5 ms·

Almost more interesting than Reiki itself is the reflexive responses, bifurcating essentially into: 1. it's all mumbo jumbo 2. there's more in heaven and eart

Almost more interesting than Reiki itself is the reflexive responses, bifurcating essentially into: 1. it's all mumbo jumbo 2. there's more in heaven and earth, my son Note that neither group is particularly interested in the empirical evidence, though group 1 will tend to take a louder cherry-picking feint at it. An empiricist mindset is really hard for humans to inhabit. We (scientistic hard-heads included) judge propositions new to us largely in terms of what we think we already know, and pre-existing metaphysical beliefs weigh far, far heavier than does empirical evidence. My reflexive reaction is closer to 1 than to 2. But I don't take that reaction more seriously than any old muscle twitch I might happen to have.

GuiA 7y ago
3. Humans tend to feel better when other humans take care of them, pay attention to them, touch them It’s not that crazy, and it’s based in empirical observation and consistent with our biological/medical understanding.
- Ididntdothis 7y ago
  A lot of people still have the mindset that the body is a system with clear inputs and outputs and predictable outcomes. But in many cases the brain plays a big role so things like people feeling good and getting attention helps a lot. A lot of regular medicine feels very rushed and if you have a complex problem it's hard to get anybody to listen. I bet for things like chronic pain or chronic fatigue they would get better results if they slowed down a little and listened.
  - loopz 7y ago
    Reductionism is just one methodology of many, and has shortcomings regarding complexity, subjective experience and 3-many-body problems.
- silveroriole 7y ago
  See also: the ASMR trend. A lot of the videos are emulating personal attention and ‘social grooming’ (someone doing your makeup, haircare, shaving, etc). And reiki, crystals, tarot, palm reading, and so on are all popular subjects too! Some section of the population, those who experience ASMR properly, have a unique physical reaction to this sort of attention and touch; and it’s obvious that large sections at least find it relaxing and calming in a way that enhances their wellbeing and gives them a feeling of social connectedness. To say it’s all debunked mumbo jumbo that won’t cure cancer is to miss the point!
seer 7y ago
Great comment and I apologize in advance for going off topic. We all have our mental models and it takes effort to re-evaluate and change them. And as the saying goes - there are no right models, only useful ones in some situations. Some are useful in more situations than others. Take “flat earth” model of the world. It’s not right, but it’s precise enough for the purposes of living in a village. Nothing wrong with that, its when you want to venture out, then you have to find a more precise one. But if you live your life in that village - it’s very useful and you can be excused for believing that this is all there is to the world. I once started learning some chinese martial arts, and the instructor was a true believer in more than the fighting techniques, but the spirituality that comes with it. Very easily debunked by modern fact based science. But if you followed the practices that the believes justified, you could help your health tremendously - meditation, physical exercise, calmness - it had a very neat system to explain everything. Imagine being a practitioner several thousand years ago - you had a system and if you made people practice it - they got better. Even if the exact mechanism of why it happened is flawed, and failed in some cases, by the most part it worked. You just had to refine it a bit. And it did help me as well. Had I just dismissed it as shaman mumbo jumbo and not went through with it, I’d be worse off for sure. No reason I had to adopt his model wholesale though - I just needed to attempt to reconcile his one with the science based one I knew, and see where I can learn a thing or two. Anyway just wanted to say that from that I did learn to be more tolerant and not dismiss out of habit things that were not peer reviewed double blind tested, but rather look at the results first. All models are wrong, some models are useful.
- crispinb 7y ago
  I don't think that's really off-topic & I agree. Another case in point: indigenous Australian cosmology. On the one hand, I don't personally take the notion that ancestors created the landscape very seriously. On the other, this cosmology was part of a system of thought, culture, and action that helped maintain a civilisation's existence for over 40,000 years (a feat we're very clearly not going to match). And such questions naturally address an individual very differently according to their situation. I can't say I'm ever likely to be involved enough with Reiki to need to take a strong stance on its efficacy. So why not just remain open and admit ignorance? That admission seems as hard for humans as does holding an empirical stance. HN is (hardly uniquely) stuffed full of comments proclaiming great certainty about things it's blindingly obvious people hardly know a thing about. It's fine often (and in truth most of the time) just not to know.
blast 7y ago
There are two different kinds of empiricism, and they're in tension with each other. One kind is where specialists measure things and publish the measurements in journals. The other is where individuals try things for themselves and decide for themselves what they experienced.
- loopz 7y ago
