In Defense of Homeopathy

Jeanette Winterson offers her "defence" in the Guardian, and I can't wait for Ben Goldacre to rip into it.

She starts with this classic argument from anecdote:

Picture this. I am staying in a remote cottage in Cornwall without a car. I have a temperature of 102, spots on my throat, delirium, and a book to finish writing. My desperate publisher suggests I call Hilary Fairclough, a homeopath who has practices in London and Penzance. She sends round a remedy called Lachesis, made from snake venom. Four hours later I have no symptoms whatsoever.

Dramatic stuff, and enough to convince me that while it might use snake venom, homeopathy is no snake oil designed for gullible hypochrondriacs

Actually, the fact that she thinks this is a valid argument shows that it is snake oil designed for gullible hypochondriacs. As they say, the plural of anecdote is anecdotes, not data.

It get's worse - ready for some quantum water woo?

She starts with a defense of a homeopathic clinic in Africa:

I have found myself cited, and drawn into this, because I am on record as supporting homeopathic practice in general, and in particular the Maun homeopathy project, a clinic in Botswana set up by Fairclough
...
As a patron of Fotac (Friends of the Treatment Action Campaign) that has been fighting President Mbeke's lunatic insistence that HIV sufferers just need Vitamin C and a good diet, I am dismayed by any claim that may deter HIV sufferers from taking anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs). And so is Peter Fisher, an NHS doctor, director of the Faculty of Homeopaths, and, incidentally, homeopath to the Queen. Good homeopaths know the value of conventional medicine and do not seek to undermine that value. Fairclough's clinic, and her talk at the symposium, concentrate on using homeopathy to support the ARV programme by alleviating the side-effects of ARVs, and boosting the patient's immune system so they are better able to fight off the opportunistic viruses that follow behind HIV, and the drugs necessary to suppress it. There is no suggestion that homeopathy can replace ARVs.

While it's all good and nice that she's all for real medicine, and this is the very bare minimum to not be an immoral monster, I disagree that homeopathy in this case is at worst harmless. As long as you're spreading nonsense and fraud you are doing wrong to your fellow man. There is no evidence magic water does any of these things, and the last thing we need to do for Africa is export pseudoscience (they have enough with idiots like Mbeki, clearly). This can not be morally justified.

The article then devolves into the "other way of knowing" nonsense:

A recent furore over those homeopaths who offered an undercover journalist alternative remedies for the prevention of malaria has also prompted long-term critics of homeopathy to demand its head on a plate. There will soon be an article in the Lancet calling on doctors to tell their patients that homeopathic medicines offer no benefit. Until now the caveat has been no "proven" benefit. But where is the scientific sense is saying that because we don't understand something, even though we can discern its effects, we have to ignore it, scorn it, or suppress it?

What effects exactly are we discerning of your magic water other than a placebo effect? That's what no "proven" benefit means after all.

This homeophobia is, I think, a genuine terror of what homeopathy is suggesting; which is that we think differently about the relationship between the cure and the disease.

Ah yes, the appeal to think "differently" than scientifically. Why be rational when you can be an idiot?

It is not enough to say Disease A is caused by B and can be cured by C. Homeopathy, in common with other holistic approaches, asks that we look at the whole picture - the person, and not just his illness.

The whole person? How does magic water address the "whole person" better than a real drug that works on the whole person? Oh wait, she'll explain it:

Specifically, in the case of homeopathy, the remedy picture, which is carefully drawn up after full consultation with the patient, follows the "like by like" premise - that tiny dilutions of the "problem" can prompt the body to effect its own cure. This is why the homeopathic code of practice does not talk about the medicines themselves having a simple causal effect - C cures A. Homeopathy seeks to understand everything we are, everything we do, as a web of relatedness.

Can you believe that arguments like these work on people? That magic water (that can't even be said to contain the "problem") work by magic because it's like something else? And how can homeopathy seek to understand anything when it has no standards for inquiry and evidence? If I can just make shit up, how does that connect us in our web of relatedness?

