And back to spamming. Bye, Nancy.

Hans

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You have a right to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.

You keep on posting anti-homeopathy spams. In the mean time I am posting research papers on homeopathy

Homoeopathic Links (Theime)

Usefulness of the Homeopathic Medicines in Furunculosis (2010) //Hepar sulphuris, Antimonium crudum, Sulphur and Calcarea carbonica for boils

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Yes, you can prove that PI is an irrational number with an infinite number of decimal places.

And yes again on the the observation that very few areas of interest qualify as science in the strict sense. But it bears considering the consequences of this definition: something like medicine is NOT a science! Things like the application of statistics even become questionable in the medical context because statistics only strictly apply to REPEATABLE events. And no treatment is repeatable.

I agree. But what's the meaning of evidence if you can't repeat the claim made by somebody else because the phenomena observed are in principle not repeatable. That's the very situation medicine is in.

And homeopathy isn't better off than conventional medicine in this particular respect, either. But it makes me smile if a member of the established allopathic medicine accuses homeopathy of being "unscientific". They should abstain from throwing stones while sitting in a glass house themselves.

Not so. Quantity does not signify quality. And we have to be very careful what we regard as "evidence" in a scientific world.

Why do you say so?

That's a very relevant and extremely important question to which entirely too little thought has been given.

I don't want to write a book on this (yet) but I can tell you one thing I don't particularly consider very important in judging the merits of a therapeutic system: being "scientific".

There are other standards, measures and merits that are much more important than striving for something that's not even applicable much less relevant.

-- Chris.

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Chris Kurz
If you like my posts, you might also like my book:
"Imagine Homeopathy -- a book of experiments, images and metaphors"

Homeopathic remedies can provide a fast, lasting cure for depression. Part of the reason these natural remedies are so effective is that they match your personality and individual symptoms. Homeopaths have discovered the alternative medicine can be used to treat depression and anxiety


Homeopathy Sydney - effective homeopathic remedies that work

Allopathy is concerned with quantitiy whereas homeopathy is concerned with quality

Homeopathy improving Quality of life

Homeopathic medical practice (2005) FULL TEXT // (Chronic) Disease severity and quality of life demonstrated marked and sustained improvements following homeopathic treatment in 3981 patients for 2 years
BioMed Central | Full text | How healthy are chronically ill patients after eight years of homeopathic treatment? - Results from a long term observational study (2008) FULL TEXT //Disease severity & QoL of life increases following homeopathy treatment

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Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine
Homeopathic treatment of depression and anxiety (1997) //58% of patients responded to homeopathy for anxiety and phobia

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Let's not nitpick this too far, but I said verify. I know you can provide a theorethical proof, but according to Popper .....

Medicine can be approached scientifically. As I say, science is a method, so medicine is not science, but it can be approached using scientific methods.

This is false, even within homeopathic doctrine. Even in homeopathy, epidemic occurrences are treated as repeatable (with the same remedy for all patients). It is, of course, true that no two cases are exactly identical, but that does not mean they are not repeatable. Statistic methods are perfectly capable of handling noise factors. In fact, one of the important uses for statistic methods is to extract the repeatable parts of complex functions.

That is not correct. Even if though there are wide variations, it is still possible to prove causal relationships in medicine.

Well, you will notice that this thread was started by a homeopath. However, I do certainly consider conventional medicine to be using a far more scientific approach than homeopathy.

Well that was sort of my point. Nancy is the one posting loads of reports, and I sad that IF that was the measure, I could easily beat her.

I say that homeopathy and conventional medicine are mutually exclusive because their paradigms are incompatible. - In homeopathy, what is the definition and cause of disease?

No, the merits are to be judged on their practical ability to treat disease. However, the crux of the matter is: HOW do you judge this ability? By scietific methods (even given their limitations), or do you prefer anecdotical evidence?

Hans

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You have a right to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.

Yes, even according to Popper. Pi is an irrational number which can be proved irrefutably.

Strictly speaking and according to Popper: no. You can't apply scientific methods outside the field of science PER DEFINITION. Because science is defined (and here I agree with you) to be that part of knowledge which can be learned by the application of scientific methods. Scientific methods imply and are based on the repeatability, verifiability and falsifiability of its statements and premises. Most knowledge in medicine is not repeatable and therefore not verifiable or falsifiable. For example: the same medication may act in an unpredictable way and different from time to time. Treatment in allopathic medicine is most of the times a trial and error approach. If one medication doesn't work, let's try another one. This is not scientific. Don't get me wrong: there's nothing wrong with trial and error backed by some heuristic knowledge. It's just not a science. Still useful, but not a science.

As an aside: even though I am a nuclear physicist, I have never understood why it is of such paramount importance for allopoathy or homeopathy to be regarded as "scientific". There are places on the endless map of knowledge which lie within the realm of natural sciences and many more places which don't. Neither knowledge is more important or "better" than the other. It alludes me completely, why homeopathy even wants to be measured by the scientific yardstick. And sometimes I find it funny that allopathy really thinks that it can be. It reminds me of Grimm's fairytale of "The Emperor without Clothes."

Homeopathy isn't a science, either. I never claimed it would be. And much misunderstanding has arisen from the fact that the many among the homeopathic community dearly want it to be one. Epidemics aren't repeatable events. They are a number of events that have one basic trait in common -- the genus epidemicus. And they differ in many other respects.

Let's not go there. First, "cause" is an entirely elusive concept and many times a figment of our imaginations. To prove that A causes B again requires repeatability can strictly only be achieved if you understand the phenomenon in question at all levels. And we don't even begin to understand the underlying effects in medicine.

You can claim this many times over but it won't get more true by repetition. This is simply not true.

If that were true, than eating and drinking were mutually exclusive, too. Two things can only be mutually exclusive if either one doesn't leave room for the other and is capable of explaining all phenomena. Since this is not true for either of them, I contend that we cannot determine their mutual relationship. Probably they are both "true" in the sense that they both are valid frameworks for a beneficial therapy depending on circumstances. It all depends on the circumstances.

Right there you have pointed your finger to the crux of the problem: since their definitions of health and disease are very different, how can you compare them? What counts as "patient treated successfully, case closed" in allopathy will many times not be considered a "cure" for a homeopath. You are comparing appleas and pears.

-- Chris.

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Chris Kurz
If you like my posts, you might also like my book:
"Imagine Homeopathy -- a book of experiments, images and metaphors"

Disease is not an entity. It is dynamic disposition (alteration) in harmony of constitution (due to dis-arrangement of vital force) not just the physio-chemical alteration of tissues.

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http://drnancymalik.wordpress.com/

This is how homeopathy defines health, disease and cure

Health is not just merely an absence of disease but a state of equilibrium of the vital force that keeps the constitution of an individual in harmony.

Disease is not an entity. It is dynamic disposition (alteration) in harmony of constitution (due to dis-arrangement of vital force) not just the physio-chemical alteration of tissues.

Cure (-the single purpose and highest ideal of the medicine) is “the rapid, gentle and permanent restoration of health, or removal and annihilation of the disease in its whole extent, in the shortest, most reliable, and most harmless way, based on easily comprehensible principles” . Cure means the recovery of the state of stability of physiological norms.

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