  Every new paradigm shift had to start with just one individual (or a situation with a core group).
  - blast 7y ago
    I think I agree (assuming I understand your meaning). Individual experimentation and experience is the leading edge. Only much later does it get codified into institutionalized forms. This in fact is the history of what we call science, but somehow we've dropped the "find out for yourself" aspect and returned to something that uncomfortably resembles the priesthood that the original scientists were deviating against.
hyko 7y ago
These two responses are not equal, as every claim made by anyone should fall into category 1 until proven otherwise. Response 2 admits the possibility of better theories about the world being possible, while refusing to do the actual science that would prove their existence. Claims about alternative medicine don't even get to start from this generous position because the field has produced reams upon reams of utter-and dangerous-nonsense, so the evidential bar must be set even higher to cut through that noise. Our collective body of knowledge is not just based on a string of isolated empirical assessments, it has to be integrated into a theoretical framework. Otherwise, you're just left holding a very large bag of statistical anomalies that could basically mean thing anything you want (usually: buy my product!).
- loopz 7y ago
  Nobody is able to practice 2 while holding 1 as belief. The opposite is ironically possible.
  - mcv 7y ago
    2 is not a practice, it's a belief. It's still possible to practice something without believing it works, or without believing some theory behind the practice. People used to navigate by the stars because they believed the stars were fixed points on a dome that covered the Earth. The belief was wrong, but the practice worked.
    - loopz 7y ago
      Granted, 2 as stated, is about faith and open mindedness. However, without experience or practice, there's not much basis. Faith should be != belief systems, which are really often just constraints and thoughts. If you try to think your way through life, you're missing the view for all your own thoughts.
- tsimionescu 7y ago
  It's all mumbo jumbo is equivalent to 'it has been proven not to work'. That is a strong position to take, not a default one. The second is too hand-wavy to even really call a position. Note that it's generally important to separate the possible effectiveness of a technique from the beliefs about why it may be effective that practitioners hold. Willowbark is an effective remedy for some ailments, not because of some tree spirit or some alchemical mumbo-jumbo that many may have once believed in,but for different reasons they had no way of knowing. If it turns out under serious study that Reiki has positive effects, we will need further study to understand why, and perhaps distill that into an even more effective treatment. It won't be magical energy, but perhaps there is something to it that can be identified and taught.
kingludite 7y ago
My reflexive reaction is: I don't know. I'm not interested in empirical evidence but if there is evidence of some effect I hope the right people show an interest in it. I keep wondering what the big deal is with admitting you don't know something. I don't know C++, I should have an opinion about some C++ library? Does it work or not? When asked to defend my opinion about Reiki I would have to resort to a completely moronic line of reasoning that is of no use to anyone. I leave this to the professional skeptics.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  One day you might be sick and having a opinion will be important.
raverbashing 7y ago
I think researchers get too hung up on the a) "folclorical explanations" and b) specific measurable attributes (depression scales, anxiety scales, etc) I have no doubt that the Reiki or Acupunture traditional explanations make no scientific sense. But I'm also long on the idea that sticking needles at a shallow depth might have a certain analgesic effect (also see: tattoos). Yeah it seems you can't do a "fake acupunture" study, but that's not its fault. I'm not sure about Reiki (and I'm much more skeptical) but massage feels good. It might have a non-identified reason for that, but that seems likely.
- M2Ys4U 7y ago
  >Yeah it seems you can't do a "fake acupunture" study, but that's not its fault. Actually you can. More specifically, you can place needles randomly/arbitrarily rather than looking at "energy lines" or "chi" or whatever utter bollocks proponents of acupuncture spout. Turns out, it performs at the same level as placebo. Just like "real" acupuncture.
  - raverbashing 7y ago
    As I said the lines are probably BS anyway But you can't do something that feels like getting poked with needles but isn't
  - nprateem 7y ago
    > "energy lines" or "chi" or whatever utter bollocks proponents of acupuncture spout. I do love an open mind. Here's a simple and fun way to perhaps convince yourself that this 'utter bollocks' has something to it. Learn tantric sex. Seriously. It's insightful when you realise you can use your mind to control your sexual energy and last far longer than when you don't 'move your chi along energy lines'.
    - M2Ys4U 7y ago
      >I do love an open mind. As do I, but one's mind shouldn't be so open that the brain falls out. >Here's a simple and fun way to perhaps convince yourself that this 'utter bollocks' has something to it. No. The way to decide whether there's something in it is to perform a robust clinical study. People have, and the results have shown that, in layman's terms, it's utter bollocks.

