Homoeopathy: Help explain it to our credulous parliamentarians!

Yup:

10C=1 : (10^100)

1 kg-mole of water = 6x10^28 molecules and has a mass of (2x1)+16 kg=18kg (H2O)

1.6x10^71 kgmole
3x10^72kg


Assuming water is approximately 1000kg/m^3 denisty, this equates to a volume of
3x10^(72-3)cubic metres=3x10^69 cubic metres or 3x10^60 cubic km.

Volume of a sphere =4/3 pi r^3

thus the radius of a sphere of pure water that should have one atom is going to be cube_root((3x10^60)/((4/3)*pi))
=cube_root((10^60)*4/(9*pi)))=5x10^19 km

so this is equivalent to one molecule in a sphere of pure water with a radius of 5x10^19km

The Earth is about 150x10^9 km from the sun, so the sphere of water would have to have a radius of about 347 million times the orbital radius of the Earth.

One atom in a sphere with a radius that is 347 million times longer than the distance from the earth to the sun

(or according to google, over 5000 light years)

one molecule in a sphere of pure water 10000 light years in diameter

and that is only 10C...


-

Oh sorry, Father Dagon wanted the dilution for a litre of water, not a molecule...
 
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Zep & jimbob, thanks. But how many centisimalpotentials is used in the homeopatic system?
 
Can't answer that Father Dagon, but I just want to add that for the calculations, I have assumed that such a hypothetical sphere of water wouldn't form a black hole...

Maybe it is less dense than that, and spread out over solar systems (ours is about 2x10^30 kg) so that would only need 1.5x10^42 solar systems... or (assuming the milky way is 2x10^11 times the sun: 7.5x10^30 times the mass in the milky way).

Maybe that is what the Dark matter is, all the hidden material for homeopathic concentrations to begin to make sense.
 
Father Dagon said:
Zep & jimbob, thanks. But how many centisimal potentials is used in the homeopathic system?
Click to expand...
There are a few commonly used ones: 6C, 30C and 200C. These tend to be the "standard" dilutions provided by major homeopathic remedy manufacturers.

However the homeopathic method of dilution gives any of them the freedom to make up whatever dilution they see fit, using any one of these as a "base". For example, a 12C remedy can be made by diluting a 6C remedy another 6 times according to the 1:100 method. Or 2 times using a 1:1000 method.

But...!

The actual methods used for dilution are equally suspect. For example, the "Korsakov" 1:1000 method consists basically of emptying the vial containing the potion leaving some of the liquid still wet on its walls, then filling it with fresh water/alcohol. Clearly accuracy is not paramount in their calculations here!
 
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I cannot understand your calculations but I do not agree with your numbers. I do agree that a 10C solution would be pure water plus contamination.

We start with a one mm of a solution. We dilute it to 10^9. Result - we have expanded the cube by 1,000 on each side. So we only get a cube measuring 1 meter on each side. Do the same thing again and we get a cube one kilometer on each side. We now have a 9C solution. To make it a 10C solution we need to dilute it again by a factor of 100 so we get a shape that is 100km X 1km X 1km.
 
jimbob: Thanks! But I think that using moles in the calculation won't clear away any confusion. Remember that we are trying to enlighten mp:s, aye? Therefore we should use everyday measures (litre, pint, cup) for our mind-boggling demonstrations on how diluted 200C is.

Zep: Thanks!

And I remember when I was a kid and played alchemist, sort of. I wanted to add as much different ingridients I could into my concotion. But dilution never crossed my mind!
 
rjh01 said:
I cannot understand your calculations but I do not agree with your numbers. I do agree that a 10C solution would be pure water plus contamination.

We start with a one mm of a solution. We dilute it to 10^9. Result - we have expanded the cube by 1,000 on each side. So we only get a cube measuring 1 meter on each side. Do the same thing again and we get a cube one kilometer on each side. We now have a 9C solution. To make it a 10C solution we need to dilute it again by a factor of 100 so we get a shape that is 100km X 1km X 1km.
Click to expand...

I think you are right for "10C" (1:10^20) so about 6000 molecules in 18cc of water.

I think 1:10^100 would be "100X", and "10C " would be 1:100^10...

IIRC, some homeopaths also "use" 200C dilutions... 1:100^200

So the calculation for 10^100 is still within homeopatic dilutions. Just not the one that I mentioned.

just checking my reasoning:

1:10 =1X, 1:10^2 =2X, 1:10^100 =100X... yes the 200C is mindboggling...
 
