Two forms of woo finally being held to account...

[Archae]

About damn time.

“Functional medicine" debunked

David Gorski, M.D., Ph.D. has published a critique that explains why "functional" medicine—like "complementary," "alternative," "holistic" and "integrated" medicine—is nothing more than a loosely-defined marketing term that offbeat practitioners use to promote their services. Its proponents typically do unnecessary testing, claim to identify and treat the "root cause" of illnesses, and claim that their approach addresses the "biochemical individuality" of their patients.

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2016/04/18/the-quackery-of-so-called-functional-medicine-making-it-up-as-you-go-along/

[Gorski D. Making it up as you go along: So-called "functional medicine" is pure quackery. Respectful Insolence Blog, April 18, 2016]
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Homeopathy blasted

Jan Willem Nienhuys has posted a detailed report on the Ph.D. dissertation on homeopathy defended in 1943 by David Karel de Jongh, M.D., a Dutch physician. De Jongh's report was based on meticulous examination of hundreds of articles and books and his experiences while working in a homeopathic hospital. His key points included:

Homeopathy's founder, Samuel Hahnemann, M.D., never proved his method by trying it out systematically. His research consisted of gathering anecdotes from medical literature, which he interpreted in a very biased way.
Since Hahnemann's time, homeopaths have attached great value to shaking of the remedies after each dilution step. However, physics tells us that it is nonsensical: the molecules in a fluid hit each other violently many million times per second, and only very unstable materials like nitroglycerin feel any effect of shaking.
The concept of "constitutional homeopathy" enables homeopaths to give different remedies to different people suffering from the same disease, thus creating the illusion of individualized treatments.

http://www.skepsis.nl/blog/2016/04/critical-considerations-on-homeopathy/

[SheilaT]

1. Interesting. I'm quite familiar with

the terms complementary, alternative, holistic, and integrated medicine. Never before have I come across the term functional medicine.

Learn something new.

[ChisolmTrailDem]

2. Are reasonable questions by reasonable people about 9/11 still woo around here? nt

[Archae]

3. Depends on the question.

If someone asks if nano-thermite (which doesn't exist,) was used to knock down the WTC, that is a stupid question because it's part of a conspiracy theory that has been proven to be bullshit.

If someone asks how much the FBI and CIA knew about the hijackers, but did nothing due to turf battles, that is a legit question.

[ChisolmTrailDem]

4. I was so careful to use the word "reasonable", I did so twice. nt

[Orrex]

5. What about the implosion nuke that Bush personally installed in WTC7?

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