Homoeopathy article from Penn State

May I suggest that the discussion of water memory be moved to a new thread? The Ennis studies have nothing to do with homeopathy. They do not confirm that higher dilutions have greater effect, and the choice of 'things to test' is not based on homeopathic principles.

Linda
 
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meow said:
i support the theory that water has a memory of some sort.
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So what's your opinion on the fact that the vast majority of homeopathic remedies are either dry pills or use alcohol as a solute?

This is one of the many big problems homeopathy has. The claims are nonsensical enough on their own, but when the actual practice has virtually nothing to do with either the claims or things that are supposed to test them it just gets silly.
 
meow said:
maybe you are confused.

basophils were being experimented on, not humans. the researchers were blinded.

if the basophils were "people" then you would blind them and the experiment would now be called double blinded.
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I am confused about many things but not this I'm afraid. When performing experiments involving the treatment of animals (you will note that animals, too, are not "people") the animals aren't blinded either but the best studies are still done double blind.

When you made your "far far far far" claim I assumed you knew of something in the body of the paper which described effective blinding as the word 'blinding' alone in the abstract tells us nothing. I don't have access to the full paper so I was hoping for enlightenment. I take it from your obfuscation that you haven't seen the full paper either so there may be little point in pursuing this further. You appear to have made your mind up that this paper is conclusive proof of the memory of water regardless of any possible shortcomings in the protocol used.

The books "How to read a paper" by Trisha Greenhalgh and "The pocket guide to critical appraisal" by Iain Crombie are excellent and easily readable and give good explanations of what constitutes a good clinical trial and particularly the importance of adequate blinding. I'm sure a local library could get them for you.

Yuri
 
fredriks said:
Have you read the full 2004 Ennis paper?
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That's an extremely good question, and I hope meow will answer it.

I've read it. Insofar as I could. It is without exception the most obfuscatory, incomprehensible, opaque, convoluted piece of user-hostile writing it has ever been my misfortune to encounter, and I've seen a lot I can tell you (I scrutinise papers for scientific jouirnals quite regularly). I even include Milgrom's quantum flapdoodle papers here, and that's saying a lot.

It is, quite frankly, almost impossible to understand. I have to wonder what the scrutineers were thinking of, but honestly, sometimes people get intimidated by very very obscure presentations and instead of saying, here, send this back to the authors and tell them to re-write it so it can be understood, they just pass it rather than admit they don't really follow it.

I can only speculate why anyone would write that way, especially if they've got results which challenge the very fundamentals of our world-view. Possibly because the "significant" findings took a lot of teasing out of the raw data? Possibly in order to make it difficult to criticise?

The comparison with Pons and Fleischmann is appropriate, however there is one difference. The physics/chemistry establishment bought into Pons and Fleischmann at first. They were sceptical, yes, because the theory sounded dodgy from the get-go, but there was enough there that researchers felt it was worth their while to get involved in testing the claims. Partly because of natural scientific curiosity, and partly of course because there would have been great prestige in being the guy who managed to replicate the alleged findings.

The Benveniste/Ennis claims are similar. They suggest that much of what we think is true about the basic functioning of matter is flawed. Normally, this sort of claim has physicists and chemists swarming all over it, all wanting to be the first to solve the mystery. However, that ain't happening. Why not? Because, frankly, any serious physicist or chemist can see there's nothing there but a noisy, unstable system that sometimes seems to generate "significant" output - exactly what Pons and Fleischmann had, come to think of it.

And as for Madeleine Ennis being a non-believer. Well, that's her account of how she came to the subject originally. She's been a complete woo for quite a number of years now. The gullible and those prone to delusion can be encountered in all walks of life, even, though it pains me to say it, amoung biochemists.

Rolfe.
 
fls said:
May I suggest that the discussion of water memory be moved to a new thread? The Ennis studies have nothing to do with homeopathy. They do not confirm that higher dilutions have greater effect, and the choice of 'things to test' is not based on homeopathic principles.

Linda
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I know the dilution and in vitro basophil studies aren't homeopathy per se but the work has been taken to validate the memory of water theory which in turn is a cornerstone of homeopathic pseudo science. I thought it was interesting to explore the issue further.

Oh blimey, now I've upset Linda. :o

Yuri
 
fredriks said:
Have you read the full 2004 Ennis paper?
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yes, a very good question.

If you have read the entire paper, then please explain to us the results, in more detail, and the conclusions as well.

Let's see something from you that proves you read more than the abstract. The abstract tells me very little, if anything.

