The Organon of Medicine

[timokay]

Rolfe,

 

Re. diet. The Bryonia proving would be so quick you would not have to worry about it. This is Hahnemann's take on the Prover's diet:

 

Aph 125: "During the experiment the diet must be carefully regulated. It should consist as much as possible of simple, nourishing food without spices, and one should avoid green side dishes, roots, all salads, and soup herbs (all of which always retain some disturbing medicinal properties no matter how they are prepared). Young peas in the pod, green beans, steamed potatoes, and if need be, carrots can be eaten. They are permissable as the least medicinal vegetables.

 

Beverages should be those usually taken and should as much as possible not be stimulants. The subject of the experiment must not be in the habit of taking wine, spirits, coffee, or tea and should long before have given up the use of these stimulating, medicinally harming beverages completely. "

 

Tim

[timokay]

Rolfe,

 

Your interest in the issue of DBPC trials of Provings much appreciated...discussed with Francine (BGH) elsewhere.

 

To catch up with this important issue of DBPC trials, please read from 70% of the way down page 3 below, a post from Timokay beginning "This is from Francine, ..."

 

http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28050&perpage=20&pagenumber=3

 

Thx

 

Tim

[Rolfe]

I understand about DBPC trials.

 

I'm just thinking that if the symptoms are as definite as Tim says, there's a relatively easy way to test this.

 

Tim's sure that he could tell whether he's been given a remedy (Bryonia, or whatever he chooses) or a blank pill.

 

Now it seems to me that the real crux of the argument is that the "scientists" say that there's nothing in the remedy pill which isn't in the blank pill, while the homoeopaths say that the remedy pill has very definite effects. These effects include the symptoms a healthy person would experience in a proving.

 

So, surely this is a very easy way to tell whether it really is possible to distinguish a homoeopathic remedy from a blank. Can someone, anyone, reliably tell by observing whether or not the characteristic symptoms appear, whether they have taken the remedy or the blank? Can they do it often enough to convince a casual observer that they're not just making lucky guesses?

 

I'm trying to make it easy by suggesting that the person could be Tim. He knows what he's looking for, he believes he can do it. If someone like Tim can actually tell in a blind trial (which is what this is) the difference between a remedy and a blank, I'm listening.

 

Rolfe.

[timokay]

Chaps,

 

I must run, 'til the morning.

 

Tim

[timokay]

Rolfe,

 

Under your name it says you are from England.

I am too. Suppose I send you money (inc postage) to buy two Homeopathic medicines from Boots (I could do that myself but you could say I tampered with them) ...common ones like Bryonia and Rhus Tox. Then you scratch off anything that distinguishes them...then mark them A and B and send them to me.

 

(I would prefer Bryonia v Blanks, but Blanks not available.)

 

I will tell you which was which.

[Rolfe]

Hmm, there are a few difficulties here, but they aren't fatal to a preliminary test.

 

1. As you say, getting hold of blanks is difficult. However, if you're prepared to try instead the (perhaps slightly more difficult) feat of telling apart two different remedies, then that would certainly do. Assuming the actual pills look and taste identical, which I think is usually the case. (Funny, that, in any other area of pharmaceuticals this would be unheard of, for safetly reasons.)

 

2. One trial isn't enough. It has a 50% chance of being a success through no more than a lucky guess. This would have to be repeated several times. What sort of a strike rate does Tim think he can achieve? 90%? 18 right out of 20, say? (If anyone has a set of t tables handy, what would you reckon would give significance at p<0.01?)

 

3. I'm not nuts about entering into snail-mail correspondence with anyone on an Internet forum, as a general principle. However, again as a preliminary test, I'd trust Tim's sincerity. He seems to believe what he says. So, in the first instance, why not ask a friend to do the blinding? This wouldn't necessarily prove it to MY satisfaction, but if Tim's honest, it would allow him to see for himself whether he can really do it.

 

I'd suggest the following protocol.

 

Choose two commercially-available remedies - Bryonia and Rhus toxicodendron, if you like, so long as the pills are indistinguishable to sight and taste. Buy enough for, say, 15 trials on each (to be on the safe side).

