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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMaybe I'm Misunderstanding Woo... But... Wasn't There A Time When...
Medicine was woo... or manned flight... landing on the moon... chemistry... geology... psychology... sociology...
Hell... the entire modern world would have been considered woo a hundred or two years ago.
Please set me straight.
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mike_c
(37,051 posts)" Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)The two concepts are entirely different.
pnwmom
(110,260 posts)even though it is backed up by dozens of studies published in reputable medical journals and practiced by doctors at Harvard, Stanford, Chicago, and elsewhere.
But they don't think that miniscus surgery for knee pain is woo, even though repeated studies show that it doesn't work any better than sham surgery for the vast majority of patients.
So the precise concept of "woo" seems to exist only in the mind of the user.
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)...those people are incorrect. I say "if true" only as a consequence of my own ignorance on the matter. But assuming that...
1) There are dozens of studies indicating a strong correlation between acupuncture and a therapeutic benefit.
2) There are significantly fewer studies which do not indicate a strong correlation.
3) The methodologies used are properly controlled to account for variables which might interfere with that correlation.
...then this is not woo. What you've described is SCIENCE. It would be woo if the efficacy was asserted to be fact without evidence, or the evidence was refuted. However, if, for example, 2 above is NOT true, and there are about an equal number or more to say that there is not a correlation, yet its proponents cherry-pick the studies that show that it has a correlation to assert its efficacy, then it is woo. If the assertion is NOT made, then it remains conjecturable, but is not woo.
If the assertion of meniscus surgery as beneficial is proven false (again, I am ignorant of many of the specifics), then, to continue to assert its benefits in the face of that information would be woo. However, I do recall some information that the surgery was originally in response to specific cases, in which it was efficacious (the small minority in the shadow of your vast majority), so if it does work in these cases, it is not specifically woo, rather its practice is overextended.
The precise concept of woo is real and specific and is not subject to the vagaries of any given mind. There is a right meaning for it. Pseudoscience. The unrelenting assertion of a questionable 'truth' in the absence of any support outside of the anecdotal, or the continued assertion of that truth in the face of direct evidence to the contrary. Whether people are using it properly notwithstanding, there is a proper usage.
pnwmom
(110,260 posts)have repeatedly made this claim. They made up their minds on the subject 20 years ago and no amount of research will change their minds.
http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/acupuncture-is-worth-a-try-for-chronic-pain-201304016042
Over the years there has been substantial debate about whether acupuncture really works for chronic pain. Research from an international team of experts adds to the evidence that it does provide real relief from common forms of pain. The team pooled the results of 29 studies involving nearly 18,000 participants. Some had acupuncture, some had “sham” acupuncture, and some didn’t have acupuncture at all. Overall, acupuncture relieved pain by about 50%. The results were published in Archives of Internal Medicine.
The study isn’t the last word on the issue, but it is one of the best quality studies to date and has made an impression.
“I think the benefit of acupuncture is clear, and the complications and potential adverse effects of acupuncture are low compared with medication,” says Dr. Lucy Chen, a board-certified anesthesiologist, specialist in pain medicine, and practicing acupuncturist at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital.
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)...a studied medical practice that has a palpable, non-trivial therapeutic value cannot be considered woo by any reasonable person.
Those DUers who have made this claim ought to temper their reflexive and overwrought skepticism and accept the idea that science has peered into this box and found something useful.
That said, though, is that this whole flap on DU of late seems to spring forth directly from the other side of the issue, the peddling of actual woo. The umbrella of 'alternative medicine' as understood by some DUers shelters some serious woo and irrational mistrust of science. Some of those vested within that framework of ideas take umbrage to being classified as such.
Then some poo was flung. The rest is history.
pnwmom
(110,260 posts)I disagree that this "flap" about woo sprang forth from peddlers of woo. I think it came from repeated posts like this one:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023207376
Vattel
(9,289 posts)IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)When things work, and it can't be explained, the folks who don't know why are shouting "woo!" instead of WHY?
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)
orpupilofnature57
(15,472 posts)darkangel218
(13,985 posts)
defacto7
(14,162 posts)but probably accepted.
orpupilofnature57
(15,472 posts)
jazzimov
(1,456 posts)"Excepted" means "excluded".
"Accepted" means "included".
defacto7
(14,162 posts)Both work.
TeeYiYi
(8,028 posts)TYY 
darkangel218
(13,985 posts)Unfortunately, those things happened in the past. They do not seem to care about history. Its just as woo as the present.
Pretty sick.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)They stand on those shoulders and claim to know the truth.
bananas
(27,509 posts)They don't seem to be able to grasp the concept.
"Those who don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it."
What's even weirder - I used to be like that - back when I was 14 years old.
Another old saying:
"How do you gain wisdom? Experience."
"How do you gain experience? By making mistakes."
They don't understand that science is still making very serious mistakes.
And we don't even know what those mistakes are.
There used to be a concept called the Precautionary Principle,
but our newbies are clueless about that, too.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)Those things were considered to be impossible at times when we had not discovered the proper prerequisite technologies or disciplines... No future technologies or disciplines will make homeopathy work as we have already figured out it does not work.
darkangel218
(13,985 posts)Really?? How so?
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)Long discredited as nothing more then a placebo at best and yet there are still people who deny the science and cling to non-sense. Any evidence offered is either denied outright, ignored or claimed to be 'fixed' somehow. Pure stupidity.
whatchamacallit
(15,558 posts)that anything new can be learned about the effects of natural compounds or therapies on human health. We are done here. <- Pure stupidity.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)The hucksters that try to pass it off claim that the water somehow has a memory of something being in it and that somehow that memory cures you... You are aware of this right?
TransitJohn
(6,937 posts)That's all you ever get in homeopathy, water.
idwiyo
(5,113 posts)Or something else. Because I want to believe it does! There!
^^^^^^
Scientific proof that homoeopathy works!
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)DES or Thalidamide eg? Speaking of 'woo'. I have a friend whose mother was given DES to 'prevent' miscarriages. The babies who survived that 'science' have suffered grotesque consequences such as cervical cancer, unable to have children, and moe recently, not just females but now also males.
Science is woo to the victims of these travesties. Otoh, it would be foolish to deny some of the successes of science, just as it is foolish to deny some of the successes of alternative medicine.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)It is a fantasy that it might ever 'cure' or even 'help' anything. The very best that can be said for it, is that it's a placebo. Not even the fact that you can name some bad drugs that have been put out for release changes that it does nothing.
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)Someone tells you "I did this, and then THIS happened" to which you reply, "no it didn't!"
I call it the "neener neener syndrome" - it involves ignoring data that does not agree with your preconceived notions instead of investigating how and why results were achieved.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)That some people continue to believe in several hundred year old crap does not change anything... It still does not work and it's a willful denial of reality to think otherwise.
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)be someone NOT LYING about their own personal experiences? That maybe the bottle contains SOMETHING that is beneficial or helpful or something that, if investigated, might yield value? Maybe it is the liquid it is mixed with, maybe it is the secret herbs and spices, and maybe they just have more powerful brains and are able to control their immune system like Tibetan monks - REAL investigation is a good thing.
Instead someone says to you "I did this and this happened" and you call them a gullible fool spreading delusions - then wonder why people get offended/don't find your "knowledge" to be as valuable as you do.
I don't know anything about homeopathy; I am in the "nutrition matters" camp. But seriously, denying the experiences of other people and ignoring data is NOT SCIENCE. At least not "good" science.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)It quenched my thirst. See? It WORKS.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)I had been wearing black underwear but switched to Grey yesterday and got cured.
See now why scientists must discount personal observations?
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)Because babies take 40 weeks to "cook", parents are instructed to judge their milestones based on "adjusted" versus "actual" age.
For example, a baby at six months is expected to begin meeting certain milestones - by 4-7 months, they begin to roll over, but since a PREMATURE baby hasn't finished "cooking", you subtract those months, and expect them to meet milestones for the "adjusted age". In my case, my babies were referred to as "six months actual/four months adjusted." (Is that clear?) Parents are assured premature babies will "catch up" to their full term peers between one and two years of age.
Except *my* babies were caught up to the "full term peers" by FOUR MONTHS ACTUAL/TWO MONTHS ADJUSTED, and by SIX MONTHS ACTUAL (four months adjusted) they were Top of the Growth Charts for Full Term Babies, and meeting/beating their milestones as if they were born full term. It is documented in detail with medical records and photographs, and as luck would have it, I know what I did "differently" and we've been able to repeat the same results in multiple cases with an identifiable pattern.
Oh, and we also have a reasonable explanation for why the babies "catch up" between one and two years of age - it is when they start eating "real food" which has the missing micronutrients they are deficient in, instead of the processed baby food, formula or breast milk. (Breast milk is best because what Mom eats, she is better able to pass on some of them.)
My babies were blatantly OUTSIDE THE NORM (thank goodness). Now, while some might attribute the results either my powerful prayers (lol!) or the birth of "magical mutations" (HA!), I think it is because I did something different and as it turns out, repeatable. Furthermore, it is TESTABLE (not that the medical community seems interested, six years later - grumble).
These types of things *SHOULD* be investigated thoroughly. If you are under the impression they are, let me disabuse you of that notion. They are dismissed with the "lucky" diagnosis.
And if they did it to me, with medical records, photographic evidence, and a couple of amazing children standing right in front of them, I guarantee it is happening in other "woo cases" too.
Silent3
(15,909 posts)...it's about whether they are confusing cause and effect.
Look up "post hoc ergo prompter hoc", a common logical fallacy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc
There are many reasons you might take something, feel better, yet that thing you took has nothing to do with you getting better, or is nothing more than yet another form of placebo.
