chinese medicine, is it all nonsense?

[Guest]

Chinese medicine, including acupuncture, is a complete and total Sham! With a capital S. Anyone who pursues that rubbish deserves the bad things that WILL result. Every so-called "study" that has purportedly shown some benefit has been linked in some way to the Chinese government or Chinese research institutes, either through funding, or information, always some link. Truly independent studies debunk it and expose it for the pure rubbish it is.

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Fortunately, not all are so adamndantly closed minded. Including the Canadian Government that supports and pays on our medicare for "Alternative" therapies, including acupuncture. My own family docotr is certified in its use and has good success with many people....but the patient also must be open minded. Suspect that even radiation therapy won't work if you truly believe it won't. The human mind is the most pwerful healing mechanism we have.

 

AFYI..no he's not Chinese, British in fact and a stanch right wing conservative, not a Chinese infiltrator.

[Guest]

>>>not a Chinese infiltrator. <<<

 

can't be too careful - you never know those commie agents...

the y have all sorts of disguises now...like signitures in strange languages on messageboards... :: :: :hubba:

 

 

 

[Torneyboy]

My wife allthough does not get sick often.

If she feels a bit ""off"" will go to a chinese doctor.

 

 

A few weeks ago i came home opened the door ..and the smell that hit me was incredible.

On the hotplate was a ""bong"" looking contraption i looked in and this green slimy,,weedy stuff in there bubbling away..not to eat..just for the vapour and the smell to clear the head/mind/body she said.

 

It worked by the way.

[Guest]

If I am correct at least western Canada has a very large Chinese population. It only makes sense that they would expect the med system there to pay for their "medicine" as well. That fact has absolutly nothing to do with whether or not it acutally does any good. I also think your statement "Suspect that even radiation therapy won't work if you truly believe it won't." to be rather interesting. Sure one can still more or less choose to be sick, but I am sorry if you get zapped with radiation something will acutally happen. It is a matter of physics and there is no hocus pocus involved. Unlike many non modern methods where there is absolutly no effect, other than placibo. Again I think that most day to day illness or lack of well being will pass on its own. It is usualy within this time line that most people partake of non modern medical sevices. When things run their cousre the non modern medical service will get the credit for "curing" the problem. But when real life threatening issues are treated with this type of "medical" care the results can be tragic. Medicine is a science, not a philosophy or a spiritual belief. It is quantifyable and replicable.

[Guest]

>>>Medicine is a science, not a philosophy or a spiritual belief. It is quantifyable and replicable.<<<

 

 

and lots of it we do not know yet, or are just at the beginning of understanding with our methology - esp. the correlation of physic and psyche.

 

[lembeh]

 

>and lots of it we do not know yet, or are just at the beginning of understanding with our methology - esp. the correlation of physic and psyche.

 

 

I thnk no scientist (or medic) would ever suggest that we "know it all" so to speak. But, where I think that western and eastern "science" diverge is that "western" science has a commonly agreed methodology.

 

Probably the most single important aspect of western science is : reproducability. i.e. what one person does, another *must* be able to do, in exactly the same way, and, most importantly, must get *exactly* the same result. If not, the discrepancy *must* be explained. To enable this, every scientific work, every medical study has fairly detailed instructions as to *exactly* how the study was undertaken or performed. To a greater or lesser degree, one scientist can write and ask the author of the study for particular materials, reagents or animals, so that they *can* replicate the study.

 

In particular cases, scientists will even travel to another laboratory to learn the ins and outs of how the experiment was done. Non-replicatable science is soon discredited.

 

It is this "system" of both thought and approach that so separates eastern and western science. *Belief* has no place in western science, only fact and replication.

 

This is why I said (and stand by) that *if* there is anything in "eastern" science, it will eventually be bruted out by western science. Eastern science, by its very thought processes is not able to analyse itself.

-j-

[Guest]

>>>Probably the most single important aspect of western science is : reproducability. i.e. what one person does, another *must* be able to do, in exactly the same way, and, most importantly, must get *exactly* the same result.<<<

 

 

 

but that approach gets to its limits even in our own science - psychiatry and psychology. in many cases there reproducability is very limited, and methods based on empirical studies are still emploeyed in lack of anything else.