 

Get a batch of 20 empty bottles, preferably identical. Just scratching labels off isn't enough to be sure of removing identities from the manufacturer's bottles.

 

Give the purchased remedies and the empty bottles to your friend, and explain the object of the exercise.

 

What he or she has to do is decide on a consistent coin-toss system of allocation - say, heads you get the Bryonia and tails you get the Rhus tox (or the other way round, but keep it both secret and consistent).

 

Trial 1. Toss the coin, once, and put one trial's worth of the pill the coin indicates into one of the empty bottles. Note which remedy it is, secretly, and give you that bottle unlabelled. Wait till you've made up your mind which one you've got, then make a note of the result. Don't tell you whether you were right or not.

 

Trial 2. Toss the coin again, and repeat.

 

Repeat this for all 20 trials.

 

After the last trial has been completed, your friend then reveals the results. How did you score?

 

If this was done honestly, with a friend who was prepared to be scrupulously correct and secretive about the protocol, I'd certainly listen to Tim's account of the outcome.

 

How about it?

 

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

[Tried to delete, as this was covered by editing the previous post, but the system won't accept the delete - please ignore.]

[timokay]

Rolfe,

 

I done my provings several times. Getting a friend to help is nothing new.

 

FRANCINE: This is from Albert:

 

FRAN: So, since DBPC trials weren't done with proper

analysis afterwards, how can we tell that anything in

Materia Medica and Repertory is more than just random

(at best) or (at worst) biased by provers knowing what

they were suppsoed to feel."

 

Nobody knew anything about the medicines, so they were NOT going to know "what they were supposed to feel."

 

That is so ridiculous!

 

Even today, because there are hundreds and even thousands of symptoms, and because each person will have a relative sensitivity to the medicine being proved, that's impossible to perceive beforehand; they produce the symptoms they produce, period.

 

I have no idea what the problem is here.

 

It is a natural law, you very stupid man; it is not something that can be toyed with.

 

All of the initial provers were homeopathic physicians physically around Hahnemann as his immediate students or were adherent to his precepts as foreign students, like those in the U.S., not liars for whatever reason one can imagine they'd think up symptoms.

 

David Tate (ala Francine, Benji Mouse, Manon Thebus), you're a strange person.

 

You presume and assume everything under the sun because you know nothing but allopathic medicine, which is nothing but total quackery.

 

We are in the business to cure, not to prove anything to anyone else according to their ignorant views of reality.

 

You ought to try getting some integrity some time; it would change your world.

 

Things go into the repertory only after they have been verified by several cures.

 

Things cannot go into the materia medica with "proper controls," as you ignorantly call them, if the only person who would have produced an important symptom would have been thrown out for whatever reason you'd come up with.

 

We have repeatedly suffered your ignorant kind from the beginning.

 

You want to sift the materia medica for "relevant symptoms."

 

All of the low-potency pseudo-homeopaths or allopaths from the beginning have been ignorant fools like you and your kind, but we easily recognized them and thus ignored everything they said as stupid allopathic nonsense.

 

Well, guess what, pal?

 

It ain't us who are wrong; it's you guys, and the proof is our cures and your total quackery, so get a clue!

 

The oddest symptoms have been repeatedly verified as important for cure, and your kind would have thrown them out.

 

Gee, golly, guess we don't need the assistance of bozos, do we?

 

If you continue to examine homeopathy through allopathic lens, you will see only allopathy, and that does not cure.

 

----------

 

A follow-up thought.

 

All of the modern provings are totally useless.

 

The GV HPHs have produced lots of provings, but all of them are totally useless.

 

Guess why.

 

 

Albert / Hanemannian

[Rolfe]

timokay said in post #58 :

Rolfe,

 

I done my provings several times. Getting a friend to help is nothing new.

 

Oh well, that's it then?

 

You were talking about DBPC trials. What I suggested was actually a SBPC trial, but it would have been good enough for the purpose.

