Penn & Teller on Alternative Medicine

[epepke]

I'm not trying to prove that anything works. I'm trying to show you that Penn & Tellers show on Alternative medicine is Bullsh*t.

You'd probably love their episode on Medical Marijuana then.

 

[politas]

Well just because Magnets may not work, lets not
write off the whole natural meds world.

We don't. We write off magnet therapy because magnet therapy doesn't work.
We write off homeopathy because homeopathy doesn't work. We write off
chiropracty (for anything other than certain skeletal-related problems)
because chiropracty doesn't work for anything other than certain
skeletal-related problems. We write off acupuncture because acupuncture
doesn't work.

Every alternative medicine has been tested. The parts that work become part
of mainstream medicine. The parts that don't work remain "alternative".
Many herbal remedies have become part of mainstream medicine, like aspirin.

The synthetic meds may help people with their
symptoms but they don't cure. What does cure is changing your lifestyle
because obviously you did something to bring on the illness. You can't just
pop a pill and keep doing what you're doing and think it will go away.
Natural meds work with the body to cure, but you can't just think that will
work either.

So maybe those natural meds didn't work in the studies but those test
subjects probably kept living their junk food, lazy lifestyle that got them
sick to begin with.

This is complete nonsense. When I go to a GP, they talk about improving
diet and fitness as well as trying to identify the illness, not just
treating the symptoms.

When I went to a homeopath once, all he was interested in was my symptoms.
In fact, he explained in detail that what homeopathy was all about was
treating the symptoms with sympathetic magic. Of course, that destroyed the
placebo effect for me, because I don't believe in magic.

 

[Curnir]

1. well duh of course dose is an issue., but we weren't talking about dosage. You brought up that toxic stuff but you never mentioned dose the first time. I never mentioned dos and nobody else did. The thing is dose is harder to over do with natural and very easy to do with synthetic.

Gee wonder why.

Infact over dosing on synthetic pills is one reason why people die in the hands on doctors (i've seen the stories on tv).

wow... ok riddle me me this batman, how many of those people overdose by not following the dosage recommended by the MD?

Fun fact: it's impossible to have a fatal over dose on marijuana. Aspirin cause more deaths than marijuana. So why ban it? Because our government are crooks. You can't trust anything. I would post a link about marijuana because there is such a thing as medical marijuana but I need 15 posts first to link.

Fun fact. Watch Penn & Teller's ******** Season 2 episode 4.
Why do people die from aspirin? Gee could it be because the don't follow the recommended dosage written on the frickin package?
Just out of curiosity, do you include traffic accidents where one of the drivers are stoned in your Marijuana statment.

And WE KNOW about medical marijuana.

So marijuana (natural) is safer than cigs (synthetic). Pot can help people while cigs kill people. So here is just one example of how government can be really crooked. Many studies show marijuana can help illness and yet its illegal. So there, I found a natural substance that can help but our government denies it.

Oh oh oh this is just to good to be true.
It it only the cigs that are synthetic according to you or can you include things like pipe tobacco and cigars?

If so. Please explain why they are synthetic.

 

[Stitch]

Can you prove the drugs and the medical industry don't cause hundreds of thousands of deaths and injury?

Can anybody say "burden of proof"?

You're claiming that alt med works, that mainstream pharmaceuticals are killing people and keeping them sick, the onus is on you to show the evidence to support your claim.

 

[Stitch]

Their supposed to say both sides of the case. So maybe magnets don't work but with is the death toll? How many deaths does car accidents cause in the US? i'm talking stats for the US through this whole thread btw. Anyways I looked at stats for 2003 car accidents and it was much less than hosp deaths.

For grey your link brought me to healthgrades.com and I went down a little and you can see the study under healthgrades research.

For the most part, people use mainstream treatment for critical illnesses, you don't see too many people in A&E brought in from a car crash telling the doctors to stop and call their homeopathist.

So if you use alt med for the non critical stuff then people are unlikely to die from using an ineffective treatment. However, if you can find sufficient voluenteers with a treatable cancer prepared to give up their treatment and move wholesale to an alt med treatment I wager the mortality rate will be pretty high and significantly higher than with the mainstream treatment.

