By the same token Hans, there are studies that have shown homeopathy in a negative light. These trials too have been demonstrated to have flaws, in just the same way as the positive ones. I think Bach has already done this quite successfully as far as I am aware!!

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Sarah-I. RN, Homeopath, Craniosacral Therapist, Therapeutic Massage Therapist, Reiki Master Teacher.

Yes, the studies I have seen that show no effect of homeopathy are also flawed. You might say that no valid studies of homeopathy exist at all. Which is a little bit surprising, as it should not really be too difficult.



Hans

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<i>You have a right to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.</i>

They are not all flawed and you have to remember that new research is being undertaken all the time and especially through the homeopathic hospitals in both London and Glasgow. David Reilly has been instrumental in setting up new research.

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Sarah-I. RN, Homeopath, Craniosacral Therapist, Therapeutic Massage Therapist, Reiki Master Teacher.

quote (hans): "As for the many theories of how homeopathic remedies might act physically, there is still none that do not require some as yet unvalidated mechanism to exist."

quite right. in these terms, which very adequately sum up the situation, there is nothing to lead one to prefer paracelsus to florence nightingale, and nothing leading to a preference for florence over hahnemann. and, as sarah-i (thank you, sarah) points out, the double blinds showing negative for homeopathy can also be critiqued, some on grounds of research methodology, some on grounds of what i have called credibility: failure to measure what they claim to measure.

we all agree that the earth is round, not flat. we all agree that the earth is not the center of the universe. we all agree, i suspect, that it is very very very safe to assume that this agreement reflects an accurate estimate of the true nature of the universe in these regards. we are also all agreed that we do not have the overwhelming kind of evidence these truths represent, that would lead to a similar level of confidence regarding determination of the efficacy of homeopathic remedies.

this explains why no one in the present company is conceding the inadequacy of their own vision. it does not explain why so many in the present company insist that they have discovered the grail. quantum this. randomized that. the memory of water. the sweetness of sugar. it's all speculation at this point. we're still gathering evidence, people: but don't worry, there is plenty of room for pride of position, even if the road to the future is not quite clearly marked as yet ... though that leaves less room for ego, vanity, and condescension than some prefer, methinks.

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.

Well, all I can say is that I have yet to see an unflawed one. Now, obviously, I don't expect you to accept my authority on this. However, last time I looked, none of the trials came unscathed through peer review.



Hans

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<i>You have a right to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.</i>

Yes Hans, we are the homeopaths around here afterall. I suspect however that you just like to play at it though, extremely badly!!

Surely, this then makes most scientific trials fundamentally flawed in some kind of way, drug trials included? Think about that one for a moment hey!!

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Sarah-I. RN, Homeopath, Craniosacral Therapist, Therapeutic Massage Therapist, Reiki Master Teacher.

No, the trials in question were individually flawed. You can actually find formal faults in the protocols. Faults that would compromise the conclusions no matter what was investigated.

You cannot infer that all scientific trials are flawed.

Hans

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<i>You have a right to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.</i>

Qoute
The strange thing was that about the time Benveniste was being outed for heresy in 1989, theoretical work by Italian physicists actually predicted the molecular mechanism of just such a water-memory effect using an approach based on quantum theory.

I must say that this water memory is quite rubbish. As far as we can understanbd the properties of water, it is rather ridiculous to assign it with memory. Much more rational and scientific is to see it as a storage medium, much like a CD. Why this is more rational, is obvious from the fact that when distilled, its supposed memory is wiped. Hence this so-called memory is very labile and thus no memory at all. Otherwise, it would retain it for ever.
Our own memory does not suffer any diminishing when we go to the sauna and subject it to heat. Yet water loses all. A CD can be wiped of its information and so can water, hence it is nothing more, nor less than a storage medium.
I think this distinction is quite important to the arguments put forward here.

quote (hans): "As for the many theories of how homeopathic remedies might act physically, there is still none that do not require some as yet unvalidated mechanism to exist."

It is not theoretical when we state that the remedy neutralises the disease and the disease neutralises the remedy. The body in between these two forces is not attracted to either and thus in the healthy state.
It is like two magnets, whereby the energy of the one neutralises the energy of the other, provided of course that the identical poles are opposite each other. The piece of iron in between will not be attracted to either and thus in the neutral state.