 

I'll say it again. What you think you feel when you know in advance what you've taken is MEANINGLESS. The only way to demonstrate that you're not imagining it, to yourself as much as to anyone else, is to do a "blind tasting". Just like wine buffs do to prove they can tell Chateau Napoleon 1066 from Australian supermarket plonk. If you haven't done that, you don't know anything, no matter how often you've swallowed a few pills.

 

I'm prepared to do you the courtesy of believing that you're sincere, and that even if I wasn't personally supplying you with the stuff, you'd follow the protocol. But you seem to be simply backing out.

 

Why? What's the difference between me posting you the bottles exactly as I described, and you asking a friend to do it? Actually, the latter would be better from your point of view, as you'd know that I hadn't had any chance to interfere with the test.

 

You expressed an interest to Francine/BGH in investigating DBPC trials of the provings. Now I agree with her that this is an excellent way to test the system. And to make it as fair as possible, it would be best if it was done by someone like you, with some experience of what the symptoms feel like and who wasn't subconsciously inclined to deny they were feeling anything.

 

The single-blind test I suggested was by way of a preliminary, handing control over to you, but trusting to your honesty to do it properly. If you really did manage a significant score on that protocol, it might be possible to arrange a more controlled trial, perhaps.

 

But no, you don't want to do it. You know what? Every time I see backpedalling like this, I start to think, is this person really sincere in their belief, or do they, deep down, know it's complete bunkum?

 

Rolfe.

[BigGiantHead]

Tim

 

I am going to leave this to Rolfe at the moment, he is pursuing a new tack on this trial thing, that does cover most of the same territory that I would have got into, but it does look like an interesting angle. I think I'll wait and see how you get on with following the protocol. I would agree that I think you have the integrity to report honestly back to us if you take it on.

 

In the meantime, since you communicate with Albert, does he have an answer to what got called Albert's Logical Impasse at the BBC site, where he rejects trials because he doesn't like the homeopaths who took part, but seems to ask us to accept those homeopaths' clinical experiences (even though they may not be the purist that he is)?

 

(If he can reply without abuse then I'll engage with the discussion, but if it's more of the same then I'm not going to bother. I think we can take for granted all the abusive stuff by now, we've got the glossary: quack, ars, ignorant fool etc etc. Why doesn't he post here? Was he banned? Ahh, I just checked the members' list and answered my own question. He is banned. I'll not subvert the Mods' intentions by communicating with him via you acting as proxy, so I think we'd best leave it at that. And perhaps you should avoid forwarding his stuff or the Mods might extend their judgement to you, which would be a shame when we're in the middle of something. Have you suggested that he could tone it down a bit if we wants to stay in forums like this? )

 

BGH

[Glider]

timokay said in post #58 :

You presume and assume everything under the sun because you know nothing but allopathic medicine, which is nothing but total quackery.

I have seen little to suggest that you know much about conventional medicine either.

 

We are in the business to cure, not to prove anything to anyone else according to their ignorant views of reality.

You need to prove, or at least provide convincing evidence, that anything you do actually cures anything.

 

You ought to try getting some integrity some time; it would change your world.

 

We have repeatedly suffered your ignorant kind from the beginning.

 

All of the low-potency pseudo-homeopaths or allopaths from the beginning have been ignorant fools like you and your kind, but we easily recognized them and thus ignored everything they said as stupid allopathic nonsense.

 

It ain't us who are wrong; it's you guys, and the proof is our cures and your total quackery, so get a clue!

 

Gee, golly, guess we don't need the assistance of bozos, do we?

It is clear you have strong views concerning your subject, but this is degenerating into abuse. If you can't present your case without abusing other members, you will lose the opportunity to present your case here at all.

[timokay]

Glider,

 

Please note that the words you commented on above were not mine. I stated this at the beginning.

 

FRANCINE: This is from Albert:

 

The words were from Albert (Francine's sparring partner). Francine is known as BigGiantHead in this forum.

 

Rolfe,

 

You do not wish to be involved in the test.

I have faced this before. It is like eternally having to go back to step 1 all the time; never any progress with people here.

 

I have already done and proved all that needs to be proved. My test was a new one to involve you, but you're not interested.