TAM:)
 
meow said:
i believe a properly prepared ultra dilute lithium solution can easily be identified from a control using thermoluminescense.... see below

http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=0dd37a60a935ce27e1ac6ccc41b2ef1c

Ultra-high dilutions of lithium chloride and sodium chloride (10−30 gcm−3) have been irradiated by X- and γ-rays at 77 K, then progressively rewarmed to room temperature. During that phase, their thermoluminescence has been studied and it was found that, despite their dilution beyond the Avogadro number, the emitted light was specific of the original salts dissolved initially.
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What a very strange paper:
Much to our surprise, the experimental results do show—without any ambiguity—that for an X-ray dose of 0.4 kGy the thermoluminescence glows of the three systems were substantially different. These findings did prove to be reproducible in the course of many different identical experiments.
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"Different identical experiments...", "Much to our surprise..."???

Maybe this is a translation issue.

Yuri
 
Yuri Nalyssus said:
I know the dilution and in vitro basophil studies aren't homeopathy per se but the work has been taken to validate the memory of water theory which in turn is a cornerstone of homeopathic pseudo science. I thought it was interesting to explore the issue further.
Click to expand...

What about exploring the issue that it doesn't provide any support for homeopathy? We seem to have fallen in lock-step behind those who claim it does and argue on the basis of study quality instead.

Oh blimey, now I've upset Linda. :o

Yuri
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You bastard!

Linda
 
Rolfe said:
That's an extremely good question, and I hope meow will answer it.

I've read it. Insofar as I could. It is without exception the most obfuscatory, incomprehensible, opaque, convoluted piece of user-hostile writing it has ever been my misfortune to encounter, and I've seen a lot I can tell you (I scrutinise papers for scientific jouirnals quite regularly). I even include Milgrom's quantum flapdoodle papers here, and that's saying a lot.

It is, quite frankly, almost impossible to understand. I have to wonder what the scrutineers were thinking of, but honestly, sometimes people get intimidated by very very obscure presentations and instead of saying, here, send this back to the authors and tell them to re-write it so it can be understood, they just pass it rather than admit they don't really follow it.

I can only speculate why anyone would write that way, especially if they've got results which challenge the very fundamentals of our world-view. Possibly because the "significant" findings took a lot of teasing out of the raw data? Possibly in order to make it difficult to criticise?

The comparison with Pons and Fleischmann is appropriate, however there is one difference. The physics/chemistry establishment bought into Pons and Fleischmann at first. They were sceptical, yes, because the theory sounded dodgy from the get-go, but there was enough there that researchers felt it was worth their while to get involved in testing the claims. Partly because of natural scientific curiosity, and partly of course because there would have been great prestige in being the guy who managed to replicate the alleged findings.

The Benveniste/Ennis claims are similar. They suggest that much of what we think is true about the basic functioning of matter is flawed. Normally, this sort of claim has physicists and chemists swarming all over it, all wanting to be the first to solve the mystery. However, that ain't happening. Why not? Because, frankly, any serious physicist or chemist can see there's nothing there but a noisy, unstable system that sometimes seems to generate "significant" output - exactly what Pons and Fleischmann had, come to think of it.

And as for Madeleine Ennis being a non-believer. Well, that's her account of how she came to the subject originally. She's been a complete woo for quite a number of years now. The gullible and those prone to delusion can be encountered in all walks of life, even, though it pains me to say it, amoung biochemists.

Rolfe.
Click to expand...

I found your link to the paper in an old thread. I can't find any description of their blinding methodology in it--only the assertion that it was done.
 
Rolfe said:
The Benveniste/Ennis claims are similar. They suggest that much of what we think is true about the basic functioning of matter is flawed. Normally, this sort of claim has physicists and chemists swarming all over it, all wanting to be the first to solve the mystery. However, that ain't happening. Why not? Because, frankly, any serious physicist or chemist can see there's nothing there but a noisy, unstable system that sometimes seems to generate "significant" output - exactly what Pons and Fleischmann had, come to think of it.



ridiculous



Rolfe.
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and yeah, i've read it

meow
 
meow said:
easily proven, however, as randi once said, "never play another man's game." as he most certainly sabotages the experiment during the preliminary stage. he is allowed to do that according to the rules he spells out.


easily proven via....



http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=0dd37a60a935ce27e1ac6ccc41b2ef1c

Abstract

Ultra-high dilutions of lithium chloride and sodium chloride (10−30 gcm−3) have been irradiated by X- and γ-rays at 77 K, then progressively rewarmed to room temperature. During that phase, their thermoluminescence has been studied and it was found that, despite their dilution beyond the Avogadro number, the emitted light was specific of the original salts dissolved initially.
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here's the evidence.

like i said, easily proven.

Physica A --- first rate physics journal, read away


meow meow
 
OK, meow, you've read it. Yaw(n). That's an easy statement to make.

Now please explain, in detail, what the paper presents that has convinced you. (Nerr-y a chance.) This is your Gold-en opportunity.

Just parroting p <0.001 again and again doesn't cut it. Not even if you add "The Queen of England - and her son!!"

So, demonstrate that you've read it, understand it, and can explain the conclusons.

Rolfe.
 
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