Mojo
Mostly harmless
The 6x will contain less than 1 part per million of the original substance. If it's been made up accurately, it'll contain 1ppm of the mother tincture.
More Fun with Homeopath Dana Ullman, MPH(!)
- Thread starter sbernie87
- Start date
The 6x will contain less than 1 part per million of the original substance. If it's been made up accurately, it'll contain 1ppm of the mother tincture.
Baron Samedi
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2006
- Messages
- 476
That's my point. To say that 30c contains less than 1ppm is like me saying that scientists using the Hubble telescope can see more than 20 stars in our galaxy! It's true, but mind-blowingly out of proportion.
A funny, but very apt analogy!
Badly Shaved Monkey
Anti-homeopathy illuminati member
- Joined
- Feb 5, 2004
- Messages
- 5,363
It's all part of the semantic game the homs like to play. While factually true, it enables them to imply a casual comparison with herbal remedies which really do contain stuff, other than the solvent, in meaningful quantities, for better or worse.
Very often you will hear them talking about "tiny" or "minute" doses to quietly elide the fact that there really is nothing in them or, according to the homs, there is some kind of energy signature but no actual chemical residue of the mother tincture.
This is part of why I find them so creepy. They can't even be honest about what they do because what they do is basically embarrassing to them.
Very often you will hear them talking about "tiny" or "minute" doses to quietly elide the fact that there really is nothing in them or, according to the homs, there is some kind of energy signature but no actual chemical residue of the mother tincture.
This is part of why I find them so creepy. They can't even be honest about what they do because what they do is basically embarrassing to them.
gmanontario
Muse
Just saw this, I hope nobody has posted it before. I love it..
Dana Ullman
Thinker
- Joined
- May 22, 2007
- Messages
- 201
Just because I (or others pro-homeopathic thinkers) go away for a time does not mean that we are "broken" (your word); it is because I (we) have a life and have more things to do than to respond to the narrow fundamentalist thinking that pervades this site.
I will be curious which ones of you will be smart enough to formally apologize for your antagonism to homeopathy, though many flat-earthers died believing in their silly beliefs.
I had previously alerted you to some forthcoming research on homeopathy, and it has now been published. Poor Ben Goldacre has decried that he doesn't have access to the journal ("Homeopathy") that is published by Elsevier, but heck, such is the catch 22 when skeptics insist that we publish in peer-review journals and then bemoan the fact that they cannot access them without going to a proper library to read them.
If you wish to read the FREE and available writing of one of the author's in this journal, check out the work of Martin Chaplin...he serves as "guest editor" of this special issue.
Dr. Martin Chaplin's website and its info on homeopathy and water: This review of research on water includes reference to over 1,200 (!) published articles on water (needless to say, if you think that you know more about water than he does, put up or shut up): http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/homeop.html
http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/memory.html
--these are but two short sections on homeopathy and the memory of water.
Entire table of contents for Chaplin's website: http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/index2.html
To learn about who Dr. Chaplin is: http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/chaplin.html
Professor of Applied Science
Water and Aqueous Systems Research
Head of the Food Research Centre
London South Bank University
You will find that Chaplin is a straight-shooter. He is not an advocate or an antagonist to homeopathy, and yet, he finds that the body of evidence for the making of homeopathic medicines and the therapeutic effects of these medicines is consistent with modern scientific thinking about the structure of water and how it can influence biological systems.
Below is a press release sent out by Elsevier:
A special issue of the journal Homeopathy, journal of the Faculty of Homeopathy and published by Elsevier, on the “Memory of Water” brings together scientists from around the world for the first time to publish new data, reviews and discuss recent scientific work exploring the idea that water can display memory effects. The concept of memory of water is important to homeopathy because it offers a potential explanation of the mechanism of action of very high dilutions often used in homeopathy.
