Daniel Price
New member
I'm not trying to stir up the pot. My question is sincere. Whenever I see posts on social media about so called complementary and alternative health that are unscientific, unverifiable, and not grounded in any significant tradition or empirical body of work, more often than not its homeopathic in nature. And when I'm reviewing research on PubMed or wherever, I can find lots of positive studies about herbs as they're used by their traditional systems, even though these studies are limited and their methodologies aren't the right way to get the best results. But I don't recall ever coming across anything convincing or compelling about homeopathy.
I know a lot of people who lump in homeopathic claims with herbal medicine in general, or even with the traditional systems of health, and see it as the same source. Homeopathy really appears to have damaged the reputation of traditional and natural health approaches.
I know the title of this post sounds inflammatory, but that's really how it seems to me. All of the great systems of health -- Indian, Chinese, Arabic, Western, Indigenous -- they all use high doses of herbs at times and polyherbal formulas. And they've all been empirically tested over generations of use.
I don't doubt there's some contexts where like treats like and very small doses apply. But where? How many? This is not clear to me at all.
And when we're dealing with such low doses it's very hard to be sure which variable is causing which effect. Have homeopathic remedies ever passed randomized double blind placebo control studies?
I know a lot of people who lump in homeopathic claims with herbal medicine in general, or even with the traditional systems of health, and see it as the same source. Homeopathy really appears to have damaged the reputation of traditional and natural health approaches.
I know the title of this post sounds inflammatory, but that's really how it seems to me. All of the great systems of health -- Indian, Chinese, Arabic, Western, Indigenous -- they all use high doses of herbs at times and polyherbal formulas. And they've all been empirically tested over generations of use.
I don't doubt there's some contexts where like treats like and very small doses apply. But where? How many? This is not clear to me at all.
And when we're dealing with such low doses it's very hard to be sure which variable is causing which effect. Have homeopathic remedies ever passed randomized double blind placebo control studies?