GuiA 7y ago

3. Humans tend to feel better when other humans take care of them, pay attention to them, touch them It’s not that crazy, and it’s based in empirical observation and consistent with our biological/medical understanding.

Ididntdothis 7y ago
A lot of people still have the mindset that the body is a system with clear inputs and outputs and predictable outcomes. But in many cases the brain plays a big role so things like people feeling good and getting attention helps a lot. A lot of regular medicine feels very rushed and if you have a complex problem it's hard to get anybody to listen. I bet for things like chronic pain or chronic fatigue they would get better results if they slowed down a little and listened.
- loopz 7y ago
  Reductionism is just one methodology of many, and has shortcomings regarding complexity, subjective experience and 3-many-body problems.
silveroriole 7y ago
See also: the ASMR trend. A lot of the videos are emulating personal attention and ‘social grooming’ (someone doing your makeup, haircare, shaving, etc). And reiki, crystals, tarot, palm reading, and so on are all popular subjects too! Some section of the population, those who experience ASMR properly, have a unique physical reaction to this sort of attention and touch; and it’s obvious that large sections at least find it relaxing and calming in a way that enhances their wellbeing and gives them a feeling of social connectedness. To say it’s all debunked mumbo jumbo that won’t cure cancer is to miss the point!

seer 7y ago

Great comment and I apologize in advance for going off topic. We all have our mental models and it takes effort to re-evaluate and change them. And as the saying goes - there are no right models, only useful ones in some situations. Some are useful in more situations than others. Take “flat earth” model of the world. It’s not right, but it’s precise enough for the purposes of living in a village. Nothing wrong with that, its when you want to venture out, then you have to find a more precise one. But if you live your life in that village - it’s very useful and you can be excused for believing that this is all there is to the world. I once started learning some chinese martial arts, and the instructor was a true believer in more than the fighting techniques, but the spirituality that comes with it. Very easily debunked by modern fact based science. But if you followed the practices that the believes justified, you could help your health tremendously - meditation, physical exercise, calmness - it had a very neat system to explain everything. Imagine being a practitioner several thousand years ago - you had a system and if you made people practice it - they got better. Even if the exact mechanism of why it happened is flawed, and failed in some cases, by the most part it worked. You just had to refine it a bit. And it did help me as well. Had I just dismissed it as shaman mumbo jumbo and not went through with it, I’d be worse off for sure. No reason I had to adopt his model wholesale though - I just needed to attempt to reconcile his one with the science based one I knew, and see where I can learn a thing or two. Anyway just wanted to say that from that I did learn to be more tolerant and not dismiss out of habit things that were not peer reviewed double blind tested, but rather look at the results first. All models are wrong, some models are useful.

crispinb 7y ago
I don't think that's really off-topic & I agree. Another case in point: indigenous Australian cosmology. On the one hand, I don't personally take the notion that ancestors created the landscape very seriously. On the other, this cosmology was part of a system of thought, culture, and action that helped maintain a civilisation's existence for over 40,000 years (a feat we're very clearly not going to match). And such questions naturally address an individual very differently according to their situation. I can't say I'm ever likely to be involved enough with Reiki to need to take a strong stance on its efficacy. So why not just remain open and admit ignorance? That admission seems as hard for humans as does holding an empirical stance. HN is (hardly uniquely) stuffed full of comments proclaiming great certainty about things it's blindingly obvious people hardly know a thing about. It's fine often (and in truth most of the time) just not to know.

blast 7y ago

There are two different kinds of empiricism, and they're in tension with each other. One kind is where specialists measure things and publish the measurements in journals. The other is where individuals try things for themselves and decide for themselves what they experienced.

loopz 7y ago
Every new paradigm shift had to start with just one individual (or a situation with a core group).
- blast 7y ago
  I think I agree (assuming I understand your meaning). Individual experimentation and experience is the leading edge. Only much later does it get codified into institutionalized forms. This in fact is the history of what we call science, but somehow we've dropped the "find out for yourself" aspect and returned to something that uncomfortably resembles the priesthood that the original scientists were deviating against.