 

[Stitch]

(i've seen the stories on tv).

So if it's been on TV it must be true? So why are you disagreeing with Penn and Teller?? Ahhh cherry picking!!

 

[Amorelli]

Can anybody say "burden of proof"?

You're claiming that alt med works, that mainstream pharmaceuticals are killing people and keeping them sick, the onus is on you to show the evidence to support your claim.

I already did. I showed that the medical industry kills. Most doctors im sure don't do it on purpose but their treatments do kill a lot more people.

Anyways

This is all about the natural cure for cancer and its story.

How Healing becomes a Crime. part 1

How Healing becomes a Crime. Part 2

How Healing becomes a Crime.
Part 3

 

[Curnir]

I already did. I showed that the medical industry kills. Most doctors im sure don't do it on purpose but their treatments do kill a lot more people.

Anyways

This is all about the natural cure for cancer and its story.

How Healing becomes a Crime. part 1

How Healing becomes a Crime. Part 2

How Healing becomes a Crime.
Part 3

Awww go on, give us a brief synopsis. Please.

 

[Rasmus]

I already did. I showed that the medical industry kills. Most doctors im sure don't do it on purpose but their treatments do kill a lot more people.

Those are very serious allegations of malpractice. I betcha you won't dare to name any doctors that you think are guilty of this!

I am sorry, but this PC is acting up badly when it's supposed to play vidoes, so I'll have to pass for the time being.

 

[gruk]

No, alt-med would lose them money because they generally cost a lot less money and you don't need to buy the meds from them because it's natural. They would have a lot more competition from the little guys doing the same thing - selling natural meds. Synthetic meds are very unhealthy in most cases and so maybe they prove to suppress the symptoms (you'll feel cured), they don't cure it and then you can also get the side effects....in some cases death.

It depends on the medicine. In some cases, all we can do at the moment is to treat the symptoms and hope the root cause goes away (or at least doens't cause further problems). A typical case in hand would be diabetes type 1. The only think we can do is to feed insulin into the sufferer and hope nothing else causes problems. We cannot, yet, cure the root cause (complete failure of the Langerthan Islets) but may be able to do so in the future.

Another typical case of "cure symptom" is pain relief. It does have some beneficial effect, though, since a lessening of pain allows more relaxation and gives the body a chance to repair itself. It's not a cure per se, but may well be part of a cure (some pain relief substances also act as anti-inflmmatory, as vasodilators and other functions).

Anyways I wasn't trying to get into this argument. I was pointing out the hypocrisy of doctors bashing natural meds. Even if they aren't the leading cause of death, think about every year planes crashing into buildings causing 300,000 to die. That's 9/11 100x. Why isn't this reported??? I think before doctors go and bash natural meds, they need to fix their own ◊◊◊◊.

No, because "natural meds" are of very varying quality and potency. Take salicylic acid (the compound that was, eventually, stabilised and synthezised as acetylic salicylic acid and sold under a variety of brand names, including Aspirin) as a perfect example. It's a slightly improved natural substance, but as opposed to the tree bark the original remedy comes from, a lab-produced substance has the sam strength today as it did 10 years ago. An extract made from bark from tree 1 is most probably NOT of the same potency as that made from the same sort of tree only a mile away.

This causes BIG problems for anyone wanting to deliver a consistent dosage.

Also, bear in mind that at least some "natural remedies" have had their efficiency boosted by the inclusion of pharmaceutical substances (read the ingredients list, you may be surprised).

 

[gruk]

And marijuana doesn't?

Duh! Of COURSE it doesn't! Marijuana is a COMPLETELY INERT substance, causing NO EFFECT in ANYONE, especially when BURNED. The light-headedness that users CLAIM to EXPERIENCE is due only to the vigorous huffing and puffing they do while toking up.

