it clear that homeopathic treatment was successful, but the “Bad Science” author admits the harm conventional medicine was doing. In this day and age of prescription drug therapy which is rife with harmful, even leathal side affects, can we really say conventional medicine is any better than it was in 1854? Remember the Hippocratic oath: “first do no harm”.

Give me an example of this horrible new medicine thing. Thalidomide? Another example. Oh, you don't know any others? Didn't think so.

Our understanding of the true science of our universe is very limited. To think that we can prove something is real and true with our limited, parochial understanding undermines our quest for scientific knowledge. Homeopathy is frontier medicine. Because it works it shows us we are lacking in true understanding of how the universe works.

Prove it works.

That the current system of scientific verification labels homeopathy’s demonstrated efficacy as “placebo” only underscores how absurdly faulty and inadequate this verification system is.

WTF?! The system should say that everything works? The plural of anecdote should be data?

Instead of denying homeopathy works and limiting our choices and possiblities we should embrace this knowledge and let it take us forward to open new possibilites.

Like what? A world where no treatments are proven, and things just magically work? I see some really nice possibilities there.

Oops, my sarcasm detector is beeping.

"Free to choose health"

Today I have decided to rant about a homeopath's blog, "freetochoosehealth's Weblog". Looks like someone forgot to change the blog title.

Among other things, the blogger accuses sceptics of being part of the "Baaad Science Cult". To quote a blog post:

For those of you new to this scene: Why do I call them a cult of quackbusters, debunkers and bad science?

Because…

they definitely fit the definition of a Cult:

1. followers of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices
2. an interest followed with exaggerated zeal

So I'm part of a cult am I? Hmm....

The blog speaks of "freedom" - interesting considering comments are ruthlessly censored; and when they are not simply deleted, they can get rather stupid replies. Consider this one where brainduck
commented on the subject I am talking about:

2 Comments »

if you believe in freedom to choose, why delete my comments?

Comment by Duck | December 8, 2007

Stop spamming this blog.

Comment by freetochoosehealth | December 9, 2007

As you can see, Duck is accused of 'spamming'. Interesting considering the definition of Spam is:

the abuse of electronic messaging systems to indiscriminately send unsolicited bulk messages.

The blogger then snatched up a story from The Guardian (which has apparently been disproven), and calls him/herself a scientist:

I know, I know I was a uneducated nitwit according to those advocating only science based medicine. I always gave my kids and myself honey for coughs instead of pharmceutically engineered cough syrups. And there was no scientific proof for this honey thing and it was just an old wive’s tale.

Well, look now there is scientific proof.
...
Well before I was a nitwit and now I’m a “scientist”. Well, how do you like that?

Meh.