Very High Dilutions Beyond Avogadro


ECH GENERAL ASSEMBLY – XVIII Symposium of GIRI 12 to 14th of November 2004. Scientific Report.
The Activity Of Very High Dilutions

First question addressed: The activity of very highly diluted preparations.
Homeopathic practitioners will argue that the use of preparations that are diluted beyond Avogadro’s number (i.e. potencies greater than C10) happens in only 25% of the prescribed homeopathic medications. Nevertheless, for some people this question is the most important obstacle to the acceptance of homeopathy.
A/ The experimental model that is cheapest, most reproducible and also the most easily researched is probably the “acetylcholine-induced contraction of the rat ileum”. It is a wellrecognized scientific model (Chang FY, Lee SD, et al. Rat gastrointestinal motor responses mediated via activation of neurokinin receptors. J.Gastroenterol Hepatol 1999; 14: 39-45).
This model has been devised for the verification of very high dilutions of Belladonna by A. Cristea, a Romanian researcher; results have already been published (Bastide M (ed). Signals and Images. Kluwer Academic Publishers 1997: 161-170).
Professor Wolfgang Suess, Institute of Pharmacy at the University of Leipzig, has used this model to test the transfer of the activity of a homeopathic remedy (in this case Atropinum sulphuricum D60) from the original liquid form to the homeopathic tablet. As usual, several controls were performed. Alpha-lactose monohydrate tablets impregnated with the highly diluted Atropinum had systematically efficacy, on the contrary with anhydrous alpha-lactose tablets no effect can be ascertained. Thus, the quality of homeopathic tablets can be tested before daily use in pharmacy (constant reproducibility). This very simple model therefore has the potential to remove doubts about the activity of very highly diluted homeopathic remedies (Schmidt F, Suess WG, Nieber K. In-vitro Testung von homöopathischen Verduennungen. Biol.Med./Heft 1/February 2004;32-37).

B/ It has taken much more time for another model to be accepted by the scientific community. The first publications appeared in 1991 but it is only in 2004, after an international cooperation, that the results have finally been accepted in a high-standard peer-reviewed journal, Inflammation Research. This model is different from the Benveniste model; he used the same control but not the same activator.

Professors Marcel Roberfroid and Jean Cumps of the Institute of Pharmacy at the University of Louvain, who respectively coordinated the European multi-centre (4 centres) trial and performed the statistical analysis, explained the protocols and discussed the results. The work demonstrates a significant inhibition of human basophil degranulation, as measured by alcian blue staining, by high dilutions of histamine (10-30 – 10-38 M). This multi-centre research has subsequently been confirmed in three laboratories by applying flow cytometry analysis and in one laboratory by measuring histamine release. Even if, at present, the molecular theory cannot explain these findings, the facts remain indisputable as recognized by the editor of Inflammation Research. (Belon P, Cumps J, Ennis M, Mannaioni PF, Roberfroid M, Sainte-Laudy J, Wiegant FAC. Histamine dilutions modulate basophil activation. Inflamm. Res. 2004; 53: 181-188.)

C/ Research on high dilutions has existed since the 1950s, but the number and quality of publications has increased in the last decade. Reviews and meta-analyses have even been performed but often ignored or even denied (see COST B4 supplement report EUR 19110 ISBN 92-828-7434-6). This research is not encouraged and even deemed inadvisable by academic authorities.
Professor Jean Cambar, Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Bordeaux, described the most important models that have been published previously in international journals, confirming the effects of very highly diluted homeopathic preparations.
The efficacy of very high homeopathic dilutions of human or animal natural molecules (also called endogen molecules) has been published several times in prestigious journals. Examples include the following:

