HOMEOPATHY AND THE POPULAR VOICE

Homeopathy and the popular voice                                                                                

“Our expectation of an explanation for a mechanism of action is that it is both scientifically plausible and demonstrable. We should, however, add that, while we comment on explanations for how homeopathy works, it is not a key part of our Evidence Check. Historically, some medical interventions were demonstrably effective before anyone understood their modes of action. For example, after 150 years of use, there is still debate about precisely how anaesthetics work. It is more important to know whether a treatment works—its efficacy—than how it works.”

Extract from UK Department of Health Evidence Check 2: Homeopathy - Science and Technology Committee (circa 2010) (my bold italics)

The world is a mad place. Tears For Fears weren’t wrong when they penned that massive 80’s hit.  Despite the madness though, it’s still a very compelling and hospitable planet for the most part – some might say despite the human race yet I say, perhaps because of us.
We just haven’t been given our say; perhaps what we say is going increasingly unheard or more optimistically maybe we’re actually starting to be heard.

I recently engaged in a debate on social media about homeopathy, taking a devil’s advocate stance against some pretty heavy hitting ‘sceptics’.

While I firmly accept the crucial role of science in establishing the paradigm in which we exist in this material realm, I think we should take pains to acknowledge that honest scientists are the first to admit they don’t fully understand how certain things work and this may simply be attributable to an inability to adequately measure the efficacy of those things.

I’m neither for nor against homeopathy. However, I am sceptical that the means whereby the benefits of the modality are measured may sit outside the paradigm of the science that would attempt to understand it.

The UK Dept of Health evidence check report makes the point that any effects of homeopathy were placebo effects – it may induce improvement simply through belief in it. There have been exhaustive tests conducted over the years involving RCT’s (Randomised Controlled Trials) usually taking the form of double-blind medical studies, almost exclusively funded by the pharmaceutical industry with, it must be stressed, heavily vested interests in specific outcomes.

The definition of a double blind medical study is given as follows: “An experimental procedure in which neither the subjects of the experiment nor the persons administering the experiment know the critical aspects of the experiment; a double-blind procedure is used to guard against both experimenter bias and placebo effects" All of that makes perfect sense. What doesn’t make any scientific sense, however, are the psychological and psychophysiological impact of the placebo effect in these trials, effects which inevitably occur.

Dr Howard Brody, Director of the Institute of Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch defined the placebo effect as "a change in a patient's illness attributable to the symbolic import of a treatment rather than a specific pharmacologic or physiologic property". In other words, changes take place within a patient’s physiology either for better (placebo) or for worse (the so-called “nocebo” effect) simply as a result of that patient’s belief that a change is inevitable due to the medication that’s being taken.
This is an inexplicable, invisible paradigm that’s occurring that science cannot begin to adequately explain and we certainly don’t have the means with which to monitor or test the placebo effect.

Only one thing is for certain, however, faith, religion and belief often mixed with nutritional regimes – work. The belief in something (a thought sequence) has a manifest physical effect on matter. We can alter our wellbeing and wellness simply through a pattern of belief. It’s never worded that way in the double blind studies but indubitably that’s what’s happening.

It is perhaps most obvious in those who become convinced that their illnesses will kill them. Inevitably, however, all such discussions are cloaked by sceptics who argue against doctors holding strong religious beliefs because such beliefs, lead to patients living longer and so using up more money

Fritz Albert Popp, a bio-physicist, claimed to have discovered and even demonstrated that photons provide the vehicle for information transmission in living systems – “biophotonic” activity took place in specific cell tissues and organs within a patient’s body merely by concentrating one’s thoughts on that particular spot.

The Sceptic movement in its beginning was highly vociferous against such ‘science’ because it posed real problems for the profits of pharmaceutical companies. Sceptics have done everything they could to wreck such theories. The late French scientist, Jacques Benveniste was bitterly attacked when he discovered the invisible bio-messages travelling through water, because it enhanced the idea held by homeopaths that immeasurably small quantities of a substance could affect matter.

The idea of faith or even immeasurable (invisible) quantity may go a long way to beginning to explain the placebo effect (more plainly; mind over matter) and I have no doubt that it will be empirically measurable in time to come, however, it currently obtains as an effect that cannot be adequately measured or explained under the circumstances or with the equipment used in contemporary RCT’s.