The "liquid" homeopathic "treatments" are mixed with is water. Nothing but water. This water is used to make incredibly tiny dilutions of supposed "active" ingredients, often so great a dilution that it becomes statistically unlikely that there remains even a single atom of the supposed active ingredient. Why this would be called a "treatment" at all is based on the totally unproven, in fact widely discredited and inconsistently applied, notion that water retains a "memory" of the stuff that has been dissolved in it.
If there's anything in a homeopathic preparation that isn't water or the highly diluted (perhaps non-existent) active ingredient, it's either no longer homeopathy, or it's a contaminated batch. None of your "maybe this, maybe that"s apply here.
Beside, what constitutes "REAL investigation" when a thing has been investigated repeatedly, found wanting repeatedly, but people still cling to it? Is the jury always out? Is the fact that people won't give it up always to be considered positive evidence?
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)My current expertise (and take that with a grain of salt, because I have A LOT of questions) is nutrition.
Of course "cause and effect" can be confused ("I prayed, and my tumor went away, all while simultaneously taking chemotherapy."
, and that is why investigation for the *unexplained* improvements needs to happen.
Telling people that their experiences are not relevant instead of investigating is part of the problem.
There is a fabulous story (I'm losing track of the threads, but it is in one of the "woo" threads) about someone figuring out that "traditional treatment of rickets by native americans" was (bunch of stuff I don't remember) which *never* worked when the modern folk tested it, but was historically documented to be effective. Finally somebody figured out the concoction was traditionally prepared in *clay* containers (instead of modern glass, metal or plastic), and the mystery was solved.
I am not convinced that some of the "investigation" on "woo" has been conducted with scientific diligence. (I am not omniscent, so I may be wrong.) I can tell you this: when you type in "micronutrient deficiency" (my area of experience) the first site you find is one about "quack watch" which says "nothing has been proven." It does not tell you "nothing has been investigated." And I just got another note from a parent in the project about a child who was supposed to be dead (not kidding - a few weeks before she joined, the mother was being advised to "just let her go" who went from "failure to thrive/completely unable to control her own movement" to "no longer failure to thrive/recovered from hip dysplasia surgery in record time/just moved four feet in a gait trainer under her own power while wearing a body cast". She's a little young for the placebo effect to be credited. 
Some of this stuff is COMPLICATED. We've only got an 83% rate of good responses, and to be blunt, we are dealing with a diverse self-selected population. BUT if *I* was able to figure out that I have five difference sources of deficiency (prematurity/IUGR, maternal deficiency, malnutrition, absorption issues and exposure to teratregens) which all have the same symptoms (failure to thrive, neuromuscular issues, cognitive/communication delays, sensory processing issues) which four out of five times respond to the same protocol in the same pattern --
Ah, but it is "woo" until someone else publishes it in a medical journal. Sigh. And getting it investigated, if you aren't already trained to discount it, is like pulling teeth because WOO!!!!
Marr
(20,317 posts)Homeopathy has been repeatedly proven to be BS. The body heals itself from all sorts of things, however, and if someone is doing a homeopathic treatment while that healing takes place, they might very well assume a causal connection where none exists.
This is exactly the sort of thing that scientific testing is meant to weed out-- and the science has been in on homeopathy for a very, very long time.
TransitJohn
(6,937 posts)n/t
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)Many of their stories begin because someone starts asking questions.
Once there is a name, you can collect data (or so believes google).
For those of us with medical records, our stories AREN'T anecdotes; they can become what is known as a "case study."
Unless one chooses to dismiss them, of course. Then they are fairy tales. 
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)This is ridiculous, all sorts of us good democrats use homeopathic medicines quite happily. I keep arnica and apis melifera in my purse at all times for bumps and wasp stings. Most of us who raise livestock use a number of homeopathic remedies as first aid until the vet comes. And some prescribed by the vet. These bizarre conversations on DU are distracting us from the real problems that Republicans throw at us day in and day out. Just leave me alone with my arnica and Apis melifera. I get stung 20-30 times a year by wasps and it helps me tremendously.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)It's water (or perhaps alcohol), nothing more.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathy
It does not cure disease. It does not treat anything.
MyNameGoesHere
(7,638 posts)The drinking water for Washington, D.C., and surrounding areas tested positive for six pharmaceuticals.
I get treated for stuff I don't even have so woo hoo.
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)And this silly fighting over things that do not matter will end our once wonderful site where we came and debated and tried to educate each other.
Please, leave me alone with my little way of surviving wasp stings and bumps and bruises.
Let's debate political matters, not how I deal with wasp stings!
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)You seem to think it contains something other then water... It does not. Not even the makers of homeopathy "cures" claim it has anything other then water... They claim the water has a memory of something that was once in it and it somehow passes this memory on as a cure... It's complete non-sense and no rational person should be falling for it.
I do agree that this should not be a discussion topic for GD.
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)and what they say is not something that makes any sense to me BUT SO WHAT?!
When I get stung by a wasp, this stuff helps. I fall off my seed cleaner platform, the bruising is diminished. I do not care about if the supposed mode of action makes sense. It matters not to me.
I maintain that these topics should remain in the protected groups and that we reserve our discussions to topics of general interest rather than divisiveness and ridicule.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)YOU can use arnica all you want and I won't care less. The vets that prescribed it should have their licenses revoked though.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)Sid
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)who care for animals day in and out? Did you read what that fabulous horse trainer posted about her vets from Cornell, I believe?
Get a grip, the inability to observe cause and effect cripples one's capacity to learn and develop.
And give up on this silly crusade to rid DU of anyone who does not tow the line when it comes to your definitions of medicine.
This is bad for our site, and bad for the things we come together here to work towards.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)is an unwillingness to allow fraud.
Vets who use homeopathy and acupuncture are frauds. Our country needs more science and less bullshit.
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)veterinary sciences and great keeper of the temple of science : oh do take pity on us mere farmers and shepherds who turn to our dedicated vets who come to our lonely farms in the wee hours of the morning to help us with lambing or a colicky horse. Our vets who are physically here with us, castrating our lambs while sedated so that they do not suffer unnecessarily. Who advised me in the treatment of a ewe who suffered the loss of her entire epidermal layer on one side of the body from shoulder to flank thanks to a coyote attack. Her advice allowed this ewe to live and produce gorgeous lambs. It took 4 months for that skin to grow back, antibiotics and fly control daily, but the ewe survived because my vet was there for me advising all the way. The vet who gives shots to the farm worker's dogs and cats in the area pro bono. The vet who coordinates and volunteers at the low cost spay and neuter clinic for our county. Oh yes, dear and all knowledgeable Internet guy have mercy on us for turning to such frauds .... NOT!
Seriously, your opinion on these matters being voiced with unearned authority simply makes DU look more and more ridiculous.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)Thanks for taking my side....
I was talking about vets that practice bullshit and separate farmers from their money. Nothing you talked about was woo.
way to violently agree with me.
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)and like most all of the vets who work on horses advises the use of arnica for swelling. This "either or" mentality is simply nuts. We vaccinate when castrating and organic standards allow for non meat animals to be treated with antibiotics when administered by a vet. That our vets use all methods that work shows how intelligent they are. And this is not only my vet, most large animal vets employ all working modalities. Didn't you read all the posts by that horse trainer that your group attacked? Goodness!
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)Acupuncture and Arnica are methods to separate people from their money and nothing more.
Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)I will alert.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)You go right ahead
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Even at the Olympic level the vets use arnica and acupuncture. They dose the horses and do the acupuncture and chiro themselves. Since they're on salary this isn't some kind of billing scheme. Its because it works.
You are so woefully behind the times I pity you.
I wouldn't spend $$ on any remedy that didn't provide tangible observable results with the animals under my care, custody and control.
Observable by mri, ultrasound, xrays or physical demonstration.
The racehorse industry has poured billions into research. They've brought more "woo" medicine into the mainstream human medical realm than I'm willing to re-hash.
MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)Being that it is dressage you probably have the money for it though.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Quantifiable via MRI, ultrasounds, xrays and performance.
NOBODY will pay for procedures that don't provide pain relief for beloved animals.
NOBODY.
Fact is rich people cut loose poorly performing vets faster than you can wipe your butt.
Bank on it.
The USEF funds all international equestrian sports. Those vets are on salary. There's no incentive to use acupuncture, chiro, homeopathic remedies... no incentive at all.
Except they work.
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)when it comes to the investigation I have been involved in as it turns out the vets have been investigating nutrition issues in regard to trace mineral deficiency issues for decades. Just the writings on "nutritional deficits during pregnancy can impact two generations down" -- !!! -- solved one of the mysteries for us. Vets are the best, especially because they have to figure out what is going on with patients who can't talk.
to the vets!
zappaman
(20,627 posts)Proof that it's not a charade!
http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2079795,00.html
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)not as a cure but as an assist to the body's own intelligence,
so the body can cure itself.
It really is science, in fact it is highly advanced technology.
You just haven't figured out yet how to measure things like this.
The instruments of science are crude, yet.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)
Sid
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)SidDithers
(44,333 posts)Sid
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)Marr
(20,317 posts)MattBaggins
(7,948 posts)Marr
(20,317 posts)But that's about it.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)By that "logic", you are no more scientific than woo! I'm not a fan of quackery, but there have been LOTS of cases where "science" turned out to be woo and vice-versa. Only it didn't seem that way at the time.
--------------------------------------
http://www.homeopathy-soh.org/about-homeopathy/what-is-homeopathy/
The principle of treating “like with like” dates back to Hippocrates (460-377BC) but in its current form, homeopathy has been widely used worldwide for more than 200 years.
It was discovered by a German doctor, Samuel Hahnemann, who, shocked with the harsh medical practises of the day (which included blood-letting, purging and the use of poisons such as arsenic), looked for a way to reduce the damaging side-effects associated with medical treatment.
