Matt79
Global Moderator
Because I'm dissatisfied with the current level of SS-rage in support of science, let's discuss whether the practice of homeopathy should be banned, given it does no good and can acutally be dangerous.
To be clear, I'm not talking about any other kind of alternative remedy, some of which probably do work (albeit on a scientific basis that we simply haven't identified yet, or as a placebo), but specifically talking about homeopathy - the process defined in Wikipedia (for want of a readily accessible definition) as:
first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796, that attempts to treat patients with heavily diluted preparations. Based on an ipse dixit axiom formulated by Hahnemann which he called the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given as the treatment for patients exhibiting similar symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion, after each dilution under the assumption that this increases the effect of the treatment. Homeopaths call this process potentization.
I'd say yes, because you're essentially bilking people with a confidence scam. If I was caught sellig bottled water to people telling them it cured headaches or whatever, I'd get done for a scam. But because homeopaths go through a process that, according to everything we know about how chemistry works, would have no measurable affect on the water, and wrap in some pseudo-science babble, they are protected.
To be clear, I'm not talking about any other kind of alternative remedy, some of which probably do work (albeit on a scientific basis that we simply haven't identified yet, or as a placebo), but specifically talking about homeopathy - the process defined in Wikipedia (for want of a readily accessible definition) as:
first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796, that attempts to treat patients with heavily diluted preparations. Based on an ipse dixit axiom formulated by Hahnemann which he called the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given as the treatment for patients exhibiting similar symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion, after each dilution under the assumption that this increases the effect of the treatment. Homeopaths call this process potentization.
I'd say yes, because you're essentially bilking people with a confidence scam. If I was caught sellig bottled water to people telling them it cured headaches or whatever, I'd get done for a scam. But because homeopaths go through a process that, according to everything we know about how chemistry works, would have no measurable affect on the water, and wrap in some pseudo-science babble, they are protected.