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Father Dagon, when you are talking about "100X", then litres doesn't begin to work. you need thousands of cubic light-years of water for a single molecule...

As for "200C"...
 
rjh01 said:
<snip>We start with a one mm of a solution. We dilute it to 10^9. Result - we have expanded the cube by 1,000 on each side. So we only get a cube measuring 1 meter on each side. Do the same thing again and we get a cube one kilometer on each side. We now have a 9C solution. To make it a 10C solution we need to dilute it again by a factor of 100 so we get a shape that is 100km X 1km X 1km.
Click to expand...

Father Dagon said:
jimbob: Thanks! But I think that using moles in the calculation won't clear away any confusion. Remember that we are trying to enlighten mp:s, aye? Therefore we should use everyday measures (litre, pint, cup) for our mind-boggling demonstrations on how diluted 200C is.
<snip>
Click to expand...

You want me to expand my 1mm^3 to a litre? OK. That would expand my result by 100 in all dimensions. So the box would be 10,000 X 100 X 100 km. This is only a 10C solution. To get to a 13C add two zeros to all numbers. I would give you the answer to 200C but it blew my brains out doing the calculations.
 
To get to a 31C solution add 14 zeros to the numbers. To get back to a 30C solution subtract two zeros from one of the numbers. This means that a 1 litre solution diluted to a 30C solution would be a box of size 10^15 X 10^15 X 10^15km. To put this in perspective Neptune is about 4.5 X 10 ^9km from the sun.
 
Let me guess, Hahnemann flunked at math:
Physicist Robert L. Park, Ph.D., former executive director of the American Physical Society, has noted that "since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth." Park has also noted that "to expect to get even one molecule of the "medicinal" substance allegedly present in 30X pills, it would be necessary to take some two billion of them, which would total about a thousand tons of lactose plus whatever impurities the lactose contained." The laws of chemistry state that there is a limit to the dilution that can be made without losing the original substance altogether.​
(wikipedia)

And please tell me when I'm wrong:

1C=1:100
200C=1:100^200=1:10^2000
 
Father Dagon said:
Let me guess, Hahnemann flunked at math:
Physicist Robert L. Park, Ph.D., former executive director of the American Physical Society, has noted that "since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth." Park has also noted that "to expect to get even one molecule of the "medicinal" substance allegedly present in 30X pills, it would be necessary to take some two billion of them, which would total about a thousand tons of lactose plus whatever impurities the lactose contained." The laws of chemistry state that there is a limit to the dilution that can be made without losing the original substance altogether.​
(wikipedia)

And please tell me when I'm wrong:

1C=1:100
200C=1:100^200=1:10^2000
Click to expand...

You just have to have faith :)

If you believe, then it's you that gets the dose with the lucky molecule :D

Or am I thinking about something else?
 
Father Dagon said:
Let me guess, Hahnemann flunked at math:
Physicist Robert L. Park, Ph.D., former executive director of the American Physical Society, has noted that "since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth." Park has also noted that "to expect to get even one molecule of the "medicinal" substance allegedly present in 30X pills, it would be necessary to take some two billion of them, which would total about a thousand tons of lactose plus whatever impurities the lactose contained." The laws of chemistry state that there is a limit to the dilution that can be made without losing the original substance altogether.​
(wikipedia)

And please tell me when I'm wrong:

1C=1:100
200C=1:100^200=1:10^2000
Click to expand...
Actually Hahnemann was perfectly well aware that serial dilution has finite limits. He couldn't reconcile his "apparent" successful effects with this at all. So he postulated the "life force" thingy as a reason for the results, never actually bothering to prove it definitively. It seemed to explain the results at the time, so he stuck with it.

Many of contemporaries were quick to point out what we know already today - that it was in fact placebo (they called it something different then) and no "life force" thingy was necessary or involved. Hahnemann was being thoroughly debunked before his death, but being a stubborn old git, he considered that these rebuttals were just further proof of his theories (known as: I'm persecuted, therefore I'm right!).

Subsequent homeopaths took all his speculations as unassailable gospel, and have refused ever since to believe otherwise that Hahnemann could have been wrong. The "life force" idea continues to this day, sometimes being proposed under other names such as "the memory of water" and other such bunk.
 
In scientific mode windows allowed me to find the square of a number that gave the answer 9.9999999999999999987712e+282623.

Is that big enough?
 
Just to clarify my workings:

I assume that 6C is 1:100 solution diluted six times, and 200C is 1:100 diluted 200 times?

In which my (1:10)^100, 10,000 light-year diameter sphere would be a "100X" "solution"

Am I correct?
 
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