This seems to be partly why tests used for conventional medicines fail when used to test homeopathy.

Ah yes - I know this doggerel. Your woo can not be penetrated by science!

Sceptics will say it is the medicines that fail, and not the trials, but if the medicines really are ineffective, why is it that so many people who have tried homeopathy have found that it makes a difference to their wellbeing?

It is because people are irrational idiots, are susceptible to suggestion, and will feel better if you listen to their problems patiently and then give them anything. But wait, she knows this already!

The placebo effect that is often cited by detractors as homeopathy's only resource (ie that people like being talked to and then given a pill to take), is common to all therapeutic processes, and it is valuable.

So why did she ask? Oh well. Time for the quantum woo. It starts with proof she doesn't know anything about physics.

Objections to homeopathy begin with what are viewed as the impossible dilutions of the remedies, so that only nano amounts of the original active substance remain, and in some cases are only an imprint, or memory.

Impossible to prove of course, we're once again looking for the invisible dragon.

Yet our recent discoveries in the world of the very small point to a whole new set of rules for the behaviour of nano-quantities. Thundering around in our Gulliver world, we were first shocked to find that splitting the atom allowed inconceivable amounts of energy to be released.

No we weren't! We knew that was going to happen ahead of time. That was the whole point of the Manhattan project, we knew that the atom contained energy. Despite what woos think, quantum mechanics and other branches of physics actually make sense to some people.

Now, we are discovering that the properties of materials change as their size reaches the nano-scale.

This might be the first true statement of the article, but is irrelevant, because homeopathic medicines don't contain anything but water. They are diluted to the point that you could drink homeopathic remedies your whole life and not get a molecule of the ingredient.

Bulk material should have constant physical properties, regardless of its size, but at the nano-scale this is not the case. In a solvent, such as water, nano particles can remain suspended, neither floating nor sinking, but permeating the solution. Such particles are also able to pass through cell walls, and they can cause biochemical change.

Lies, lies and damn lies. Molecules are molecules, they don't impart their properties to the whole by magic. If this were true, why drink any homeopathic remedy? According to this logic every molecule of water would have the properties of every chemical substance that has ever seen water on the planet. River water should be homeopathic medicine. And how is the memory of all the other things those water molecules have seen eliminated?

Fisher says that water as a solvent has properties that are not yet understood, and there was great excitement recently when a team of Korean scientists seemed to show that water has "memory". I take New Scientist every week and I am continually amazed at how the seemingly well-known physical world of ours is beginning to show itself as stranger than anyone imagined.

She's referring to this idiotic article. These people need to figure out if they like pharmacology or not. First their woo is impenetrable to science, now they want to say science shows a mechanism for pharmacological effect. Never mind that the substances being concentrated by dilution have no pharmacological effect even given undiluted (or if they did it would likely be poison). As always they want it both ways. It's not about creating a consistent world view or understanding of the world, of physics, of medicine, or of "the whole person". It's about harnessing any argument, logical or illogical, to justify their belief in magic. First it's the memory of the water, now it's molecules aggregating together as they're diluted. And always, there is a complete absence of a biologically-plausible mechanism of action or proof of efficacy in controlled trials.

Finally:

I would like to see homeopathy better regulated. I would like to see the Society of Homeopaths engaging with its critics, as well as initiating more research. There will always be rogue homeopaths and bad homeopaths, but that is true of any profession. Above all we should be careful of dismissing the testimony of millions who say the remedies have worked for them.

How exactly do you regulate frauds to be less fraudulent? Why do we need to research a process that you say is immune to science? How do you tell a bad homeopath from a good homeopath? Well, the good one doesn't discourage you from using real medicine. So why do we need homeopathy again?

This is a defense of homeopathy? Really?

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I think Winterson's article is, more or less, identical to every article I've read, written in praise of some altie "medicine". We think differently. We're about the "whole picture". We don't need your science! Magic water/beans/chants/potatoes will cure what ails ya!

You'd think they could be a little creative with their defences or their placebo.

Good homeopaths know the value of conventional medicine and do not seek to undermine that value.