Guest editor Professor Martin Chaplin of the Department of Applied Science at London South Bank University, remarks: “There is strong evidence concerning many ways in which the mechanism of this ‘memory’ may come about. There are also mechanisms by which such solutions may possess effects on biological systems which substantially differ from plain water.”
The concept of the memory of water goes back to 1988 when the late Professor Jacques Benveniste published, in the international scientific journal Nature, claims that extremely high ‘ultramolecular’ dilutions of an antibody had effects in the human basophil degranulation test, a laboratory model of immune response. In other words, the water diluent ‘remembered’ the antibody long after it was gone. His findings were subsequently denounced as ‘pseudoscience’ and yet, despite the negative impact this had at the time, the idea has not gone away.
In this special issue of Homeopathy (http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/623042/description#description), scientists from the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, USA as well as the UK present remarkably convergent views from groups using entirely different methods, indicating that large-scale structural effects can occur in liquid water, and can increase with time. Such effects might account for claims of memory of water effects.
Commenting on the special issue, Professor Chaplin said: “Science has a lot more to discover about such effects and how they might relate to homeopathy. It is unjustified to dismiss homeopathy, as some scientists do, just because we don’t have a full understanding of how it works.” In his overview he is critical of the “unscientific rhetoric” of some scientists who reject the memory of water concept “with a narrow view of the subject and without any examination or appreciation of the full body of evidence.”
Professor Chaplin and Dr Peter Fisher, editor-in-chief of the journal, agree that the current evidence brings us a step closer to providing an explanation for the claims made for homeopathy and that the memory of water, once considered a scientific heresy, is a reality. “These discoveries may have far reaching implications and more research is required,” comments Dr Fisher.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/14754916
--the table of contents of a special issue on "the memory of water" in the journal, HOMEOPATHY, published by Elsevier.
I will be curious which ones of you will be smart enough to formally apologize for your antagonism to homeopathy, though many flat-earthers died believing in their silly beliefs.
I had previously alerted you to some forthcoming research on homeopathy, and it has now been published. Poor Ben Goldacre has decried that he doesn't have access to the journal ("Homeopathy") that is published by Elsevier, but heck, such is the catch 22 when skeptics insist that we publish in peer-review journals and then bemoan the fact that they cannot access them without going to a proper library to read them.
If you wish to read the FREE and available writing of one of the author's in this journal, check out the work of Martin Chaplin...he serves as "guest editor" of this special issue.
Dr. Martin Chaplin's website and its info on homeopathy and water: This review of research on water includes reference to over 1,200 (!) published articles on water (needless to say, if you think that you know more about water than he does, put up or shut up): http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/homeop.html
http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/memory.html
--these are but two short sections on homeopathy and the memory of water.
Entire table of contents for Chaplin's website: http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/index2.html
To learn about who Dr. Chaplin is: http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/chaplin.html
Professor of Applied Science
Water and Aqueous Systems Research
Head of the Food Research Centre
London South Bank University
You will find that Chaplin is a straight-shooter. He is not an advocate or an antagonist to homeopathy, and yet, he finds that the body of evidence for the making of homeopathic medicines and the therapeutic effects of these medicines is consistent with modern scientific thinking about the structure of water and how it can influence biological systems.
Below is a press release sent out by Elsevier:
A special issue of the journal Homeopathy, journal of the Faculty of Homeopathy and published by Elsevier, on the “Memory of Water” brings together scientists from around the world for the first time to publish new data, reviews and discuss recent scientific work exploring the idea that water can display memory effects. The concept of memory of water is important to homeopathy because it offers a potential explanation of the mechanism of action of very high dilutions often used in homeopathy.
Guest editor Professor Martin Chaplin of the Department of Applied Science at London South Bank University, remarks: “There is strong evidence concerning many ways in which the mechanism of this ‘memory’ may come about. There are also mechanisms by which such solutions may possess effects on biological systems which substantially differ from plain water.”