Okay, so let’s accept for a moment that homeopathy is nothing more nor less than a placebo form of treatment - to accept this we have to forget about using homeopathic principles with children and animals. If we accept that as offered by the mainstream medical establishment as a dismissal of homeopathy, we see how truly disingenuous that argument appears to be. If the effects cannot be understood or adequately measured during the double blind studies, how can the medical professionals analysing these data, call for the results to be dismissed if there is even the possibility of a placebo effect or, as the homeopaths claim, the stimulation of the body’s self-healing mechanisms? They have no demonstrable way of measuring this unless we begin to introduce the complexity of Popp’s experimental methodology into the mix.

The concluding dig of the UKDOH report runs: “Our expectations of the evidence base relevant to government policies on the provision of homeopathy are straightforward. We would expect the Government to have a view on the efficacy of homeopathy so as to inform its policy on the NHS funding and provision of homeopathy. Such a view should be based on the best available evidence, that is, rigorous randomised controlled trials and meta-analyses and systematic reviews of RCTs. If the effects of homeopathy can be primarily attributed to the placebo effect, we would expect the Government to have a view on the ethics of prescribing placebos.”

Indeed and why not, with costs to consider one might have imagined that this was, in the absence of scientific ‘proof’ one of the first principles of policy?

It goes on: ‘Homeopathy is a 200 year old system of medicine that seeks to treat patients with highly diluted substances that are administered orally. Homeopathy is based on two principles: "like-cures-like" whereby a substance that causes a symptom is used in diluted form to treat the same symptom in illness and "ultra-dilution" whereby the more dilute a substance the more potent it is (this is aided by a specific method of shaking the solutions, termed "succussion"). It is claimed that homeopathy works by stimulating the body's self-healing mechanisms.’

My own experience of homeopathic remedies utilising these solutions (not to be confused with herbal or natural remedies) was one of distinct success when I sought them out to aid with seasonal allergy problems and viral conditions such as colds and flu. They appeared most efficacious, however, that could simply have been my belief in the remedies or even my own natural immune system kicking into gear or my focus on my personal restoration in the vogue of Fritz Albert Popp – through thought and intention. I don’t really know but the results were always more rapidly efficacious than the conventional meds my buddies were taking. Or at least that’s how it appeared to me.

The point is, one cannot rule out the importance of the symbolic and psychological factors on the outcome. They’re manifestly evident. To this end, we had forgotten the popular voice on these matters – had that is until the populist call in Switzerland circa 2005 and again in 2016 (intended to be reintroduced in 2017) demanded that homeopathic practitioners and medications be included in their national health care system and subsidised accordingly.

This simply reveals that there is a significant number of people who either know it works or at very least believe it does, which, if it’s merely a placebo dynamic, should surely be sufficient. In Switzerland, according to a recent article on the topic, “homeopathy, holistic medicine, herbal medicine, acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine will acquire the same status as conventional medicine by May 2017 when it comes to health insurance. 

“After being rejected in 2005 by the authorities for lack of scientific proof of their efficacy, complementary and alternative medicines made a comeback in 2009 when two-thirds of Swiss backed their inclusion on the constitutional list of paid health services.”

Let me reiterate that statement - two-thirds of the population backed the move. Unlikely that it was an initiative of a financial thrust alone – this is health management we’re talking about.

People have a voice and they are making it heard when it comes to health and wellness.
We cannot and must not lose sight of the significance of that collective popular lay voice.

Two of the largest consumer organisations on the planet – viz: McDonalds and Coca-Cola have been forced through public demand to offer healthier options to their consumers. It isn’t that they grew a conscience overnight – their businesses are still driven by profit – the crux is though, that the people spoke in sufficient numbers to make that demand viable on the balance sheet and more importantly, we started to make better choices about our health. We forced a change.

Another manner in which people lack the insight into their innate power is to apply the don’t-go approach. You want to make people change a pricing structure or a service offering? Then simply boycott that business. Collectively, if people did this, businesses would have no choice but to accede to these ‘demands’ or face financial ruin. We have that power. We don’t use it. We tend to make much more acquiescent choices in our daily lives.

That said; many are starting to make the same noises about vaccines and demand that they be made safer and that all information being suppressed regarding that safety should be made public so that ‘informed consent’, a fundamental democratic right, can be realised instead of the medical fascism that currently obtains in the US, UK and Australia to name but three modern democracies forcing unsafe vaccines on their populations against threat of financial punishment or even incarceration.

I’m not for one moment advocating that we suspend our faith in medical science or technology but I am saying – use your voice and demand that what we partake in and of, is designed to be safe and the best it can possibly be.

Medication is understandably crucial in aiding the correction of imbalances in the body but there is a growing consensus of people who posit that one’s health is more holistically maintained through proper balanced nutrition and healthy lifestyle choices, which more often than not is distinguished by a marked absence of prescription drugs.