He began experimenting on himself and a group of healthy volunteers, giving smaller and smaller medicinal doses, and found that as well as reducing toxicity, the medicines actually appeared to be more effective the lower the dose. He also observed that symptoms caused by toxic ‘medicines’ such as mercury, were similar to those of the diseases they were being used to treat e.g. syphilis, which lead to the principle he described as ‘like cures like’.
Hahnemann went on to document his work, and his texts formed the foundations of homeopathic medicine as it is practised today. A BBC Radio 4 documentary aired in December 2010 described Hahnemann as a medical pioneer who worked tirelessly to improve medical practice, insisting that medicines were tested before use.
References
1) Endler PC, Heckmann C, Lauppert E, et al. The metamorphosis of amphibians and information of thyroxine. In: Schulte J, Endler PC (eds). Fundamental Research in Ultra High Dilution and Homoeopathy. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998
2) Montagnier L et al. Electromagnetic signals are produced by aqueous nanostructures derived from bacterial DNA sequences. Interdiscip Sci Comput Life Sci, 2009; 1: 81-90
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)And more:
"The fact that homeopathic medicines are so highly diluted has led some sceptics to say that homeopathic medicines are ‘nothing but water’. However, research suggests that vigorous shaking during the manufacturing process may imprint information from the original substance into the water it is dissolved in which would explain how preparations can still be active at very high dilutions."
http://www.homeopathy-soh.org/about-homeopathy/about-your-remedy/
Yeah... It has a memory of something once being in it... It's water.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)some "scientific" studies find unexplained results, and those are not in wikipedia..
Sorry but the vast, vast majority have found it is at best a placebo. It's water by their own admission... You just can't get around the whole 'memory heals you' thing. It's non-sense used to prey on the desperate and the foolish.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)The evidence was scant, and the cause was hard to demonstrate. Smokers and many scientists thought the idea was "woo".
One hundred years later, the evidence was clear.
Lots of effects are intermediate, weak, difficult to detect, and hard to replicate. That doesn't mean the effect isn't real.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)After a few hundred years, one would thin science would be able to detect... Anything. It's a fantasy.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)and may not affect everyone.
That's the point of the article.
Maybe it will be a proven therapy in the future.
Real science doesn't exclude any possibility...even if it's unlikely or misunderstood.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)At least learn about what you promote.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)you condemn an effect that some people observe and a few (but not all) attempts at experimental treatment show a small or possible effect. Of course, you say, "it's only water" and call it "woo" because there is no clear scientific evidence that it's a useful treatment.
In the 1890's, medical doctors (in a famous publication at Dartmouth) said that smoking caused cancer.
In exactly the same way, some people at the time said "it's only smoke" . Likewise, most scientific efforts failed to find a clear connection to cancer so many lay people ridiculed those who warned that smoking might be the cause of cancer.
-because the effect didn't happen to everyone
-because the effect was hard to detect
-because the chemistry was not understood
It took many years and study to find that smoking caused cancer.
You can't just discount something as "woo" because you say "it's only _____" and you can't discount any observed phenomena just because science doesn't understand it (yet).
You have no way to know that "it's only water" and you don't have any way to predict what future science will discover. Therefore, you have no right or reason to call something "woo".
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)You have a failure to understand that science has advanced enough in the last few hundred years so that we do in fact understand how dilution works, it is no longer a mystery. It is not some trace amount we do not have the ability to detect... It is diluted out of existence... It's gone... It is just water. This is not some claim made from a lack of ability to detect, it is a statement of fact. That you fail to understand the basic science behind how dilution works, does not mean it does not not exist... And that you choose to not only continue to remain ignorant but to also try and pass off such ignorance shows a willful ignorance. You night as well also believe that what you are trying to cure is evil spirits... It is the same essential hoax that creationists try to pass off in their efforts to discredit evolution... Cherry picked bits made to sound like science mixed with out right lies and some vague claim that we just don't know enough yet. Complete non-sense.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)your first sentence gives away your poor logic. Every day, science and chemistry progress - so you cannot state that anything is "no longer a mystery". Real science never completely "understands" anything.
Next, your assertion that "it's just water" doesn't hold water. We established that in the last post.
Calling me ignorant is a personal attack, which also reveals something about yourself. BTW, I'm not ignorant - in fact I'm highly educated. I don't personally have a direct research interest in hydrology, but I'm pretty knowledgeable and formally trained in research. Actually, you don't understand the basic science and I don't have time to discuss detailed chemistry on DU.
You really need to study the history of science more, and maybe participate in some actual science. I doubt it would change your mind or emotional reaction - but you are simply wrong in your assertions.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts) Sancho
(9,205 posts)Montagnier L et al. Electromagnetic signals are produced by aqueous nanostructures derived from bacterial DNA sequences. Interdiscip Sci Comput Life Sci, 2009; 1: 81-90
This was already sent to you, but there are many more. Water is not "just water" if it has ionic or magnetic or other properties even though it's just H2O.
You are still wrong, and going down deeper and deeper into the dark water "ignorance". Keep going...and you will drown in your lack of knowledge of "basic science"
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)So... They dilute shit to the point it cannot be detected anymore through 'special shaking' and create "Electromagnetic signals are produced by aqueous nanostructures derived from bacterial DNA sequences" and this miracle cures people at a rate consistent with the placebo effect... The people who make it have not even a remote clue how this works, can't replicate it for studies with more consistency then a placebo and it has been this way for a few hundred years... Yet you still want to insist 'we just don't know enough'?
Should not common tap water also have these undetectable trace amounts? Why does it not cure everything?
It's probably missing that magical 'special shaking'...
Also... How does this special shaking create "ionic or magnetic" properties? Does this mean it is no longer "like cures like" but rather it is this "ionic or magnetic" properties created by the magic shaking that is really what cures people at rates consistent with a placebo?
Do you realize just how stupid this all sounds?
Sancho
(9,205 posts)whether or not you think something works, or is a placebo, or whatever isn't the point. Your "opinions" don't count.
Many others have pointed out to you that the history of science (old and recent) is replete with assertions that were shown to be false, undetected effects, and new discoveries that explain the previously unexplained.
This chemistry of water that you are so excited about is simply a case where YOU make a blanket statement that cannot be true. Your descriptions of what you think is happening or why it is "woo" to you are simply wrong in the context of science, history, and also the anecdotal experience of some people.
As such, you have to accept that you could calling names for no reason.
And no, common tap water may have undetectable properties. Water changes dramatically from one city or well to another - and even changes from day to day. There are certainly elements and properties that are not typically detected or even tested for...which is one of many rival hypotheses as to why water or diluted compounds might have a real effect. Have you ever asked your public utility for a report of their regular analysis...even that will list many trace elements. Of course, the city is likely adding things like chlorine and fluoride, testing for all kinds of bacteria, and checking acidity.
Again, DU is not the place to discuss the molecular properties of water or anything else. You just need to understand that the chemistry of water and all the possible things that could be in the water is likely a lifetime of study.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)We have a great place to discuss it... The Science Group:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1228
Since it is so complicated you feel we here in GD just can't understand, please post it all there... I'm certain it will go over as a wondrous revelation when you post all the real science behind it... Or you can just keep trying to claim we are just all too stupid to understand.
I'll be looking for your 'science'
Sancho
(9,205 posts)I've been subscribed to the science group for years, and I really think that most people on DU are pretty reasonable. You don't seem to have any science background yourself, because you don't know how to look up or read any of the articles or studies on the topic that you rant about...and you didn't follow the few examples that I provided to you. You cite weak sources like Wikipedia.
Again, you seem to enjoy illogical and personal attacks, but you don't get the point. Your statement that "it's just water" is NOT a justification to claim that there's no possible therapeutic effect - even if there's not a clear "scientific" reason that makes sense to you. The history and alternative hypotheses have been explained to you, yet you try to change to another attack.
I suspect that your difficulties with this are probably because you haven't had much formal science study yourself, but it's also possible that you are just making a logical error. Regardless, I've tried to explain it to you (and so have some others).
"Those convinced against their will, are of the same opinion still!"
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)Does that mean you won't be presenting anything?
Sancho
(9,205 posts)I'll be glad to help you understand them. When you've gotten through these basics, PM me and I'll get you into some details.
I just gave you references to a bit of the science you didn't know about, including some about the "magic water" you seem to be obsessed by. Honestly, what I posted to you was just a tiny tip of easily available science. For example the first article I asked you to read has a reference list with yet another set of studies to consider.
I don't know if you can even read the biology, chemistry, or statistics in these articles. It usually takes years of graduate study to read and understand some refereed publications.
In my first response to your post I indicated you didn't know the science, and yet you spouted off and called me ignorant.
Frankly, you need to apologize and admit you didn't know what you were talking about. No, I won't post any of my own research articles on DU - and I generally don't work in the area of homeopathy - but I can read and understand most of these published research. If I don't understand, I'm glad to say so. I would not make rash statements about something that I didn't understand.
To conclude this argument, when you say, "It's just water" you are wrong to imply that there's no science about homeopathy, and also you are wrong if you think the science is clear and the issue is scientifically settled. It is not.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)You seem to know where the scientific papers are... You just need to post the links to them in the Science Group... It does not have to be original work... Why the hesitation? Please post this science that proves homeopathy.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)you are the one who made the incorrect statements as part of this thread, and I simply demonstrated where you were wrong.
If you have access to a science library, many of those articles are easy to download. There are some articles that require a fee.
I don't need to start a new discussion in a different group titled, "Why Ohio Joe is wrong about water". Anyone who bothered to read the series of discussions with you clearly understands you are logically wrong.