The concept of the memory of water goes back to 1988 when the late Professor Jacques Benveniste published, in the international scientific journal Nature, claims that extremely high ‘ultramolecular’ dilutions of an antibody had effects in the human basophil degranulation test, a laboratory model of immune response. In other words, the water diluent ‘remembered’ the antibody long after it was gone. His findings were subsequently denounced as ‘pseudoscience’ and yet, despite the negative impact this had at the time, the idea has not gone away.
In this special issue of Homeopathy (http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/623042/description#description), scientists from the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, USA as well as the UK present remarkably convergent views from groups using entirely different methods, indicating that large-scale structural effects can occur in liquid water, and can increase with time. Such effects might account for claims of memory of water effects.
Commenting on the special issue, Professor Chaplin said: “Science has a lot more to discover about such effects and how they might relate to homeopathy. It is unjustified to dismiss homeopathy, as some scientists do, just because we don’t have a full understanding of how it works.” In his overview he is critical of the “unscientific rhetoric” of some scientists who reject the memory of water concept “with a narrow view of the subject and without any examination or appreciation of the full body of evidence.”
Professor Chaplin and Dr Peter Fisher, editor-in-chief of the journal, agree that the current evidence brings us a step closer to providing an explanation for the claims made for homeopathy and that the memory of water, once considered a scientific heresy, is a reality. “These discoveries may have far reaching implications and more research is required,” comments Dr Fisher.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/14754916
--the table of contents of a special issue on "the memory of water" in the journal, HOMEOPATHY, published by Elsevier.
Davo
Thinker
- Joined
- Feb 17, 2004
- Messages
- 244
Can any advocate of homeopathy please, please explain what source of water they use for the homeopathic dilution process.
Is it Pure water or does it have any contaminants in ?
If pure, how is it ensured that pure water is pure water with no memory ?
Is it Pure water or does it have any contaminants in ?
If pure, how is it ensured that pure water is pure water with no memory ?
Dana Ullman
Thinker
- Joined
- May 22, 2007
- Messages
- 201
Whooops...it guess that you have not done the reading in this dialogue. It is a double-distilled water and/or a mixture of water and ethanol (ultimately, it is not just a memory of water...it is a memor of other things too, but I just cannot remember what---see, homeopaths can have a sense of humor, even if it is a homeopathically-sized one).
Rolfe
Adult human female
Why don't we take this discussion where it belongs. Where we've already been discussing Roy's underwhelming paper for a couple of days.
I do so hate having to repeat myself.
Rolfe.
I do so hate having to repeat myself.
Rolfe.
Badly Shaved Monkey
Anti-homeopathy illuminati member
- Joined
- Feb 5, 2004
- Messages
- 5,363
That would leave this thread as the ideal place for JamesGully to answer any one of the numerous questions he has evaded or refused point-blank to answer.
Try again on this;;
Do airport X-ray scanners inactivate remedies? Yes or no. Give the reasons for your answer.
Homeopaths show evidence of being "broken" in many ways. The most common is simple refusal to address the internal problems in their belief system. Running away tends to be a consequence of that.
kieran
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2004
- Messages
- 294
Looks like you like to write, but not to read. This hypothetical situation has been addressed in direct response to you earlier in this thread. But since you asked again ...
If, and that is a very big if, any credible evidence (that's statistically significant and repeatable) is ever shown for homoeopathy being anything more than a pure placebo effect, then you'll get lots of apologies, and we will all be very excited and interested in discussing why it works ... however at the moment we have nothing to apologise for - we keep asking you for evidence and you keep obfuscating.
You know why you need the smoke screen. If it works, then it works ... if it doesn't, then better keep hiding behind waffle eh?
You should apologise immediately for your pathetic attempt to take the moral high ground ... you are the one that makes black/white statements based on no evidence. If (hypothetically) you are right, it won't be because you know you are right, it will be because you hope you are right. I think you should apologise for that regardless of the efficacy, or lack of efficacy, of homoeopathy.