At the very least, you should be able to make up your mind about what goes into your body regardless. Remember well - there are corporations out there relying on you not making that choice.

POLLEN MURRAY REPORTING FOR DUTY...

I spent the first forty five years of my life quite perfectly adapted to the environment in which I lived.
What happened to suddenly make me incompatible with the planet?
When did Gaia arbitrarily decide that I was no longer going to just breathe normally without being subjected to itching nostrils, sore eyes and the manifestation of Niagaran volumes of snot from a seemingly endless source - enough to glue wallpaper from here to Timbuktu?
What did I do wrong to be rejected so callously by my planetary mother?
It was like somebody flicked a switch. One day it was all hunky dory and the next I was a raving, mucous-riddled ratbag. No gradual easing into this bitch. No little exploratory pollen-induced sneezing sessions just to warm me up - nope - I just went full slant-eyed, double-barrelled snotgun.
And it was the same for Karen. Decades of harmonious existence with the plants of the world then one day - boom! Have some of this hay fever, bitch!
I mean, what the fuck!
The only thing I can come up with is that it's revenge, vigilantism on the part of the plants that I, as a vegan, am not consuming.
"Hey, that sonofabitch is dedicatedly eating our veggie brethren, it's time we fucking showed him that that kind of irresponsible behaviour comes at a price. Bottlebrush, give him a dose of your finest and then you slinky little grasses, hit him with the next salvo. Then, just when he's taking some form of medication to ward you off, we'll come up with a covert combination cocktail that their chemists haven't even heard of. Ready?"
Well here's the thing - I'm not going to say fuck you, Gaia nor am I going to cease and desist from my wanton consumption of plant matter by way of sustenance. If you are what you eat then I should be the most compatible planetary plantman going. Not so. Just have to keep trying...
Although admittedly, once the pollen pulverising ensues, I do kinda devolve to a semi-vegetative state so perhaps my transmogrification into the Swamp Thing is progressing as planned. 
And as if that wasn't the strangest part of it all, the plants conspire to occasionally release me from this torment while directing their assault on my wife and as soon as she emerges snot-free from a three-day bout of this, I plunge back into the pollen purgatory while she looks on agog.
It is spectacularly bizarre.
The season has, however, almost run its course this year and soon we will be the merry, skipping free-breathing kids we once were for another eight months or so before the cycle resumes...
Achoo.
Namaste, mothersuckers.

THE COLŁECTIVE CAT CON CONUNDRUM

This involves a cabal of cats, as many as seven (in our case) or more. 

The conspiracy commences over food, despite their usual disparate hierarchal infighting.  

On this topic they all agree. Nothing that their humans provide for them, unless it's hand delivered coconut oil or cheese, is good enough. And even then, some will balk at the delivery method of coconut oil on the hand, preferring to lick it off the spoon simply to ensure the humans have another washing up item with which to contend. 

The staff must earn their right to serve cats. 

One of the seven likes only the cheapie pellets and nothing else, another likes these mixed with a better product but only if served in her bowl - no other bowl will do despite impending starvation when that bowl is empty (read: containing pellets but bare in the middle section - cat empty). 

Yet two others will sit and stare longingly at the backs of the feeding cats wondering why the humans have chosen to feed only them and not us...until one of the humans scoops them up and deposits them in front of their regular unattended bowls just beyond the feeding cats where they've eaten for the last two years...

One snoozes contentedly on the humans' bed knowing he can eat at his leisure once the rabble have completed their stupid daily ritual. He's the leader. Even if the rest of the mob don't know that yet. He doesn't have to demean himself by showing a need for these human handouts. He will wait. 

And once it's all over and at least one of them has vomited (not on a wipeable tiled surface or outdoors - it must be on a carpet or rug - staff must earn their keep), the mob will engage in a range of activity that mostly involves - well - sleeping. Eating and puking is tiring work, don't you know. 

Once settled and the humans have embarked upon their own daily routine, any staff member alighting from a chair naturally signals a return of at least two or three expectant souls to the kitchen area just in case the staff have decided to replenish the (cat) empty (see above) bowls with new, decent food worthy of feline consideration. 

Collective coaxing and cajoling may produce handouts from the shiny cold box or not but the demands must be relentless and varied. 

Any other form of human movement, regardless of its non-feline intent, must be regarded as a potential feeding opportunity and the designated spokescat must meowl appropriately on behalf of the group. 

Worst case scenario, the staff will repeat the ritual at around five o'clock whereupon the idiosyncratic pantomime shall reprise. 