Int J Immunotherapy 1987; 3: 191-200 (Thymulin in mice. Bastide M);
Int J Immunopharm 1990; 6: 211-214 (alpha/beta interferon, Carriere V);
J Vet Human Toxicol 1995; 37(3): 259-260 (Thyroxine, Endler PC);
Int J Immunopathol Pharmacol 1996; 9: 43-51 (Bursin, Youbicier-Simo BL).
During this meeting Dimitris Zienkiewicz, immunologist at the University of Edinburgh, presented preliminary findings assessing, by immunosorbent assay and flow cytometry, the alteration in activation and function of dendritic cells that comes about as a result of their treatment with homeopathic dilutions of a bacterium. Dendritic cells play an instrumental role in both activation and regulation of the immune system. Systematic changes in the profile of cytokines IL-10, IL-11 and IL-12 cannot be explained by the molecular theory.
Efficacy of very high homeopathic dilutions using pharmacological models has also been published in peer-reviewed journals. Examples include the following:
Thrombosis. Res. 1994;76: 225-229 (Acetylsalicylic acid in a vessel model. Doutremepuich C);
Haemostasis 1990;20: 99-105 (Acetylsalicylic acid in healthy volunteers. Doutremepuich C);
Thrombosis. Res.
1987; 48: 501-504 (Acetylsalicylic acid in healthy volunteers, Doutremepuich C).
The longest-used model, published frequently all over the world, is the toxicological model (Arsenic, Phosphorus, Mercury, Cadmium, Cisplatina, Glutamate, Cuprum sulphate, etc). It can be applied to vegetable, animal, cell culture material or even clinical studies. This model is still used and indeed is the theme for a collaboration between the Universities of Bern and Bologna, testing homeopathic arsenic trioxide treatments by plant-based bioassays. The working variables are the germinated seeds or the stem length on the seventh day. At least 6 recent experiments by this team are published (Dr Lucietta Betti. DISTA-Department of Agro environmental Science and Technology, University of Bologna.).
Experiments are well conducted, in controlled conditions, with a sufficient number of plants, animals or cells, and with a fair statistical treatment. The facts are indisputable, statistically significant and reproducible, even if they cannot be explained using the molecular paradigm.


The Content Of Very High Dilutions

• Second question addressed: The content of very highly diluted homeopathic preparations.
Professor Jean Cambar introduced the theme by asking what are the contributions of the different spectroscopies (Raman, Ultraviolet, X-ray or Magnetic Nuclear Resonance) in revealing the structure of water and solvents in high dilutions? What is the real relevance of Avogadro’s number in evaluating the precise pattern of molecules? Can a dilution work without any molecule? One of the most innovative perspectives in this last decade was the demonstration that high dilutions have as much activity and effectiveness in an organized structured solvent without any solute molecule as they do when molecules are present (even only some molecules).

Professor Louis Rey, Doctor of Sciences, Lausanne, a specialist in low temperature thermoluminescence, has published on this topic in the international journals Nature (1988; 391: 418) and C.R.Physique (2000; 1: 107-110). He presented the latest results of the experiments he carried out together with Dr. Philippe Belon on the thermoluminescence of ultra-high dilutions of lithium chloride and sodium chloride. Ultra-high dilutions of lithium chloride and sodium chloride (10-30 g cm-3) were irradiated by X- and gamma-rays at 77K, then progressively re-warmed to room temperature. During that phase, their thermoluminescence was studied and it was found that, despite their dilution beyond the Avogadro number, the emitted light was specific of the original salts dissolved initially. Much to the authors’ surprise, the experimental results showed, without ambiguity, the specificity of the contained information. The findings proved to be reproducible in the course of many different identical experiments. As a working hypothesis, the researchers propose that this phenomenon results from a marked structural change in the hydrogen bond network initiated at the onset by the presence of the dissolved ions and maintained in the course of the dilution process, and probably due to the successive vigorous mechanical stirrings. (Physica 2003; A323: 67-74).
Professor Guadalupe Ruiz-Vega, Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de Hidalgo, Morelia, Mexico, presented her most recent publications in the field of thermodynamics. She was able to demonstrate the biological effect of two ultra-low dose compounds. (Publication in process.)
The use of modern techniques in the hands of specialists is the best way to show sceptics that the experimental facts are well grounded and confirmed by reproducible experiments. Even in ultra-molecular homeopathic dilutions, specific information of the prime dissolved substance still remains in the preparation and can be detected experimentally.