You present "evidence", and then throw your toys out of the pram when its flaws are pointed out to you ... rather than go back and look for better evidence without those flaws. If it works, it works ... no matter how tight the protocols are. What's the problem with eliminating the flaws? .... unless you can't ...
You also lie about what other authors have said, and then come back again ignoring your blatent and pathetic intellectual dishonesty, no matter how glaringly obvious it is. You even intend to publish your lies - I doubt you would be so brave if the target of your lies (Holmes) was around to litigate over the complete and knowing misrepresentation.
Are you the expert here? Are you the best there is? How can homoeopathy ever be credible when frauds like you are its "best" hope?
Rolfe
Adult human female
It's been nearly 24 hours since we saw Dana. Was that just a hit and run? Does he really, seriously think that a few incompetent and quite dismally wrong spectral graphs by Roy, published in a fanzine known for the platform it gives to kooks and weirdos (especially if they're called Milgrom), is going to have the entire world gasping that everything we thought we knew about subatomic physics was wrong?
Rolfe.
Rolfe.
Mojo
Mostly harmless
That's a bit rich, considering that you don't even appear to have "done the reading" in the sources that you cite in the sample chapter of your book. For example you appear to have missed most of the quotations about homoeopathy from Twain in the article by Ober.
By the way, have you found out who or what the "Cochrane Commission" [sic] is yet?
PixyMisa
Persnickety Insect
I've looked through Chaplin's work. I don't see any evidence at all. I see a lot of speculation. I see links to a lot of papers. What I do not see is evidence.
Chaplin cites, so far as I can see, exactly one paper presenting direct experimental evidence for complex structures of liquid water. That paper applies specifically to water enclosed inside a complex molecule, and does not support Chaplin's speculation as to structures in unconfined liquid water at all.
If you think Chaplin has presented better evidence than this, then please give us a specific cite.
Rolfe
Adult human female
Is that it? He drives by to make a unilateral declaration of victory, on the basis of a paper I very much suspect he hasn't read, and know for sure he couldn't understand, published in a homoeopathy fanzine with scrutineering standards the Daily Mail would be ashamed of?
If what Roy were claiming were true, never mind the JREF million bucks, he'd be able to get a paper published in Nature and be the wunderkind (at 84!) of the scientific community. He'd give generations of physicists a new reason for getting up every morning.
But it's published in a fanzine.
Because he has his spectroscopy demonstrably, direly wrong. His control spectrum, the UV spectrum of ethanol, is simply not the UV spectrum of uncontaminated spectroscopic grade ethanol. The kindest interpretation is that he used a source of ethanol with some sort of additive that interfered with the trace. And since the homoeopathic manufacturer who sent him his remedies seems to have used a better grade (not spectroscopic, but significantly cleaner), the remedies absorb less in the UV wavelengths than the solvent does. Or seems to.
That's it. Nothing to see here, chaps.
Will Dana be back? Time will tell.
(Dana, that's "broken", as in, "Daddy, I broke my new toy! It isn't doing anything any more!" We like homoeopaths to play with, and we mourn when they get broken and don't come round to play any more.)
Rolfe.
If what Roy were claiming were true, never mind the JREF million bucks, he'd be able to get a paper published in Nature and be the wunderkind (at 84!) of the scientific community. He'd give generations of physicists a new reason for getting up every morning.
But it's published in a fanzine.
Because he has his spectroscopy demonstrably, direly wrong. His control spectrum, the UV spectrum of ethanol, is simply not the UV spectrum of uncontaminated spectroscopic grade ethanol. The kindest interpretation is that he used a source of ethanol with some sort of additive that interfered with the trace. And since the homoeopathic manufacturer who sent him his remedies seems to have used a better grade (not spectroscopic, but significantly cleaner), the remedies absorb less in the UV wavelengths than the solvent does. Or seems to.