Calling one little black duck.

By Anonymous (not verified) on 13 Nov 2007 #permalink

Bulk material should have constant physical properties, regardless of its size, but at the nano-scale this is not the case. In a solvent, such as water, nano particles can remain suspended, neither floating nor sinking, but permeating the solution. Such particles are also able to pass through cell walls, and they can cause biochemical change.

This also is true. Some nanoparticles do have drastically different properties from the bulk material, and sometimes these properties can be exploited for medical purposes. For instance, as an undergrad I worked with a professor using nanogold to mark tumors, even to kill them depending on how the particles were prepared. They are small enough to attach to or enter cells. So this quote is absolutely true.

On the other hand, this professor didn't just shake up a vial, declare he had nanoparticles, then shove the solutions down patients' throats. He first had to prove the nanoparticles were there. That part is actually very easy: just take a picture (with an electron microscope). Homeopathy fails this test. There's nothing in a homeopathic solution.

After showing there were nanoparticles in the solutions, animal tests were performed to see if the particles had any biological effects. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't, depending on how they were prepared and how the tests were done. Homeopathy fails this test, too. There isn't any effect. Ever.

After animal testing, a huge amount of time and money must be spent determining if the nanoparticles are a. safe, and b. effective for human use. As far as I know, my former professor hasn't gotten to this stage yet; perhaps he's in the process right now. Homeopathy does actually pass part a.: water sure is safe. But, again, it fails b. Miserably.

So please, Ms. Homeopath, don't talk about nanoparticles like you have the slightest clue what they are, how they work, or what they're good for. You don't.

This seems to be partly why tests used for conventional medicines fail when used to test homeopathy.
The other part being that unlike conventional medicine, homeopathic 'remedies' don't actually do anything.

I cannot comprehend how anyone of sound mind could possibly doubt that if there were any effects to be found, they wouldn't be discovered by a double blind experiment, with placebo given to the control group. To claim that there is an effect, but that it cannot be found by such an experiment, is baffling. Besides memory, perhaps water has a mind of it's own, capable of conveniently forgetting, when subjected to a scientific trial?

Homeopathy. Makin' shit up since 1796.

Think they'll use my slogan?

By Johnny Vector (not verified) on 13 Nov 2007 #permalink

One of the claims of the alties is that "allopathic medicine" treats only the symptoms, not the real disease. Why then do they support homeopathy, which is based on nothing other than treating symptoms under the doctrine of "like cures like"?

I like Johnny Vector's slogan. A while back at the Bad Science forum we had an unofficial competition to come up with a suitable t-shirt slogan for homeopathy. I can't find the thread, sadly, but there were plenty of nice
suggestions.

"Homeopathy: helping cull the credulous since 1796"

"Homeopathy: turning water into money for 200 yrs"

spring to mind

PS I think the actual word homoepathy is supposed to have appeared in 1807, though Hahnemann started writing about his theories from 1796 onwards.

You mention Mbeki, so I thought I would mention that the woo here (in South Africa) is much worse.
Kids here get murdered and dismembered (I don't have link to an article, but I see it in the news rarely, but still) to make certain "muti".
And partly because of lack of education especially in rural areas, they still believe some pretty wacky stuff. Although, having said lack of education, I should say that at a work function a couple of weeks back, a well educated collegue said something just as irrational.
I mentioned a meteor that The Bad Astronomer was showing to trick or treaters on Halloween, and she said that must be the reason the week had been so stressful and tiring. The meteor was affecting us. Of course later I heard her telling another collegue what she had seen in his life from: yep his palm.
Educated does not equal smart... or sane for that matter.
And remind me to tell you about the "tokoloshi" sometime.

By scienceteacher… (not verified) on 14 Nov 2007 #permalink

Homeopathy has been in use for 200 years while modern medicine only about 60 (since WW2). Homeopathy is going strong while modern medicine has brought us zelnorm, rotavirus vaccine, vioxx, and baychol all of which have been banned as scams. Why is that? Thats because modern medicine isnt modern. Its based on the oldest emotion known to mankind, Greed. We havent had a really useful drug brought to market by big pharma in the past 20 years. Only a long list of losers which are maintained by heavy marketing.