And that's why we love cats. 

THE TAO OF SOCKS....

My sister, Norma, dearly beloved - recently a very welcome visitor to our humble abode here in Antipodian Adelaide, will understand this comprehensively.
In fact, we spoke about it while she was here.
Socks - the singularity of those little foot wrappers and their necessary partnerships with like-fashioned companions - especially during the laundering process - is a topic upon which my big sister and I wholeheartedly agree. They cannot be separated during this process - it is a crime against some cosmic code or something and it jangles the sensibilities of the chronic process control freak who wants to see a beautifully ordered clothesline with socks pegged up in pairs, wafting in the tepid breezes of these fair climes.
Anything else simply breaks down that immutable cosmic order.
It must do, surely?
Socks should not be washed apart from their "sole" mates - that's wrong, that's just plain wrong...
My wife, through disbelieving eyes, sighs as I dump the single socks she's just washed back into the washing machine....
"But they'll be paired up when we do a third load," says she, quite calmly and unarguably logically.
Equally logically I counter, "There isn't space on the line for a third load, babe. That means two options face us - you (I'm not wrestling with the portable clothes line) will have to do the third load and hang the stuff on that infernal contraption or we simply leave the lonely single socks in the washing machine to be reunited with their partners when the current laundry is removed from the sensible outside, no-fuss clothesline. I admit that the socks currently reposing in the machine will undergo a further washing cycle thereby rendering them arguably cleaner than their temporarily displaced companions but that is infinitely better (to me) than having single socks drying in isolation and deposited somewhere (there is no feasible holding zone for them) before being reunited with their sole mates prior to rolling and placement within their designated drawer space - white sports pairs - top drawer, day-to-day lightweight working socks one drawer down and heavier winter socks on the top shelf of the closet adjacent to my tracksuit pants...."
I mean that's all perfectly sensible and normal isn't it?
My wife's eyes had glazed over at this stage and a slightly twisted, beatific smile creased her lovely features.
I could see that not only was she grappling with the prospect of tangling with the portable clothesline (only to be used in the direst of circumstances), she was contemplating whether or not she would ever understand the foibles of my domestic mind.
She said, "Okay."
That was that.
And thus these lonely, frightened, wet, cold single units repose at the bottom of the washing machine drum like inmates in a sterile prison chamber and this fills me no undue distress but less, I admit, than the prospect of dealing with washed and dried single socks reposing somewhere in limbo, unwearable and desolate, craving to be reunited with their rightful companions.
Is it just Norma and me or is there some form of feng-shui taoist sock code at play here that affects everyone other than my wonderful wife?
I'll wager she is alone in her disdain for forced sock separation through the laundering process.
I think I'll check in on the little guys when I make the tea just now. I'm not obsessing, you understand, but I do need to know if they're still okay...

HILLARY CLINTON - THE DEVIL IN THE DETAILS

On being told that Hillary Clinton is a good choice for the US presidency and that I know so little about her...

It's a truly sad state of affairs when Americans are faced with a choice between Clinton or Trump and are blind to the fact that they do have other choices, not that the media ever talks about that.

Sharyl Attkisson, for example, a real journalist - not one of the corporate-owned media drones - has written some very insightful, factual, exposés on Clinton (among many other topics) and if anyone believes for a moment that Clinton isn't a sociopathic narcissist then I'm afraid her lobbyists (including most of the mainstream press) are right - we probably exist in very different realities.

Clinton's track record (sic) as secretary of state alone should give any rational person pause but there is so much more.

I have indeed looked at the background and the legacy of HRC (both mainstream and more honest) and the glib premise whereby people are lauding her against an unarguable buffoon like Trump as a yardstick and promoting her cause as potentially "the first female president" as if those are somehow legitimate credentials to enter the Oval Office, are facile and without any substance whatsoever.

It's like saying we should vote for the paedophile babysitter instead of the child serial-killer because at least then the kids will still be alive...

Not - fuck this, let's find a babysitter we know we can trust.

Is she a cunning, savvy, effective, manipulative, assured politician? Without question.

But is she a rational, even-handed, broadminded, honest, ethical and visionary leader?

Not even close.

She, like that teflon-coated tapdancer in South Africa going by the name of Zuma, manages to wriggle and squirm and stay one step ahead of prosecution, nefarious and unarguable criminality notwithstanding.

She's the worst thing imaginable that could happen to the US or the world right now.

And, no, I'm not a Trump supporter either.

There are other, better choices but the mainstream media has convinced Americans that there aren't.