 

 

 

>>>Eastern science, by its very thought processes is not able to analyse itself.<<<

 

i am not an expert or anything like it - but have you had a look at ayurveda?

the effects of yoga have extensively been studied, and as far as i know many of its effects are not yet explainable but documented (and i am not talking here about the mumbojumbo stuff, which gets regularly exposed as fake).

and maybe one day western methology will be able to analyse its effects and even reproduce them, but i would not call that 'bullying' out, but being inspired and improve things - a very human thing. only a fanatic fundamentalist would would not accept that.

but as long as we simply are not able to reproduce under our methology the known beneficial effects of things like yoga we will just have to accept them and keep researching, but we have no right to bagatalise them just because our approach just has not reproduced those results. to do that would equal the trial of gallileo gallilei.

 

[sui_lo]

Disagree that it's totally separate.

 

Work in branch of medicine (animal rather than human) and personally practice solely Westerm styles.

Regularly will refer chronic disease with no western cure (e.g. arthritis, nerve diseases) to an acupuncturist (Western medic but learned acupuncture both in Asia and West) and get a mixed set of results.

 

Arguements are often misleading though as anecdotes never allow for the placebo effect (I think I'll get better so I do) or for natural cure (Still have Western trained doctors giving anti-biotics for flu virus infections - patient gets better on tablets but nothing to do with the antibiotics).

 

Do have a gripe against chinese meds though. First thing we're taught is: main priority is "do no harm".

Have seen many cases where people have used chinese meds in animals and made conditions worse or caused new probs - not necessarily means all chinese meds are bad but no regulations means that arsenic, lead and other heavy metals can be present w/o the user knowing what is really present.

 

Theoretically could have many good treatments though, if can regulate properly - a lot of it is herbal based and so only a step or two away from western meds (someone else mentioned foxglove and digitalis).

 

Acupuncture, massage, blowing on ribs, homeopathy ain't gonna cause worse probs other than neglect if they don't check other options as well.

 

Ultimately each to their own... ::

[lembeh]

 

 

>Disagree that it's totally separate.

 

Thats your privilidge.

 

 

>anecdotes never allow for the placebo effect

 

*EXACTLY*. In western meds (or trials etc), you *have* to allow for that (and if you did not, your study would get booted out ASAP).

 

>Still have Western trained doctors giving anti-biotics for flu virus

 

Ever heard of secondary infections?

 

>someone else mentioned foxglove and digitalis

 

Erm. No. I am pretty sure *I* mentioned fox glove and digitalis actually, again proving my point.

 

Eastern science *may* have something (although foxglove is a western folk lore remedy), but it will take rigorous (western) science to get to it....

-j-

 

 

[kamui]

Says josh_ingu:

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It is this "system" of both thought and approach that so separates eastern and western science. *Belief* has no place in western science, only fact and replication.

 

This is why I said (and stand by) that *if* there is anything in "eastern" science, it will eventually be bruted out by western science. Eastern science, by its very thought processes is not able to analyse itself.

-j-

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I repeat this again, IMHO your way of thinking is very old school.

 

First: Eastern science IS entering the field of Western medicine and as always when a transfer between two different culture takes place the original method will change a little bit to Western habits and traditions (same same with Buddhism coming to West, by the way). I am wondering why do you deny what actually is already happening, for example in Germany?

 

Anyway, all over Asia you can find the mix of both ways of healing and I really liked the situation in Japan, where I had the choice between Western and Eastern ways of healing.

 

Second: Yours problem of Western science with Eastern methods: The results CAN be verified. Why do you say they can't? But this first problem is that to reproduce the results the Western scientiest have to learn a complete new method which unfortunatley sometimes need years or more than a decade to learn. The second problem is: the way how Eastern methods work can only partly or sometimes not at all be explained with Western scientific methods, but you cannot deny that it works more or less - Same same with Western methods, some results are unsatisfactorily, but nowbody would disapprove Western medicine, because of this.

 

Why don't you say: let't take the good parts, sort out the bad parts.

 

Third: The medical industry is extremely powerful and has a very strong lobby. For example: Pharmaceutical companies and producers of medical equipment don't have any interest in substituting strong pain killers with acupuncture which does not need any pills or expensive equipment, except a few sets of needles.

 

And don't forget that Western societies lost a tremendous amount of knowledge about Western natural ways of healing since the middle ages and that in some areas new drugs are becoming increasingly more expensive and harder to develop over the years. That is way pharmaceutical companies now send their scientist to "underdeveloped" regions in "Third World" countries to learn from the natives. Some countries like Brazil already have laws against thievery of plants and knowledge by this companies which later tried to receive a patent for it.