Even if I did or did not believe homeopathy is good medicine, there is no clear way for you to say, "It's just water" and discount the entire practice of homeopathy as "woo".
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)heh... heh, thats funny.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)if you followed the Science group, you know they have already debated (on several occasions) the strengths and weaknesses of refereed/peer reviewed research.
Wether a particular member of the Science group agrees or not with an article doesn't matter. The articles have already been through a peer review process. Almost all scientists agree the review process is not perfect and they make mistakes, but expert reviewer who don't know the name of the author should have already read and approved the contents of the research.
Soooo....what anyone "believes" is of no relevance once it's published. If you disagree, you must perform some counter research or else you must write a professional rebuttal and send it to the editor. It's not the same thing as saying you "believe that blue cars are prettier than red ones".
Yet again, you obviously don't understand the scientific process. If you want to read and debate the contents of some of the literature, then do so. As I stated, I only sent you a small list of easily obtained references. I'm sure some are better evidence and better written than others, but all should be scholarly descriptions of some aspect of homeopathy.
In other words, it is not a simple, "Its just water". You are simply wrong to make that assertion. If you don't want to use homeopathy, that fine, but you should not discount things you don't know much about, including science.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)That is your claim... Back it up... Ohhhh, but I bet you will just find another excuse not to do so... We are just all too stupid
Sancho
(9,205 posts)You said, "it's only water" and "basic science" doesn't support homeopathy. You are wrong. I have no idea how intelligent you are, but from your postings I suspect you are not a practicing scientist. I am stating you are wrong and providing evidence.
I simply provided an assortment of scientific studies that included your magic "water" and some science that supports homeopathy.
The reviewers and editors who published the science are experts in the field who have already debated the merits at a higher level of knowledge than DU and already decided to publish it. BTW, did you notice I included a "meta-analysis"? That is a statistical summary of all the "best evidence" on a given topic - in this case homeopathy. Again, it's a scholarly debate of the type you desire, but by chemists, biologists, doctors, and other experts who know what they are debating. At the end, they publish the best.
There's no excuse. If you want to read and debate that meta-analysis, please get it, read it, and we'll post it on any part of DU that you wish. Also, like all good science many articles admit that some things are still not understood so more research is needed to reach a conclusion.
In this case, I'm sticking to your original statement, "it's just water" implying that there's no possible positive effect of homeopathy; what you call "woo". You also state that science universally agrees with you. In both cases you are wrong. Water therapy can be complex and may not be understood, but there is certainly scientific research on the topic.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)Now you turn it to 'water therapy'. Sheesh... At least you now admit it's just water. I'm done with your silliness but do let me know when you post all the scientific support for homeopathy in the Science Group... I can't wait to see how it goes over.
Sancho
(9,205 posts)you have been proven wrong. You can't defend the fact that you are wrong.
You simply attack and change directions and won't stick to your statement.
You repeatedly said, "It's only water". You said repeatedly said there's no science.
I've given you some references from science including a few on "water". There are plenty more, because homeopathy is certainly in the health care literature. Various diluted preparations are obviously some of the research. The professionals seem to admit that they can't always explain the effects of homeopathy, but I don't keep up with that field...OTOH I have shown you that your statements are simply overblown, wrong, and misguided. It's not simply, "woo".
You called me "ignorant" (in violation of DU rules BTW). Here's your chance to admit your mistaken position.
If you want to say what is wrong with any published journal article or government report - then post it yourself and state why the chemistry or statistical analysis or whatever is wrong. Go for it!
Again, you need apologize for the personal attacks and apologize for your incorrect position. Maybe you need to say "thank you" to all those who have corrected your logic and provided you new information.
Waiting on you!
Sancho
(9,205 posts)The first article in this list refers to your water!
Vallance AK. Can biological activity be maintained at ultra-high dilution? An overview of homeopathy, evidence, and Bayesian philosophy. Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. 1998;4(1):49–76.
Homeopathy for treatment of irritable bowel syndrome.
Peckham EJ, Nelson EA, Greenhalgh J, Cooper K, Roberts ER, Agrawal A.
Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2013 Nov 13;11:CD009710
Adverse effects of homeopathy: a systematic review of published case reports and case series - comment by Tournier et al.
Tournier A, Roberts ER, Viksveen P
Int J Clin Pract. 2013 Apr;67(4):388-9
A 30 minute introduction to homeopathy, made by the BBC in the 1990s. It so impressed the British Medical Association that they gave it their "Medicine in the Media" Gold Award - the BMA's highest possible accolade
www.dailymotion.com/video/xk45kr_homeopathy-medicine-or-magic_tech
Altunc U, Pittler MH, Ernst E. Homeopathy for childhood and adolescence ailments: systematic review of randomized clinical trials. Mayo Clinic Proceedings. 2007;81(1):69–75.
Cucherat M, Haugh MC, Gooch M, et al. Evidence of clinical efficacy of homeopathy: a meta-analysis of clinical trials. European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. 2000;56(1):27–33.
Der Marderosian AH. Understanding homeopathy. Journal of the American Pharmaceutical Association. 1996;NS36(5):317–321.
Ernst E. A systematic review of systematic reviews of homeopathy. British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. 2002;54(6):577–582.
Ernst E. Homeopathy: what does the “best” evidence tell us? Medical Journal of Australia. 2010;192(8):458–460.
Ernst E. The truth about homeopathy. British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. 2007;65(2):163–164.
Jonas WB, Kaptchuk TJ, Linde K. A critical overview of homeopathy. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2003;138(5):393–399.
Kuehn BM. Despite health claims by manufacturers, little oversight for homeopathic products. JAMA: Journal of the American Medical Association. 2009;302(15):1631–1634.
Merrell WC, Shalts E. Homeopathy. Medical Clinics of North America. 2002;86(1):47–62.
Posadzki P, Alotaibi A, Ernst E. Adverse effects of homeopathy: a systematic review of published case reports and case series. The International Journal of Clinical Practice. 2012;66(12):1178–1188.
Rowe T. Homeopathy. In: Goldblatt E, Snider P, Quinn S, et al., eds. Clinicians’ and Educators’ Desk Reference on the Licensed Complementary and Alternative Healthcare Professions. Seattle, WA: Academic Consortium for Complementary and Alternative Health Care; 2009.
Shang A, Huwiler-Müntener K, Nartey L, et al. Are the clinical effects of homoeopathy placebo effects? Comparative study of placebo-controlled trials of homoeopathy and allopathy. Lancet. 2005;366(9487)
26–732.
Tedesco P, Cicchetti J. Like cures like: homeopathy. American Journal of Nursing. 2001;101(9):43–49.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Manual of Compliance Policy Guides. Sec. 400.400. Conditions Under Which Homeopathic Drugs May Be Marketed. U.S. Food and Drug Administration Web site. Accessed at www.fda.gov/ICECI/ComplianceManuals/CompliancePolicyGuidanceManual/ucm074360.htm on March 22, 2012.
dionysus
(26,467 posts)Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)dionysus
(26,467 posts)Tumbulu
(6,630 posts)that there are a few homeopathic remedies that work for me.
If you want to be part of this nasty group on DU who want to ridicule people and make them feel bad, just keep this insulting conversation up. I have stated repeatedly that I appreciate how these inexpensive and legal remedies help me. Now leave me and the other democrats for whom these remedies work ALONE!
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Mr. Scientific Materialist!
Sid
joshcryer
(62,536 posts) SidDithers
(44,333 posts)
Sid
joshcryer
(62,536 posts)I recently discovered my mom was dropping $60 a month on a homeopathic remedy. It broke my heart. I didn't tell her that it was quite literally water, with the constituent elements supposedly there to fix the problem so diluted as to be no longer existing in the water.
indie9197
(509 posts)When I was a land surveyor all the crews used it. It works.
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)It did not prevent poison ivy on anyone... ever... any more then water does (since that is what it is). That you did not get hit by the poison ivy had nothing to do with any homeopathy 'preventative'.
Saviolo
(3,321 posts)...to get people to separate Homeopathy with Holistic medicine, which are two different things. I made a thread a while ago, a link to an article about how homeopathic medicine can easily do more harm than even the good of the placebo effect it can sometimes encourage, but I got reminded again and again that herbals and alternative medicines do in fact work! You'll never convince people they're not the same thing.
In the mean time, hold on to this amazing line from Tim Minchin's amazing spoken word piece "Storm:"
If you show me
That, say, homeopathy works,
Then I will change my mind
I'll spin on a fucking dime
I'll be embarrassed as hell,
But I will run through the streets yelling
It's a miracle! Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory!
And while it's memory of a long lost drop of onion juice is Infinite
It somehow forgets all the poo it's had in it!
Here's the whole piece:
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)They put out a few tweets a day that just have quotes for atheists. A few months ago they put out one by Tim Minchin and I made it my sig line I had never heard of him before but I've really come to love him.
What's the Twitter handle for that? I'd follow it I already follow Richard Dawkins
Ohio Joe
(21,898 posts)I have no idea who runs it or anything but I do like to read their messages every day.
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Medicine was never woo, neither manned flight, moon landings, etc...
Woo is the practice of purporting things (or the very things themselves) that are wildly speculative, thoroughly debunked, outside the realm of common sense, unsupported by anything but anecdotal evidence or study which is poor in the scientific method as fact or at least strongly indicating factuality.
For example, the antivax movement is woo because it is thoroughly debunked. Much of 'holistic medicine' is woo because the claims of efficacy are largely anecdotal and where not supported by less than rigorous attention to scientific method. ESP and the paranormal are woo because the powers or phenomena claimed conveniently disappear under scrutiny.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
Leonardo da Vinci, who lived from 1452-1519, is well known for his anatomical sketches of the human body. He would dissect dead human remains and then draw what he saw.