 

[Hawk one]

Hmmmm...Seven years ago, my Dad started having severe pain in his lower back and legs. He pretty much ignored the pain, taking asprin sometimes, for 6 months. When he could no longer walk, my Mother finally talked him into going to the doctor, where he was diagnosed with soft tissue sarcoma, which had gotten too close to too many internal organs for an operation to be safe, especially in his extremely weakened condition. The doctor said "What would have been good for you is to have come in 5 months ago." Unfortunately, he said it about a month too late, and my Dad died 4 weeks later. Obviously, the doctor and asprin killed my Dad.

Yes, it possibly couldn't have been that he was resisting going to the doctor for so long, with a disease that cannot be treated at all stages, because if you only go natural, you can cure AIDS...

(Just to clarify, I did catch your sarcasm at the end, and only followed up on it in the same vein. No attack at you meant, in other words.)

Sorry to hear about how you lost your father in such a manner, and welcome to the forum.

Edited to fix formatting errors

 

[Stitch]

I have to spell everything out for you? I mean synthetic chemicals. They add very bad stuff. Christ...

What do you mean by synthetic? Man made?

Please tell me how you would tell the difference between salt (Sodium Chloride) produced by evapourating sea water and salt produced by reacting sodium with chlorine in the lab.

 

[Stitch]

Are you kidding me? I have no idea why I argue on this forum.

We are thinking much the same thing.

Synthetic means something that doesn't isn't natural.

Define "natural"

If you add 500 chemicals and then burn them to create 4000 more then one can conclude that some of those chemicals aren't very natural.

Why? So is standing in a burning tabacco field caused by a lightening strike healthy because it's natural? Same chemicals.

Infact there are synthetic chemicals in your food! They aren't healthy either. I eat organic.

The chemicals are the same, 1 lot is produced in the lab, the organic comes from rotting animal faeces. In fact organic has MORE stuff in and on it as it has all the pathogens and bacteria from the animal dung to boot. I hope you wash your "natural" food really well!

 

[asmodean]

Can you prove the drugs and the medical industry don't cause hundreds of thousands of deaths and injury?

Mmm. I think you got things bass-ackwards here. It is your claim that this is the case, the burden of proof is on you.

 

[asmodean]

1. well duh of course dose is an issue., but we weren't talking about dosage. You brought up that toxic stuff but you never mentioned dose the first time. I never mentioned dos and nobody else did. The thing is dose is harder to over do with natural and very easy to do with synthetic. Infact over dosing on synthetic pills is one reason why people die in the hands on doctors (i've seen the stories on tv).

Well, if you've seen it on TV it must be true. Colour me impressed.

So marijuana (natural) is safer than cigs (synthetic).

Uhm, not to rain on your parade or anything, but since when is tobacco synthetic? Last time I checked, tobacco was a plant.

Pot can help people while cigs kill people. So here is just one example of how government can be really crooked. Many studies show marijuana can help illness and yet its illegal. So there, I found a natural substance that can help but our government denies it.

But you have yet to back up your statement on how evidence based medecine kills hundreds of thousands every year. Or to back up any other of your blanket assertions come to think about it.

 

[asmodean]

They have chemicals in them.

So does pot. THC anyone? Nasty chemichal. Better throw away those oranges, filled with nasty stuff like ascorbic acid and dihiydrogenmonoxied. Pure poison.

*roll eyes* Is this guy for real?

 

[asmodean]

I have to spell everything out for you? I mean synthetic chemicals. They add very bad stuff. Christ...

Ohh. Synthetic chemichals? So, can you tell me the difference between synthetic ascorbic acid and natural?

 

[Hellbound]

I really have no desire to get into this argument but...

Winston's cigarettes now have no additives. No synthetic chemicals.

Still not "healthy".

People who grew thier own tobacco in days past still died from mouth, throat, and lung cancer. No added chemicals.

 

[atari24]

I have a headache after reading this thread. I guess I should drink more water, because drinking 10 glasses of water means you'll never have headaches, and you won't get cancer. And it stops genetic diseases from taking effect. And it cures world hunger. And it also makes you better than the people who don't.

If only those damn doctors would stop their lies about "DNA" and "viruses" and "education".