That's it. Nothing to see here, chaps.
Will Dana be back? Time will tell.
(Dana, that's "broken", as in, "Daddy, I broke my new toy! It isn't doing anything any more!" We like homoeopaths to play with, and we mourn when they get broken and don't come round to play any more.)
Rolfe.
Rolfe
Adult human female
I realise I'm a month late with this, but grovelling, heartfelt thanks to HC for this.
Go on, laugh, but I wasn't aware of that shortcut, and it could have saved me a lot of trouble lots of times. (Especially when posting to the forum, when there doesn't seem to be a mouse-operated "copy" feature, and the only way to copy is to use Control-C - which is perilously close to Control-V....)
Deep gratitude, HC.
Rolfe.
Chris Haynes
Perfectly Poisonous Person
You are most welcome. I understand how it goes, since I often must ask my children for help (most recently daughter told me how to get a screen image into a buffer to edit with a paint program). We really do not know these things until some body tells us about them.
Oh, by the way as far as mouse controls go: after selecting text click on the right mouse button (right as in "right hand side"), it should bring up a small menu. (stuff I learned from computer nerd spouse)
Oh, by the way as far as mouse controls go: after selecting text click on the right mouse button (right as in "right hand side"), it should bring up a small menu. (stuff I learned from computer nerd spouse)
SYLVESTER1592
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- May 7, 2007
- Messages
- 307
Thanks JREF
Previous post:
I see The James Randi Educational Foundation has made a relatively large contribution to the "Vereniging tegen de Kwakzalverij" in the Netherlands (the Dutch Anti-qauckery Association), trying to stay above water (no pun intended), after a recent court ruling.
Thanks guys, for your support and donation,... It looks like they made it. The Dutch Anti-quackery Association is here to stay for a while.
SYL
Previous post:
I think you are right, but we have to be careful what we say when we address specific people. I see you have removed your snippets on the webpage.
Some of these homeopaths don't take being called a quack very lightly and go to court over it. In some countries, the rules are set up in such a way that homeopaths or "alternative healers" can't always be called quacks based on the law. Recently one of these alternative healers has won a lawsuit against the anti-quackery association in my country and demanded rectification of the statements. The cost of this is threatening to put the anti-quackery association out of business...
Doctors have very few rights, they have the right to make the decision about a therapy based on their knowledge ( in my country at least), but all the rest are duties and requirements. Quacks are well versed in dealing with the laws and the institutions that watch over the quality of medical practice and the disciplinary board. As a matter of fact if you need to address the disciplinary board, you are most likely to get the best arguments for your defense from them. For a quack, medicine is a business, nothing more. As long as they can make money of of it, they will exist. They are immune to the law in some cases or tolerated by the law in others as long as they don't go too far. When this is the case, the law is basically on their side...
As long as people can't understand why homeopathy can't work or give it "a chance" because it can't do any harm (except to your wallet) they are not getting proper evidence based treatment. I think this is possibly the only argument that will sway people to look skeptically at homeopathy and alternative healers. I think a skeptical approach towards homeopathy and alternative medicine should also include the law, it's not about science or medicine, we all agree on that, it's about business...
My point is: dealing with quacks is not only about medicine or science, but also about the law. You can be right in every possible way, but you need a lot more to get justice...
a skeptical approach and providing a better understanding of what they are selling, may be an eye-opener to some people. Demanding proper scientific evidence is another. Making evidence based medicine the guideline for medical practice is the key to end quackery in combination with the proper application of the law and people's desire to change the law accordingly...
Just a thought...
SYL
I see The James Randi Educational Foundation has made a relatively large contribution to the "Vereniging tegen de Kwakzalverij" in the Netherlands (the Dutch Anti-qauckery Association), trying to stay above water (no pun intended), after a recent court ruling.
Thanks guys, for your support and donation,... It looks like they made it. The Dutch Anti-quackery Association is here to stay for a while.
SYL
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