Ow, my brain

[bascule]

A "Dr." of Homeopathy attempts to explain the science behind it. Her approach seems to be doing a lot of namedropping and pulling random terms out of her ass, then stitching it all together into something completely incoherent:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZEi8l7p56I

[YT2095]

agreed, it actually runs Contrary to the whole idea of Homeopathy entirely, "The less said the better"

 

I dunno about you, but I can only take the concept in small doses!

[ecoli]

"God, in his infinite wisdom, sent him another Einstein, called Steven Hawkings. Steven Hawkings gave us the string theory"

 

 

you really can't make this shit up. wow.

 

I also find it amusing that she used homeopathy as analogous to a bomb.

[SkepticLance]

A little history.

Homeopathy was the invention of a Dr. Hahnmann, several hundred years back. At the time, medicine was equivalent to voodoo, and his idea made sense. He said that symptoms were the body's way of fighting illness. At the time, that seemed a pretty good idea.

 

One branch of medicine that was, in fact, quite well advanced was poisons. Lots of poisons were known, and their effects well appreciated. Dr. Hahnmann decided to use his poisons to enhance symptoms, thereby increasing the body's ability to fight disease.

 

He discovered, however, that adding poison into the body of a sick person, for some strange reason, reduced chances of recovery! In fact, a lot of his patients died. Then he made his seminal discovery. If he added less poison, the patient had a better chance of recovery.

 

"Ah ha" he said. "If less is better, then if I dilute the poison to really, really low doses, I will have a wonderful remedy."

 

And homeopaths have been doing just that to this day. The fact that it doesn't work really does not seem to bother them.

[gonelli]

"we have ears...string, vibratory, they pick up vibration"

 

So she is saying that she can hear the strings vibrating? Wow, that's impressive - i don't know anybody else that is able to hear them.

 

I wonder what scienctific theories she used to explain previous to string theory being announced?

[ecoli]

A little history.

Homeopathy was the invention of a Dr. Hahnmann, several hundred years back. At the time, medicine was equivalent to voodoo, and his idea made sense. He said that symptoms were the body's way of fighting illness. At the time, that seemed a pretty good idea.

Well that much is true... symptoms like fevers, sneezing, etc are symptoms of diseases, but always ways our body tries to kill or expel pathogens.

[SkepticLance]

To ecoli

 

It is SOMETIMES true. Some symptoms are a harmful result of disease, and some are even the pathogens actions, designed to spread itself to other victims.eg. the diarrhoea from cholera.

[ecoli]

To ecoli

 

It is SOMETIMES true. Some symptoms are a harmful result of disease, and some are even the pathogens actions, designed to spread itself to other victims.eg. the diarrhoea from cholera.

only partially true, considering how the human body probably wouldn't have evolved a system in order to spread a virulent pathogen...

 

Diarrhea also may have evolved to flush pathogens out of the intestines.

 

It's not an either/or system. Responses that the body has could have essentially hijacked by pathogens for their own advantage. I took a whole class on this concept last semester.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

The human body wouldn't have evolved it, but cholera uses cholera toxin to essentially flush out the intestines and spread itself.

 

I don't think that you can really argue that symptoms such as the spasms produced by tetanospasmin are natural responses hijacked by tetanus.

[SkepticLance]

There are a number of highly fascinating studies showing how pathogens can alter the metabolism etc of the host to benefit themselves. In some cases, even to change host behaviour to assist in pathogen spread. Mice exposing themselves to cats to be eaten - thus spreading the pathogen into the cat body, and so on.

[Edtharan]

Ther eis a parasitic worm in Africa (I can't remember it's name) that has part of its life cycle in water. When it infects a human and it is ready to enter its water phase of its life cycle it causes a burning sensation in the legs of the infected person who then sooths them in water (and then the worm breaks out of the legs and enters the water.

 

(off topic I know, but I find parasitology quite intersting)