hyko 7y ago

These two responses are not equal, as every claim made by anyone should fall into category 1 until proven otherwise. Response 2 admits the possibility of better theories about the world being possible, while refusing to do the actual science that would prove their existence. Claims about alternative medicine don't even get to start from this generous position because the field has produced reams upon reams of utter-and dangerous-nonsense, so the evidential bar must be set even higher to cut through that noise. Our collective body of knowledge is not just based on a string of isolated empirical assessments, it has to be integrated into a theoretical framework. Otherwise, you're just left holding a very large bag of statistical anomalies that could basically mean thing anything you want (usually: buy my product!).

loopz 7y ago
Nobody is able to practice 2 while holding 1 as belief. The opposite is ironically possible.
- mcv 7y ago
  2 is not a practice, it's a belief. It's still possible to practice something without believing it works, or without believing some theory behind the practice. People used to navigate by the stars because they believed the stars were fixed points on a dome that covered the Earth. The belief was wrong, but the practice worked.
  - loopz 7y ago
    Granted, 2 as stated, is about faith and open mindedness. However, without experience or practice, there's not much basis. Faith should be != belief systems, which are really often just constraints and thoughts. If you try to think your way through life, you're missing the view for all your own thoughts.
tsimionescu 7y ago
It's all mumbo jumbo is equivalent to 'it has been proven not to work'. That is a strong position to take, not a default one. The second is too hand-wavy to even really call a position. Note that it's generally important to separate the possible effectiveness of a technique from the beliefs about why it may be effective that practitioners hold. Willowbark is an effective remedy for some ailments, not because of some tree spirit or some alchemical mumbo-jumbo that many may have once believed in,but for different reasons they had no way of knowing. If it turns out under serious study that Reiki has positive effects, we will need further study to understand why, and perhaps distill that into an even more effective treatment. It won't be magical energy, but perhaps there is something to it that can be identified and taught.

kingludite 7y ago

My reflexive reaction is: I don't know. I'm not interested in empirical evidence but if there is evidence of some effect I hope the right people show an interest in it. I keep wondering what the big deal is with admitting you don't know something. I don't know C++, I should have an opinion about some C++ library? Does it work or not? When asked to defend my opinion about Reiki I would have to resort to a completely moronic line of reasoning that is of no use to anyone. I leave this to the professional skeptics.

lonelappde 7y ago
One day you might be sick and having a opinion will be important.

raverbashing 7y ago

I think researchers get too hung up on the a) "folclorical explanations" and b) specific measurable attributes (depression scales, anxiety scales, etc) I have no doubt that the Reiki or Acupunture traditional explanations make no scientific sense. But I'm also long on the idea that sticking needles at a shallow depth might have a certain analgesic effect (also see: tattoos). Yeah it seems you can't do a "fake acupunture" study, but that's not its fault. I'm not sure about Reiki (and I'm much more skeptical) but massage feels good. It might have a non-identified reason for that, but that seems likely.

M2Ys4U 7y ago
>Yeah it seems you can't do a "fake acupunture" study, but that's not its fault. Actually you can. More specifically, you can place needles randomly/arbitrarily rather than looking at "energy lines" or "chi" or whatever utter bollocks proponents of acupuncture spout. Turns out, it performs at the same level as placebo. Just like "real" acupuncture.
- raverbashing 7y ago
  As I said the lines are probably BS anyway But you can't do something that feels like getting poked with needles but isn't
- nprateem 7y ago
  > "energy lines" or "chi" or whatever utter bollocks proponents of acupuncture spout. I do love an open mind. Here's a simple and fun way to perhaps convince yourself that this 'utter bollocks' has something to it. Learn tantric sex. Seriously. It's insightful when you realise you can use your mind to control your sexual energy and last far longer than when you don't 'move your chi along energy lines'.
  - M2Ys4U 7y ago
    >I do love an open mind. As do I, but one's mind shouldn't be so open that the brain falls out. >Here's a simple and fun way to perhaps convince yourself that this 'utter bollocks' has something to it. No. The way to decide whether there's something in it is to perform a robust clinical study. People have, and the results have shown that, in layman's terms, it's utter bollocks.