Dissection was completely illegal unless one was a physician, which da Vinci was not. It is believed that da Vinci would get a grave robbers, and eventually a hospital director to get him cadavers to study. da Vinci hid all of this anatomical drawings and kept them secret because of the illegal nature of what he was doing. He was able to identify not only muscles and bones, but also their functions in the body, which was an incredible breakthrough. Sadly, he was not able to share any of this knowledge with others, once again, because of the illegal nature of what he was doing.
da Vinci believed only that in which he could observe, which is probably one of the reasons he resorted to dissection to learn more about the human body.
He dissected bodies illegally at first, but eventually got special permission from the catholic church to dissect and sketch what he learned for a medical book. This is when he started to use the hospital director to get him bodies. Eventually, the hospital director got much ridicule over doing this and forbade dissections.
As an artist and a great mind, da Vinci saw it important enough to ignore the law and study human anatomy via dissections. His deviance led to a better understanding of the human body, and is an important footnote in medical and art history.
Link: http://www.artcrimearchive.org/article?id=88001
eallen
(2,982 posts)WillyT
(72,631 posts)It was the scientists and their supporters who were the woo.
The alchemists and religious folk... not so much.
Keep an OPEN mind.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)Woo is fraud. It's doing things like claiming vaccines cause autism.
Heliocentrism was never woo - the people supporting it had studies backing up their claims. The fact that it took a while to be accepted did not make it woo.
Antivaxxers do not have such data. They have wild-ass claims that don't stand up to the most basic of testing.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)I agree with that.
However, you still need to test the hypothesis.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)WillyT
(72,631 posts)Scientists can also be paid to lie, make mustard gas, Zyklon-B, thermonuclear devices, etc...
jeff47
(26,549 posts)Those devices did exactly what their backers claimed.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)Link: http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1939493,00.html
jeff47
(26,549 posts)It has to be actually tested, found lacking, and then still pushed in order to be woo.
defacto7
(14,162 posts)Imagination is not the acceptance of an unproven method or believing something works either because it is perceived or not perceived to work, it's simply approaching the world with creativity. I don't think the "woo" being discussed (whatever that is) fits that criteria. But it's a nice quote anyway.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)WOW !!!
The fact that you do not get it explains so much... but I thank you for your honesty.
defacto7
(14,162 posts)You just stepped into it and you don't even know it.
You definitely are a person to beware of with such banners of self aggrandizement. But your ship did crash which was not my intention, you just leaped into your own loss of reasonable trust. Too bad. That's what I didn't expect.
Be well.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)http://www.insolitology.com/tests/credo.htm
Sid
dionysus
(26,467 posts)(reincarnation? realllly?) finding out which people here believe in woo doesn't surprise me at all...
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)It's truly mind bottling.
Sid
dionysus
(26,467 posts)tune
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)No. Woo is what you call something to dismiss it as nonsense, or fringe ideas.
During Vietnam it was considered to be "woo" to talk about The Trilateral Commission. (They have a website)
Has the CIA raised money through drug sales?
On Right-Wing boards they consider it "woo" to claim Iraq didn't have WMDs. (Over there it's considered settled FACT that they were found.)
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Woo is the fraud of asserting something as true without evidence or in the face of specific refutation. Woo does not require a threshold of acceptance, nor is retractable as a matter of hindsight.
Woo has nothing to do with politics. It is a specific term used to describe pseudoscience in a (deservedly) pejorative way. It has never been used meaningfully in any other way. So none of the things you are using here in support are actually applicable. And even if they were, who gives a whirling rat flatus what the hell they consider woo on a right-wing board? They don't know what the fuck woo is or isn't either.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Woo has nothing to do with politics.
I really don't think I can put it much plainer than that.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)That's not woo... because it's political in nature.
You guys aren't helping.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)You're not helping yourself, Willy.
Sid
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
Lesson 1: Spelling.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
Response to WillyT (Reply #107)
ElboRuum This message was self-deleted by its author.
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)...and an opportunity.
Miscellaneous pointless smilies for your amusement:
Because that's how DU rolls.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
It's not woo. It's an ignoramus spouting ignorance, but it isn't woo. Us guys may not be helping, but I get the distinct impression you're not trying.
Help me help you.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Use the broadest one you can find, kind of a philosophical all-in, huh?
To answer your retort... um, no they don't. That's just stupid, what you just said. Oh, and just because you like to redpill in your spare time doesn't make your opinion valid or even reasonable.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)...the response will be in kind, every time.
You got what you asked for, nothing more.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)"People here call anything "woo" that might fly in the face of the DC Villagers view of the world."
Firstly, let's examine your use of the word "people". Without qualifier, implying all (presumably those who don't share your view).
Secondly, let's examine your contention. People call anything woo. Excessively broad, snark to follow.
Third, let's examine the snark. That might fly in the face of the DC Villagers view of the world. Implication, redpill/bluepill nonsense (WAKE UP SHEEPLE).
So let's sum up. You attacked everyone here who thinks that your point of view is straight up a tree as typical sheeple. A daft and ridiculous attack, but an attack nonetheless.
Has your curiosity been satisfied, or will there be a flurry of denials and affirmations to follow?
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)What cause are you referring to? Who is panicking? What dogma are you referring to?
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)How does this apply relevantly to either your question or my response?
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)science'.
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Not as it has been thus defined.
Scientists can be fallible. Science cannot be. Not because scientists do not make mistakes, but because the word 'infallible' makes no sense when juxtaposed with science.
LeftishBrit
(41,453 posts)Last edited Wed Jan 8, 2014, 03:55 PM - Edit history (1)
Thalidomide was not properly tested before being put on the market in Europe (fortunately, the American authorities of the time did refuse to put it on the market before testing it). The same for DES.
In general, anything that is powerful enough to be effective can also have bad side effects. This is true both of medicines and of powerful natural objects like the sun - vital in e.g. ensuring sufficient Vitamin D; but can cause skin cancer. Thalidomide actually has a limited but important place in medicine, in the treatment of leprosy and of certain cancers; but obviously should never be used by anyone who could be pregnant, or at all where there are safer alternatives. On the other hand, anything that is absolutely safe probably can neither harm you nor cure you. Thus homeopathy will not kill you - except perhaps indirectly by preventing you from seeking effective treatment for a life-threatening illness - but is unlikely to cure you either.
Ms. Toad
(38,635 posts)Last edited Sun Jan 5, 2014, 11:46 PM - Edit history (1)
A group of individuals who
- make blanket derogatory statements about any and all forms of complementary or alternative medicine (CAM)
- reject any scientifically rigorous research about specific CAM treatments which establishes safety and efficacy (or concerns about traditional medicine) by one of two means:
- insisting the CAM then magically loses its status as CAM even though the treatment/substance is part of the group of treatments/substances which have always been part of CAM - thereby supporting their binary world in which all alternative medicine is "woo", so if it is proven to work it cannot possibly be CAM (aka redefining exceptions out of existence) OR
- by lumping together both scientifically based and extremely speculative concerns/assertions into one group (as is done with specific science based concerns about vaccines), slapping a label on it (anti-vaccers) and dismissing the entirety as magic thinking (aka making a strawman and then batting it down).
There is room for a lot of productive discussion and exploration of the role of CAM in health care - insisting it is all "woo" is ignorant and offensive.
(Edited to add, as an example, the response I described in (1) (the one I defined in (2) is in the post to which this is a response).
- insisting the CAM then magically loses its status as CAM even though the treatment/substance is part of the group of treatments/substances which have always been part of CAM - thereby supporting their binary world in which all alternative medicine is "woo", so if it is proven to work it cannot possibly be CAM (aka redefining exceptions out of existence) OR
KT2000
(22,150 posts)ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Putting aside the defensive and ignorant nature of your post for a moment...
Complementary or alternative medicine is not 'woo' if it is subjected by its proponents to scientific evaluation and peer review. If it subjects itself to such review and is found false, non-correlative to positive health outcomes, or is otherwise found to be lacking in therapeutic value and its proponents continue to insist on its value, then YES. IT IS WOO.
This is PRECISELY the case with the antivax crowd. They base their entire rationale on one debunked study and an irrational mistrust of the scientific community. This is woo incarnate. Continuing to promote this nonsense in light of the damage which can be caused by it is not only ignorant, but unethical and dangerous. So I'm sorry if the antivax crowd has a sad because someone calls them on their bullshit, but I'm not going to stand idly by while they promote hazardous ignorance.
Similarly, just because people don't trust allopathic medicine, citing a profit motive or possibly a general mistrust of science (odd that so called 'educated' people could mistrust science, but whatever, it's not unknown on DU) doesn't mean that their assertions have credence by default. It is still up to those who assert the value of these treatments to prove them out by more than just anecdotal evidence and testimonials from 'cured' individuals. If there is value in a treatment, science can only serve to certify and maybe even expand on what is ostensibly there. If such a treatment exists, it is not 'woo'. If such does not exist or is resistive of attempts at vetting, it is.
There is an anti-woo crowd on DU. This is true. And there should be. Because 'woo' is an unrelenting assertion of truth in the absence of knowledge or in the face of its direct refutation. Another word for this is 'faith'. Faith is fine for a religion, medicine, not so much.
Ms. Toad
(38,635 posts)Just really tired of the black and white condescension directed at anyone who doesn't toe the anti-woo party line.
On that we agree. Unfortunately the most vocal and insistent opponents of "woo" lump all CAM into one category and reject it all, usually along with some express or implied name calling directed even at people who provide links to scientifically rigorous studies - at best, the response is "well then that isn't alternative medicine- it is just medicine." At worst, more strawmen are built and batted down.