 

My objective is to sort out a DBPC trial that would be acceptable to all. I have asked BigGiantHead (Francine) several questions in this thread which he has ignored them all.

[BigGiantHead]

timokay said in post #49 :

 

The issue seems to be"Do you really understand symptoms?"

 

Not at all. The issue is whether you can reasonably say that taking a pill causes what occurs after the pill was taken or whether those things occur for some other coincidental reason or because of the taker's expectations. The particular nature of any symptoms is irrelevant to the principles of the DBPC protocol.

 

Which bats the question back again as, 'If Aph 138 is so rock-solid in its logic then why bother with a DBPC trial?'. Answer: Aph 138 is not rock-solid. DBPC methods correct the errors implicit in Dr H's protocol.

 

Next question: Why do you perceive there to be a need for DBPC trial? Is it because you realize it's better, though your steadfast defense of Dr H suggests otherwise, or is it because you just want to pay lip-service to scientific methods to gain a cloak of respectability? If the latter, it can only be because you assume the results will be positive and you are just tolerating the need to play science's rules. But what if they are negative, are you ready for that?

 

These are rhetorical questions, I don't expect answers.

 

I don't think your heart is in the DBPC method or you would not still defend Aph 138 and its relatives, so it's not worth pursuing this any further. As much as I can I've shown why DBPC trial are run the way they are and I've run out of new ways to explain it. Let's see if Rolfe can get there instead.

 

BGH.

[Sayonara]

timokay said in post #62 :

Glider,

Please note that the words you commented on above were not mine. I stated this at the beginning.

The words were from Albert (Francine's sparring partner).

Please make quotations clearer by using the [ quote ] tags to avoid such confusion in future.

 

You do not wish to be involved in the test.

I have faced this before. It is like eternally having to go back to step 1 all the time; never any progress with people here.

Like anyone in their right mind is going to hand out their address to a non-mainstream anonymous forum user who wants them to send him pills.

 

Please do not ask other members for personal details again.

[timokay]

I like all the fluffy bunnies.

[Guest PaulTee]

Above comment seems reasonable..there is no way that the previous post could be interpreted that way.

[Guest PaulTee]

learning how this works.

 

Paul

[Guest Franksy]

Biggianthead,

 

The issue is whether you can reasonably say that taking a pill causes what occurs after the pill was taken or whether those things occur for some other coincidental reason or because of the taker's expectations.

 

If there are 200 people doing the expt, and 100 are receiving placebo, and the whole expt is repeated 15 times by each...coincidental things would surely be sifted out when everything is totted up?

 

If a particular reported symptom occurs only once or twice during the whole process, it would be dropped...would need a cut-off point.

 

Also, ALL possible obtainable symptoms would be documented and online, for the physician to use in deciding the one most applicable to the provers description. If there is ambiguity, he would call the prover back to decide which is the most appropriate.

 

...because of the taker's expectations.

 

We are talking 100's of symptoms. The taker's will be blind not only to Med or Placebo but to the actual med being tested. How could the taker possibly predict which med is being taken, and therefore know which symptom(s) to feign?

 

Why do you perceive there to be a need for DBPC trial? Is it because you realize it's better, though your steadfast defense of Dr H suggests otherwise, or is it because you just want to pay lip-service to scientific methods to gain a cloak of respectability?

 

Your prejudice shows. Trying to understand why Aph 138 is unacceptable. With the large trial proposed, do you think things are covered? i.e., setting aside any made-up symptoms identified by using the large number of participants. ..we may need a cut-off for possibly spurious symptoms.

 

I don't think your heart is in the DBPC method or you would not still defend Aph 138 and its relatives, so it's not worth pursuing this any further.

 

Prejudice. 138 must be adapted to become a DBPC trial, as I have said before. Are you proposing a different way to do it? Starting with 200 people, blinded to their medicines; physicians blinded to the medicines; independent party decides on choice of meds.

 

Add your conditions please.

[Sayonara]

timokay was banned earlier by another Mod so don't expect a reply. In fact you're now banned anyway.

 

Oh well.