Whoaaaaaaaaa ... deep. Genius. Ummmmmm ... not so much.

So you replied solely becuase you felt the need to bash the poem?

...

Absofegginlutely - Good one!!!

actually science does expose (not fully explain) love and spirituality.

catchy, though. i'm like a walking drugstore - being informed about matters of health is going to save you a lot of money.

acupuncture is well established and I can explain the physiology as well. homeopathic medicine appears to me to be placebo. but this is no greater offender than pharma and statins and whatnot. I studied under a Japanese doctor who also studied western medicine. there are many good areas to look at for health, but this does not seem like a very strong one.

I just joined in.

My attention gave out a few lines after "pert". The poet referred to to something or another about the dark-haired cousin as "pert".

Well, the poem was good in its rhymes, in its narrative, in its building the case, but it became an epos after "pert" and I'm allergic to eposes in rhyme. A girlfriend of my father's almost succeeded to make me read Gilgameesh in the original Mezopotamian clay writing by stick-marks, god only knows what they are called in English. I hate effign eposes. I enjoyed The Siege of Troy and Olysses, but not as much as if they had not been written in verse. The movies were great for me as a 12-year-old, but any one of the three The Terminator movies speaks to me more than the entire Odysseia on film.

Ummm....isn't the basis of science especially with medicine...



....natural elements?...Alchemy, herbalism, apothecary?...for example?


Isn't that the ORIGINAL basis?



just asking...

If people insist on 'self-treating' with 'homeopathic' or 'alternative' practices they mistakenly refer to as 'medicine', they need to understand that any substance they put into their bodies as 'treatments' have only TWO dosage levels: THERAPEUTIC, and ... LETHAL. Once they understand and accept that as the simplest of realities, what they do is at their own risk ...

Too much alcohol is LETHAL....too much of anything can be LETHAL...

a little of many things can be THERAPEUTIC.....


not just synthesised pharmacutical products.

Again ... TWO dosage levels ...

I find it fascinating that you appear to scoff at alternative therapies and homeopathic remedies as medicine...and yet again.....aren't all medicines of a pharmaceutical nature originally based in a natural and usually plant based product?...then synthesised...and 'scientised'...into socially and financially acceptable 'medicine'?

Who is scoffing at herbal remedies? I do think the world would be a slightly better place if more people studied, raised/harvested, and used some therapeutic herbs.

I've known herbal enthusiasts who took things too far - who were fully committed to the dogma of their herbal gurus, who had no interest in efficacy evidence, and who had an irrationally exaggerated hatred of all things in plastic bottles.

In many cases, herbal remedies are simply not as cost effective or as practical as using medicines which are derived from these herbs...or the similar medicines which are synthesized. But for those who are willing to invest their time in this way, I think its a net gain.

Its like growing your own food...the world would be a better place if more people had gardens in their backyard. I am thankful that we have the modern technology and the economy to produce so much food with so little labor, but I'm sad that we are so fully reliant on it and do so little to raise quality food ourselves.

A synthesized drug is not different then a natural drug it is replacing. One is created by a plant, one by a scientist THAT'S IT. However, its typical for an herbal remedy to not have tight control on dosage, or to even be sure to not have quantities of other compounds, not specified, and not regulated. No regulation . . . no way to know.

Homeopathy is a word that gets co-opted into many products that are NOT actually homeopathic. Why becuase stupid cannot tell the difference and will buy it making a profit for sleazy smart a-holes. The name homeopathy earned wide acceptance as being "good", thus being a powerful marketing tool.

If a pill has active ingredients in it then its not homeopathic people! If a pill is a plant extract such as cynarin a drug commonly found in artichoke plants then it is by definition NOT homeopathic. There is no such thing as dosage levels in truly homeopathic "remedies" that is becuase if done right the original compound has been so ultra diluted as to be statistically impossible to get any from a single pill. In fact to be sure you actually got a single molecule of say caffeine from a homeopathic sleep "remedy" you would need to consume 16 average swimming pools of pills to be sure you got a single molecule . . . no really. The late mathematician Martin Gardener did that particular calculation based on Avogadro formula. http://www.chem1.com/acad/webtext/intro/MOL.html

Homeopathy is magic water, or magic pills. End of story.

Now none of this is to say that the FDA is handling herbal remedies in a highly professional and complete way. They are not. We need to regulate the herbal remedy market to protect consumers. If an herbal remedy has active ingredients it needs to be studied. If it does not have active ingredients, then it should not be sold under the guise of having any potential to effect the human body.


So what about the studies done where they use sham acupuncture, not corresponding to the meridian system, and even in one group didn't even use needles, just used items such as tooth picks that feel like having needles inserted and getting the same results as real acupuncture?

Look here. Here is a proper scientific critique of a recent study that claims positive results.

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/05/another_acupuncture_study_misinterpreted.php

Click through the links he provides and you will see the breadth of research done that shows conclusively that its nothing more then placebo.

I would enjoy for you to try to explain the physiology as you claim to be able to do.