There are people with concerns about vaccines which are irrational, and based in mistrust of the scientific community - and there are others who have legitimate, science based concerns, about vaccines. It is the height of arrogance - not to mention unscientific - to categorically insist that any concern about vaccines, without inquiry into the basis for that concern, is inherently illegitimate.
Insistence that the concerns are all based on debunked studies is another strawman - not all concerns about vaccines rely on debunked studies, but the standard response - including yours - is to assume and respond as if they are. Here is a discussion I engaged in recently in which I raised a very narrow concern, about a particular vulnerable population, articulated a scientifically reasonable rationale for that concern (down thread), and linked to current ongoing research which (although inconclusive, because it is new area of research) validates that the concern is not disconnected from the world of science. Despite that - the response was (repeatedly) (1) to ignore the research which I pointed to and summarized, without even reading either the research or the summary - because the subject was vaccination and of course any concerns that might be raised about vaccines are junk science and (2) to assume (and responded to) arguments I hadn't made.
If that was all that the beat downs were directed at, I might agree. But any fair reading of the discussions over the past decade on DU tells a different story. People who use the word "woo," use it in a black and white, knee jerk, way to shut down discussion of ideas they deem unscientific (without regard to whether the ideas expressed really are as outside the realm of science).
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)"And, speaking of strawmen - that is one of the most oft repeated strawmen of the anti-woo group: treating all people who have any concerns about vaccinations, for any reason, as if the concerns are based in an "irrational mistrust of the scientific community.""
Strawmen? Not so. Firstly, if you haven't seen this mistrust, you might try opening your eyes. Secondly, there are also the Big Pharma CTers who see science as an unholy ally of pharmaceutical profiteers, ergo EEEeeevil. These people exist, are vocal, and must be addressed in any reasonable conversation about the topic. Ignoring them as incidental and irrelevant and beside the point is not reasonable nor acceptable. Thirdly, if there is another "concern" amongst the antivax community other than linking thimerosal vaccines with greater incidence of autism, then it is far, far aside of the main one, your conversation notwithstanding. Note that the entire of the antivax movement predicated itself on one debunked study linking thimerosal vaccines to higher rates of autism. What makes this woo is the fact that the link was disproven based upon a preponderance of evidence to the contrary yet still serves as the primary contention in the argument.
If you believe 'woo' is misappropriated in a specific instance, make the case, sure. The definition I provided is the one that an actual rationalist would accept. But some of it is the worst kind of dangerous bunkum and NEEDS to be called out, regardless of who feels what about which.
Ms. Toad
(38,635 posts)Why is it that you feel the need to trounce an argument that I have not made in this conversation, or in any conversation, about vaccines (thimerosol/autism connection)? If Big Pharma plays no role in anything I am saying, why is there any reason for you to make any assumptions - or address one way or another - what I may or may not believe about Big Pharma?
ElboRuum
(4,717 posts)Your contention appears to be that you don't have interest in the thimerosal/autism connection and the anti-woo forces jump on that rather than what you wish to discuss. My point is how can they not? Who discusses other? After all of the refutations that have been presented, this STILL PERSISTS. It is still the suspected default position for anyone wishing to discuss vaccination from the anti side.
In fairness, I never claimed that Big Pharma plays a role in anything you are saying, nor do I assume you believe anything about it one way or another. What I did offer is the counter to your argument that pointing out this very large component of the antivax argument is irrelevant to what YOU wish to discuss. My point is that it MUST be addressed to even begin to talk about any other aspect of vaccination concerns because, by default, that's the linchpin of all real concerns about vaccines in the modern era, the noise questioning their safety at a root level. This, even in the face of the obvious benefit of vaccines over their potential harm, a harm that has been thoroughly dismissed by the myriad of studies suggesting the opposite.
The reason I say this is because, realistically, based upon the history of this topic, is that we cannot have any discussion now about any vaccination concerns because those that still hold to that abominable "study" have sown the seeds of their own mistrust. It is unfortunate, but that mistrust has been well earned and even those who wish to discuss other things, perhaps legitimate concerns, have to wade through that quagmire of suspicion before their concerns appear sincere. It stinks, but it is true.
If you are concerned about the safety of vaccines, you are the very FIRST I've ever talked to who DIDN'T want to assert the thimerosal/autism link. I've conversed with many over the course of the past few years and all it's ever been has been the citing of the infamous "study" and the obviousness of the linkage between the two. It's been so persistent and so single-minded that one cannot help but be primed for the argument.
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Orville and Wilbur didn't pray real hard for a wing that would generate lift.
Observe -> Theorize -> Experiment -> Observe -> Repeat.
Just because we can't conceive of how to do something right this moment doesn't make such an endeavour 'woo'.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)Or woo... if you will.
Until it was made to happen, with Kitty Hawk, and up to Boeing 747's and Space Shuttles.
It was ALL woo... until t wasn't.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Religious woo, but woo nonetheless.
I agree with other posters- I don't believe we share the same definition of 'woo'.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
2naSalit
(102,780 posts)what you consider woo... How do you know that the test and repeat hasn't taken place for those who advocate for alternatives? Sounds a lot like a corporate shill argument. Documentation hasn't been around for the thousands of years that many of the alternative medicines have been, nor has the scientific method yet many of you insist that unless it has been a paid for study, it can't possibly have merit or be true.
NewsFlash, because many of these things can't be patented, they will never be "formally" researched and that's okay with me. I'll use what works for me regardless of whatever it is you believe.
Personally, I believe in nothing, I know a few things, I understand a whole bunch of things and am open to ponder the rest. After pondering your claims, I think they are woo so I will discount them here and now, thank you very much.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Again and again and again.. there are even studies of collections of studies- 'meta' studies, as it were. No more effective than placebos is the consensus by a wide margin.
Yet people still claim that it hasn't been studied.
The words come out of my mouth just fine, thanks; I don't need your help in saying them. Besides, I don't know where you fingers have been, so keep them out of my mouth. Had I intended to say that, I would have.
I don't think you have a grasp of how science works, who does it, and how they get funded. All kinds of silly and no-so-silly theories get tested in real science. There's even an award for the silliest studies. Not all science results in patents, not by a long shot.
2naSalit
(102,780 posts)fingers or mind have been so I'll thank you to keep them out of my mind. And I actually do know what science is, how it works and how it is conducted and funded, thank you very much.
Since you don't know where my fingers have been and I haven't been putting words in your mouth because i was not agreeing with you and those were MY words coming from MY keyboard and I was interpreting what you said from my perspective and I call BS... maybe you don't even know where you are. But those weren't my fingers in your mouth nor my words coming out of it so perhaps you might need to turn on the lights a figure out who had their snarky fingers in your mouth.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)If you understand how science works, you wouldn't make silly statements like, " because many of these things can't be patented, they will never be "formally" researched "
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)movie sound tracks wherein a flying saucer or some such was denoted by a "woo-woo-woo" sound as it flew past?
Spider Jerusalem
(21,786 posts)"medicine was woo" is true of you're talking about things like balance of humours theory, or the idea that malaria was caused by bad air.
http://www.skepdic.com/woowoo.html
Th1onein
(8,514 posts)First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
Mahatma Gandhi
I think we're past the ignore and laugh parts, and into the fighting part.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
Carl Sagan
Sid
arcane1
(38,613 posts)Everything you mentioned came about as a result of objective observation and decades of careful study. A hundred years ago we had manned flight, and movies about going to the Moon.
"Woo", as I have seen the term, applies to things like the Psychic Friends Hotline, and spoon-benders. It applies to claims that are made in the here-and-now, not claims that something isn't someday possible.
Studying naturally occurring compounds for their medicinal use? That's science. Claiming that crop circles are made by extraterrestrials? That's what I would call woo, except I hate that word. I would just call it nonsense
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)"Woo" is that which as been examined by science and is known to be false, yet continues to be peddled as occulted "truth".
That is, the difference between "woo" and "fantasy" is determined after the effort is made to verify the fantasy.
For an example:
The existence of unicorns: Fantasy
The likelihood that unicorn myths started from one-horned rhinoceroses: Science (at least a solid hypothesis)
The notion that rhino horns are really unicorn horns and so have medicinal property: Woo
Ms. Toad
(38,635 posts)It is being indiscriminately applied to any and all forms of complementary or alternative medicine, or any concerns raised about the validity of traditional medicine, even when there are solid scientific reasons for doing so.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)If you have to distinguish a medical practice by calling it "alternative medicine" rather than just "medicine," then odds are solid it's bunk, and it's KNOWN to be bunk.
longship
(40,416 posts)The label "alternative medicine" just means woo-woo.
There is only medicine, and it's based on science.
Ms. Toad
(38,635 posts)It's practitioners and the NIH, among others, have distinguished it. You don't get to redefine that distinction just because you are unhappy that some of it has scientifically rigorous research supporting its use.
http://nccam.nih.gov/news/camstats/2007/camsurvey_fs1.htm
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Not an endorsement or verification of the therapies therein... right?
KT2000
(22,150 posts)approved treatment is bunk? Our medical establishment is drenched in money from powerful interests that promote "profitable medicine." Do you know that your so-called medical authorities for occupational medicine are funded by huge corporations and their board members come from those corporations? You can imagine how selective they would be in deciding what will go into their journals. What is not accepted into their journals is then said not to be included in standard practice. In some cases, actual occupational injuries are said not to even exist if they are not published, esp. chemically related injuries. Get it?
Alternative simply means other than medical establishment practice. It runs the gamut. There are many worthwhile alternative medical journals now where people can learn quite a bit.
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Hyperbole.
I'm certain there are treatments that work, but are not in the journals - yet. Like any other aspect of science, medicine is continually expanding. The thing is, as with any other science, it must be tested rigorously, and found to actually be what is claimed.