Still, given the fact that they elected (albeit illegally on at least one occasion, it must be said) someone like GW Bush for consecutive terms, speaks volumes about the American ethos and in that sense, if they aren't looking harder and further than hyperbole and campaign circus rhetoric, I guess they and sadly - we - get what they deserve.

And to think that not being American disavows the rest of the world from having an opinion on this topic, I'd counter by saying simply that this is probably the election that prompted more global citizens to start looking into the background of US politics than any other. Why? It affects us all - profoundly.

Only time will tell.

If ever there was an instance when I'd love to be wrong - this is it.

I'm not holding my breath...

Dear, US of A

An open letter

The United States of America 

Any zip code 

Dear (North) Americans 

Although we may not always like the way you go about things, we cannot but acknowledge the principal role you play within the strategic global hierarchy. To pretend it's otherwise would be utterly nonsensical. 

Ergo: you wield enormous political and cultural power and you've produced some darn fine people, innovations and other neat stuff that influence cultures everywhere. 

We might not agree with your strange spelling and pronunciation but that's small potatoes in the scheme of the world AND you gave us this little old thing called the Internet and what's not to like about that doozie? 

So please tell us why in the "land of the free" you haven't seemed to realise that the corporate mercenaries who sponsor your major politicians also sponsor (read: own) the media which is why they persist in telling you that the two newsgrabbing clowns aka Clinton and Trump are the only choices you've got. 

They're not. 

And you should be mightily glad about that. 

YOU DON'T HAVE TO VOTE FOR EITHER OF THEM! 

Really. 

There's Johnson, Weld, Stein and other independent politicians who aren't psychotic, sociopathic megalomaniacs hellbent on a path of totalitarian insanity that's going to be bad for us all, campaign rhetoric (read: bullshit) notwithstanding. 

There are options. There really are. 

Stop reading the Washington Post and the other sycophantic media outlets that want you to believe this is all you've got. 

It's not. 

You've got the power. 

Use it. 

Please. 

Because frankly, we like you - a lot actually - but you're scaring the shit out of us... 

Sincerely 

A lot of us in the west

DECOLONISE THE WORLD - NOT A TERRIBLE IDEA - JUST BEING PRESENTED BADLY?

The current decolonisation of westernised ideology that's doing the rounds in South Africa and which is being ridiculed brutally (oftentimes understandably given the idiotic ranting that we see on social media and newswires) - is it such a radical and stupid concept in reality?
We must presuppose that the world in which we live is on the pinnacle of success and balance as driven by westernised culture and if that were the case then all well and good - no argument.
But it isn't. It's anything but and I can't believe there's anyone among us that would assert we've created a workable model across the board.
It's broken.
The decolonise concept is, for me at least, actually quite simple but is being perverted fad-like by those who seek to use this mantle for other agendas and/or those who misrepresent the ideology through ignorance.
The problems that westernised thinking and culture have manifested (and we must admit there are plenty especially through its colonisation model of "civilisation") have resulted in a polarised world that's poised on the brink of self destruction if we aren't very careful.
It's also pretty much been a my way or the highway state of governance and indoctrination that's been imposed from the get go.
I think any rationally minded person would admit that we currently exist in an unsustainable world model that's run by people we both distrust and despise within governments that feel exclusive and dictatorial regardless of this illusory concept of democracy which has been failing for a very long time.
It's paradoxically exploitative and perhaps that's being realised fundamentally by black people even though the present government claims to represent them despite being within this westernised construct.
The problem with all of these worldview models is that they tend to be exclusive and comparative and dismissive of any thinking or modality that doesn't fit the prescribed worldview. And they all rely on the premise that the majority are right and dissenters are fools, however, history repeatedly shows us that the Mavericks change the world not the majority despite the freethinkers being subjected to mass peer ridicule so much of the time.
Materialist science is a great example of this - it shapes everything in our current reality as it's the accepted norm even when much of this thinking is based on ideas and "laws" that emanated from the 16th and 17th centuries and aren't questioned especially by scientists when much of that thinking is merely a perpetuation of dogma and doesn't stand up to any real form of scientific scrutiny. The establishment is unyielding and the dogma is enforced almost militantly.
Check out Rupert Sheldrake's work in this regard - a scientist who continues to question everything.
I'm all for a return to traditional ways and values that engenders inclusivity and an unbiased evaluation of the plethora of cultures that make up the whole. The sum may be greater than the parts but every part is vital to the whole.
That isn't what the contemporary or legacy driven westernised worldview has created or perpetuates.
I agree. It needs to change but not to supplant one set of imposed dogmas for another.