We do the same thing in politics. Our democratically elected leaders are there, not because of ability, because of big money and big marketing. They are losers as well.

Homeopathy will still be here 200 years from now and modern medicine will be ultimately replaced by guess what?

Thats right, Homeopathy.

We havent had a really useful drug brought to market by big pharma in the past 20 years.

We haven't had a useful drug brought to market by homeopathy since, well, ever.

This comment was supposed to be subtle satire, right?


Homeopathy will still be here 200 years from now and modern medicine will be ultimately replaced by guess what? Thats right, Homeopathy.

Homeopathy is a cult, just like $cientology.

By Eric Gisin (not verified) on 18 Nov 2007 #permalink

We haven't had a useful drug brought to market by homeopathy since, well, ever.This comment was supposed to be subtle satire, right?

Wrong. Homeopathy has been in use for 200 years and unlike thalidomide and vioxx, none of the homeopathic remedies have ever been banned from the market. On the other hand big pharma drugs are loose cannons that may or may not end up banned after FDA approval. According to Marcia Angell and John Abramson, big pharma has been controlling and corrupting medical research, and weve had a long list of marginally or ineffective drugs that make lots of money for the drug compnaies.

Attacks on homeopathy and natural remedies are merely manifestations of the politics of medicine dominated by big pharma. Its all about the money.

Homeopathy is a cult, just like $cientology.

99 per cent of practitioners of homeopathy or their clients are not scientologists.

There are various definitions of the word cult, some beneficial and some not. For example Alcoholics Anonymous is a beneficial cult. Some people would say that certain political parties represent cults, certain attachments to material or non-material objects are cults. Bottom line the word cult is so abused, its not a very good basis for an argument anymore.

Ah damn, this thread was hijacked by an idiot. thanks Ox, i wanted to hijacked it myself for something useful.

i'll try anyways.

So i was a regular reader of new scientist till i followed the links here through.

So now i'm in the market for a new science discoveries website/magazine out there. any you gentlemne and ladies can recommend?

Thanks all.

By Cat of many faces (not verified) on 18 Nov 2007 #permalink

Oh oh I know this one... "Tu quoque" for $500 Alec!

Is appeal to conspiracy a fallacy already because it should be.

Homeopathy is tripe. Yip. Tell that to the thousands of people I have helped with homeopathy. Placebo? yip. And I'm making a killing out of it. Believe what you want to. I'll just carry on helping sick people.

And here we see the TRUE motivation for most homeo-quacks:

And I'm making a killing out of it.

Science? Reality? Can I make money selling distilled water with science or reality? No? Screw it!

Crooks, liars, and scum.

"Tell that to the thousands of people I have helped with homeopathy."

Sure! Send them over, I'm sure plenty of folks here would be more than happy to tell them how you are taking advantage of them with your pseudoscience. And *not* ask for any kind of money in return.

Define "helped" and design a placebo-controlled double-blind study to measure how much "help" is actually going on.

But that would interfere with him "making a killing"! If he had to perform actual science, he would have less time to prepare his distilled water for his deluded fools, er, patients!

Fine, you don't believe in homeopathy...then don't use it...We believe in it and frankly it works... In my opinion cranks like you..."protest too much"...leads one to believe there is a hidden agenda to defame homeopathy so people don't find out just how amazing it is and how well it works (much better than pharmaceuticals...and isn't that just the point)...how much do the elites pay you to post articles bashing homeopathics so their $300/30 pill boondoggle can continue?!

By Anonymous (not verified) on 24 Feb 2009 #permalink

$300/30 pills. About $10/pill. For something that could save a life, that's cheap at twice the price. For something to block pain so the person can function? Priceless.

How much does distilled magic water go through these days? I've got a bucket in my garage I'll sell you for half that.

Homeopathy does nothing. Period. Distilled water is junk science.

By LanceR, JSG (not verified) on 24 Feb 2009 #permalink