So no, I'm not saying that "anything other than AMA-approved treatment is bunk." I'm saying that the bulk of what is referred to as "alternative medicine" has been tested and found wanting. What works is adopted and becomes regular medicine.
Relevance?
If there were no profit to be made in "alternative medicine," people wouldn't be selling it to you. In fact since in most cases alternative medicine is just self-coaching and placebo, they are making a profit by selling you nothing at all. On the other hand the medical establishment is selling you something that is, indeed, something.
Relevance x2?
Yes, I do. Did you know that it is in the best interests of these corporations that the treatments they fund actually work? Unlike the quacks selling you duct tape that "detoxifies your body" through the soles of your feet, these companies can be - and are - held liable if the shit they produce is a scam. or dangerous. Since htye produce a lot of stuff, and have a big investment (As opposed to sprinkling some mineral salts on duct tape) such a crash could present a truly severe setback.
Now, a perfectly viable case could be made for the problem of profit motive being involved in the practice of medicine. And I welcome it if you choose to make it as such. But such an argument does not by necessity bolster the claims of alternative medicine. They're two different arguments.
Conspiracy!
Again, a case can be made with regard to the expansion of profit motive in such things... and again it is not an argument for head-on forehead chapstick, or cupping, or coffee enemas. it's an argument for increasing federal funding to medical research in order to pressure out such corporate intrusion.
Red herring.
After all, lots of things are not accepted into medical research journals. It's a merit-based system, and not a democratic one, which is true for all research journals, in all fields of science.
Again there is some corruption in the system. There's an easy way to tell where, though; if a journal asks you to pay to have your research published, then it's probably a piece of crap journal. And no, it's not just the terrible corporations that buy ad space (which is what it is) - Look at some of your alternative medical journals. I'll bet a good number of them charge to publish.
Reference?
Surely you have some specifics here, and a breadcrumb trail proving the conspiracy claim.
I'm afraid that once again this is still not an argument to bolster alternative medicine. I hate to harp on with this, but it's actually really important for you to understand, especially since it seems to be the bulk of your argument here.
An imperfection within a system does not by default make a competing system superior. They must each be judged by their own merits, not by the failures of other systems.
For a prime example of this problem, look at creationism - or "intelligent design," if you prefer. The crux of this argument is that since science doesn't know exactly how the first life forms developed from nonliving matter, then "God did it!" must be the valid answer. or that since there is no set and repeatable formula for speciation, that there must actually be no such thing and the "kinds" of life are immutable. Needless to say this is just bad logic.
So too with the argument that "there are problems with standard medicine, so the alternative sorts must be good!" No. Not true. remember, each judged by its merits, not the flaws of the other.
Evolutionary theory has shown far more merit than creationism / ID. And standard medicla practice has shown far more merit than most alternative therapies - exceptions simply get adopted as a feature of standard medicine because they work.
Bland admonishment.
Seriously, saying "get it!" or worse yet, "wake up!" is a good way to look like an ignorant crank. Avoid it.
Stating the obvious.
Obviously alternative means "other than standard," one doesn't have to eat the oxford Dictionary and claim its power to understand this. However this does not say anything about the meritoriousness of alternative methods of medicine.
Omission.
It does indeed "run the gamut," from useful herbal treatments to dangerous, wasteful and toxic quackeries; and for every quinine, there's a hundred versions of tiger-penis soup.
The same holds true for those journals. And the notion of "worthwhile" is certainly a subjective one. My standard is whether the treatment can withstand scientific rigor or not. Almost unfailingly, when it does hold up, it is place within standard medicine. where it cannot, it continues to circulate among "alternative medical journals," always with the claim that "the establishment doesn't want you to know!"
KT2000
(22,150 posts)reread your post
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)reread my post, yourself.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)So was talking about manned heavier-than-air flight before the understanding of Bernoulli's principle. So was talking about converting lead to gold before nuclear theory was developed. In all those cases, one is claiming knowledge one doesn't actually have, just like woo-ists today do.
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)Recursion
(56,582 posts)
That said, it has actually been done:
http://chemistry.about.com/cs/generalchemistry/a/aa050601a.htm
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)Gold can sometimes be obtained from lead *ores*, but not from lead itself. It can also occur in other metallic ores like silver and copper.
Silver can also be obtained from lead ores, as well as from zinc and copper ores, but that doesn't mean that silver can be created from lead, or zinc, or copper.
Humanist_Activist
(7,670 posts)accelerator, and its no way to get rich, but basically, you shove enough protons and neutrons into the nucleus of any atom, and some of them are eventually going to stick, therefore changing the element itself.
But this isn't alchemy, this is science.
Disclaimer, my explanation is most likely woefully inadequate and probably incorrect on some level, only take it as a basic summary.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Though the Au nuclei were not terribly stable
joshcryer
(62,536 posts)It's just not terribly effective.
DRoseDARs
(6,810 posts)...the scientific method. Their results added to the ever-growing, ever-evolving body of Science.
JVS
(61,935 posts)
Squinch
(59,520 posts)Now, get back to the lab and write up a book that talks about REAL science. You could write about the way the heavens are a bunch of nesting bowls! We like that.
We are SO full of ourselves.
Squinch
(59,520 posts)And I'm sorry, but when we stop asking, "Wow, could I really be seeing what I think I'm seeing from that thing that shouldn't logically be happening?" is when science stops advancing.
sufrommich
(22,871 posts)A very powerful religion that silenced any scientist who dared to question the dogma of the day. Thethe so called scientists of that time who denounced him more closely resemble today's creation scientists.
Squinch
(59,520 posts)that religion/science was sure they were right.
sufrommich
(22,871 posts)for what happens when mysticism is given veto power over science.
Squinch
(59,520 posts)when unconventional thinking challenges conventional wisdom.
My issue here is that people are saying that things that have been tested and found effective, like acupuncture, are woo.
Ignorance is one thing. Refusing to accept what is known is another matter. The was a time when we had no idea what caused illness, for example. Today, that is either a solved problem or for other disorders we at least have a rough understanding. So there is no point talking about chakras (they just don't exist), crystal energy, or a lot of other made up stuff.
psychology & sociology? Well, some say they are still woo, but there are limits to what kind of experiments one can do on humans, so progress is slow.
arikara
(5,562 posts)sick and tired of lot of them. I'm sick of their fanatic belief in their religion called "science", their hectoring and heckling of anything that they don't agree with, their inability to consider the existence of anything that wasn't peer reviewed in their bible... er magazine. There is no difference between the woo-flingers and the christian born again fundy's.
Zealots.
yodermon
(6,153 posts)In a perfect world, the scientific method leads to better medicine. However, big pharma cuts corners to make a buck, and sometimes people get sick and die as a result. The backlash leads to more interest in alternative medicine, which of course is also out to make a buck and cares precisely fuck-all about scientific rigor, ever since the days of the actual snake-oil salesmen.
On the other hand, *IF* a folk remedy turns out to hold up to scientific rigor, this could threaten the profits of big pharma, and thus it's in big pharma's interest to cast alt-medicine in absolutely the most horrible light possible. Thus the meme it's always woo, always wrong, and always dangerous, full stop.
Better regulation, and the elevation of the scientific method above profit would solve all of this of course. Easy!
There was a time when those things were hypotheses. Then they were subjected to PROPER AND RIGOROUS STUDY AND TESTING.
Thinkingabout
(30,058 posts)
cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)Take manned flight. When was it that nobody believed that a heavier than air thing could possibly fly?
Never. Birds fly. Always have. Nothing impossible about heavier than air flight.
The engineering necessary to the task was way off in the future, but if you stipulated a tremendous as yet undeveloped power source (internal combustion engine, in the Wright brothers' case) very few scientifically minded people would have said such a thing was impossible because we always knew that heavier than air flight was possible, as a matter of physics.
So if someone said, "I think we will someday have a power source strong enough and compact enough to do it," that's not pseudoscience or myth or lies. It is a speculation.
Woo is not speculating about what future centuries might hold. It is CLAIMS about the world today... crop circles, fake medicine, whatever.
There is nothing unscientific about aliens coming to Earth. Unlikely, perhaps, but certainly not impossible. I think it pretty certain that the universe has millions of billions of species of technological life. But it is another thing to say they can visit us. But maybe they can.
Now then... what if I say they HAVE visited us, they ARE visiting us? Now I am making a claim about Earth... usually based on lies, obfuscation, delusion and ignorance.
And if the spaceships arrive tomorrow will that vindicate the saucer nuts? Not in anyone's eyes but their own. Because the aliens did not actually kidnap and butt-probe uncle jasper. They did not build the pyramids.
The specific claims are crap.
But saying there is probably a lot of other intelligent life in the universe is not woo at all. It is mainstream scientific thought, with the understanding that the answer is currently unknowable.
A car that runs on water producing more energy that it uses from water alone? Without some sort of fusion reaction? That's pretty much impossible. And claims that such a car ever existed are absurd.
Now, if I said in 1800 that I had a method of heavier-than-air human flight in my barn you would express great skepticism.
And you would be right.
And if some bozo insisted that his brother-in-law knew a guy whose sister had seen me fly then you would not be persuaded.
It is not woo to say, "Cancer might be curable someday." It is woo to say that it has been when it has not been. It is woo to say that X cures cancer when the result is not replicable in trials, but is found only in highly selective anecdote or weak studies easily open to fudging. (Even innocently... innocently faked data is a real problem when an experimenter wants a certain result.)
Science fiction is not woo. You saying that computer storage will be crazy smaller in ten years than we can do today is not woo.
Woo is always about things that are real in the world... that have happened. Earl Grey tea cured this cancer. Bigfoot walked by that cabin. Copper bracelets do cure arthritis. I can read minds... bend spoons... talk to your dead child... find your missing child... see with my finger-tips...
Real world claims that ought to be open normal examination, but that instead are the province of people who don't "trust" science, and want a richer life full of unicorn tracks.
But the sort of scientific advances you are talking about were developed by, and proved by, science.
When people said they were impossible they were making an erroneous prediction about future technology. But when somebody in 1800 said airplanes are impossible, she was right. They were. In 1800.
And anyone in 1800 who said they had riden in an airplane was lying. And they were in no way vindicated by the future.
But again, someone saying that bernoulli's law meant x, and thus with materials we lack Z and power source we lack Y, wings going 200 mph would create this lift... that's just math.
Einstein said gravity curves light. That was not woo, it was just a theory from someone well informed that might have been wrong.
An experiment devised and it was tested. (The famous eclipse observations) And it was true.
And almost every scientist in the world accepted, within a few years, that this improbable, amazing, crazy-sounding thing was TRUE because it had been proven to be true.
THAT is what an open mind is. Do the experiment without room for fraud and ambiguity and let's see WHETHER something is true.
I'm disturbed by just how poorly understood the difference between science and bullshit is here on DU.
Gore1FL
(22,951 posts)woo does not waste it's time on testing, review, and repetition.
LadyHawkAZ
(6,199 posts)promoting this garbage as a way for the OP to never need to use an inhaler again.
Trollie troll got a ban, of course, for promoting potentially dangerous bullshit pseudoscience in place of lifesaving medication aka woo. Replace albuterol with water intake and you die.
The line between alternative medicine and woo is very thin in some places. If a treatment is really effective, test it, prove it and mainstream it. That's what all the former woo in your post have in common- they were all subjected to scientific testing until the principles could be proven to work, or not. There are young earth creationists that still don't believe in geology. That's woo too.
I'm all for anything that can be proven to work.
Well, except acupuncture. I don't care if 10,000 scientists prove beyond any possible doubt that it cures every disease known to man, they're not sticking me with those needles. I hate needles.
SidDithers
(44,333 posts)Sid
La Lioness Priyanka
(53,866 posts)woo is claiming that something works, without first trying to disprove it does not.
medicine was woo. lots of people died. hence we created a process to keep science as accurate as possible.
Deep13
(39,157 posts)I know that you know how science works, so the following is for anyone who wants further explanation.
For something to be science, there has to be a possibility that it can fail. If an idea survives the effort to disprove it, it becomes provisionally valid. In principle any scientific fact or theory (an explanatory model based on facts) can be falsified with appropriate evidence, although in practice some ideas have enough evidential support, evolution for example, as to be unassailable.
"Woo" is a catch-all term for a wide variety of wishful thinking and what they all have in common is that they are assumed to be true without requiring evidence or even in the face of contrary evidence. For instance, vaccines are bad because they have chemicals or cause disease or interfere with natural immunity. Are there clinical studies demonstrating this? No, drug makers won't release that kind of information because of a profit motive (despite the fact that disease is a bigger money-maker than prevention). So we are back to a lack of evidence. The idea is just presumed to be true because in some way it agrees with a naturalized narrative that the proponent already accepts. Or an idea is accepted because of "evidence" that itself is unsupported. For instance, ghost investigators claim to have evidence of disembodied spirits because meters that detect electricity show positive results. The problem is that there is no real reason to suppose that, even if ghosts exist, they create electricity. Or cold spots. Or odd messages on voice recorders. All that is just assumed. One way to tell if something is real science is to look at the shit-ton of work involved. The German scientist who created the first usable antibiotics in the 1930s tested well over 600 different chemicals before finding one that killed bacteria inside the body. Still waiting for a clinical test for aromatherapy.
La Lioness Priyanka
(53,866 posts)Silent3
(15,909 posts)Furthermore, the popular press loves quotes like, "If man were meant to fly, he'd have wings!" so that when something like powered flight comes along, it seems all the more bold and daring a success -- even though, actually, plenty of scientists and engineers thought powered flight would be possible before it happened.
It's a completely stupid approach to take this already distorted view of what becomes accepted science and try to use it preemptively, acting as if just because something is scoffed at today, you become brilliant by believing in it now, with your genius doubtlessly due to be recognized in the future.
NuclearDem
(16,184 posts)That doesn't qualify as woo.
Woo is pseudoscience--claims to be science, masks itself as science, but doesn't hold itself to the scientific method.
Once we had the appropriate tools, we could very easily apply the scientific method to all of those fields.
Coyotl
(15,262 posts)It is either woo or it is not woo, no woo about it.
Marr
(20,317 posts)Do you advocate the medieval practice of curing hemorrhoids with hot irons? Is it a treatment that should not be scorned, but accepted as one more possibility? Would you try it, or suggest others try it?
If not, why not?
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)practice of curing the 'disease of homosexuality' using lobotomies and electroshock therapy? If not, why not?
That's what 'medical science' did until the early 1970's. Not the 1790s. A few years after the moon landing, they were still doing this. Many on DU were alive to actually agree or disagree with that 'science'.
Marr
(20,317 posts)Woo does not. No matter how many times someone proves that homeopathy doesn't cure anything, supporters will still promote it and make money on it.
I asked my question because I am honestly curious about where the line is actually drawn. Why are some treatments abandoned even by the most devoted supporters of 'alternative medicine', while others are not? I can guarantee you that hot irons to rectum cured just as many people as homeopathy ever has, and yet one is embraced while the other (I assume) is not. On what would such a distinction be made, if not efficacy?
sufrommich
(22,871 posts)be required reading in High School. None of those things you list are woo,all lacked the science to back them up at one time and were proved to be true. There's a reason all of those things still exist and alchemy is just a quaint memory.
gcomeau
(5,764 posts)"Woo" is not just "stuff we haven't done yet" or "things we haven't proven yet" or "hypotheses that haven't been fully tested yet".
It's generally claims made that fly in the face of available knowledge and whose champions display no particular interest in properly testing and proving them. Wild proclamations that have zero grounding in any evidence.
Or in short, magic handwaving bullshit.
baldguy
(36,649 posts)Dreaming of flying to the moon with pixie wings and fairy dust is.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)a disease. For about a hundred years that's what was passed off as 'the best science' on the subject. Absurd, obviously untrue, and yet 'Medicine' made this claim and also claimed to treat this 'disease' in various ways for generations, doing immense harm and making lots of money in the process.
They made this wild, bogus, quack's claim until 1973. The ignorance still infected the medical community when the AIDS crisis hit and they shrugged and looked confused and could not come up with any sort of protocol for years and years.
But whatever, your quip was really good too.
justiceischeap
(14,040 posts)Yet, it's a scientific fact that it isn't a disease even though there is no clear science that it's gene related (at this point).
LeftishBrit
(41,453 posts)I've never heard anyone describe science fiction as 'woo', for example. It is more a question of rejecting all the advances that you mention. Refusing to accept modern medicine in favour of what was used traditionally, and dismissing the evidence that life expectancy was much lower in past times. Insisting that the moon landings couldn't possibly have happened, and therefore must have been faked. Etc.
I don't much like the term 'woo' because of its imprecision, and because it groups too many things under one umbrella. But there definitely is an attitude in some places of rejecting science in favour of 'the wisdom of our ancestors'; and this is not only, in my view, often dangerous in itself; but is often used in the service of very right-wing attitudes: e.g. the government should not provide healthcare; the Bible is all that is needed to guide us; illness is always the result of misbehaviour or wrong attitudes; etc.
justiceischeap
(14,040 posts)You *can* argue that all the things you listed at one time *were* considered woo prior to their being proven scientifically viable. Those that argue Galileo's idea that the earth revolves around the sun wasn't considered woo at the time are not thinking in the terms and ideas of the time. His now proven scientific ideas were considered woo at the time not only by the church but anyone educated by the church. Just because it's since been proven correct, doesn't mean it wasn't considered woo by some (even though woo wasn't even a word then).
I'm sure there are some things that are currently considered woo that may indeed be proven scientifically correct in the future and of course, there are other things that are just scams to make money and other things that are because people are ill-informed.
That said, studies are still being done to prove prayer has a positive effect on people even though other studies have proven that people fared worse after surgery when being prayed for. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html?pagewanted=all Prayer = woo though I'd bet some people in this thread that are anti-woo are pro-prayer.
NuclearDem
(16,184 posts)Here's what pseudoscience is and isn't:
It doesn't adhere to the scientific method (observation, testing, independent testing, falsifiability).
It is a field that deals with the scientific method by claiming that those who want to apply it to their "studies" are part of a conspiracy or "don't want you to know the truth."
It makes claims of being "scientifically proven", which is not a term used in actual scientific fields.
It cannot be falsified or "disproven." Conversely, it cannot be confirmed or "proven" either.
Scientific fields utilize the scientific method, are subject to independent review and falsification (peers trying to find flaws in a hypothesis), don't make claims of their results or conclusions being "proven", are not infallible, and welcome critique among the rest of the scientific community.
Copernicus adhered to the scientific method. So did Freud, Jung, Renaissance surgeons, Darwin, Hawking, Sagan, Pasteur, Einstein, and every other major scientific mind of the last several centuries. They were never engaging in pseudoscience within their respective fields. In fact, it was the religious establishment at the time that pushed pseudoscience with geocentrism and creationism.
Scientific fields in their rudimentary and crude stages were never pseudoscience. They adhered to the scientific method. Ideas unpopular with authorities and religious groups were not "woo", but we're pushing back against woo.
No true scientific field is infallible. Conclusions are reached with the best methods and technology available, and the scientific community does its best to make damn sure of that through peer review. Big Pharma pushing bad medicine with bad studies and medical quackery are ethics and economics issues, not problems with the scientific method. The answer to quackery and poor ethics is tighter regulation and oversight, not pseudoscience.