3 ms·

Please note that the author is not a medical professional (he's an investor) and some of his advice may be harmful to your health. “[Instead of surgery], find

by deno 16y ago

Please note that the author is not a medical professional (he's an investor) and some of his advice may be harmful to your health. “[Instead of surgery], find out first if there’s any other non-surgical procedures. (…) first check with an acupuncturist (a good one that is recommended by friends who were actually helped by that acupuncturist) or a chiropractor.” He refers to some pop-science articles here and there, but overall it's just a ‘common sense’ advice, which you must decide for yourself whether is valuable or not. For example, although probably everyone here would agree that tobacco is very bad for you, please note that his method of arguing for that (“Of the 250 known harmful chemicals in tobacco smoke...”) is one that can be (and has been[1]) used to argue against vaccines. [1] http://www.informedchoice.info/cocktail.html http://www.informedchoice.info/cocktail.html

jaltucher 16y ago
I'm not arguing against vaccines though. And, btw, I'm not advocating people avoid surgery. But there are many well-documented stats (read any Gawande book) of when surgery is recommended but not the best solution.
- deno 16y ago
  > I'm not arguing against vaccines though. I didn't say you were. I've said that your argument can be (and has been) used to prove or disprove almost any theory—including that of vaccines conspiracy. You have to either accept all the conclusions and uses of said argument or you must acknowledge that said argument was flawed to begin with. And I'm sorry but you can't start your sentence by saying that you're not advocating people to avoid surgery and then go ahead and do exactly that. Furthermore, dr. Gawande is not arguing what you do by a long shot. Your medical treatment options are always presented to you and you're free to chose a non-invasive one if you wish to. You're however advocating for choosing a non-medical treatment instead of a medical one, and in case of both acupuncture and chiropractic, ones that have no scientific basis whatsoever, and have not been proven to work or have been proven to not work.

by deno 16y ago

jaltucher 16y ago

I'm not arguing against vaccines though. And, btw, I'm not advocating people avoid surgery. But there are many well-documented stats (read any Gawande book) of when surgery is recommended but not the best solution.

deno 16y ago
> I'm not arguing against vaccines though. I didn't say you were. I've said that your argument can be (and has been) used to prove or disprove almost any theory—including that of vaccines conspiracy. You have to either accept all the conclusions and uses of said argument or you must acknowledge that said argument was flawed to begin with. And I'm sorry but you can't start your sentence by saying that you're not advocating people to avoid surgery and then go ahead and do exactly that. Furthermore, dr. Gawande is not arguing what you do by a long shot. Your medical treatment options are always presented to you and you're free to chose a non-invasive one if you wish to. You're however advocating for choosing a non-medical treatment instead of a medical one, and in case of both acupuncture and chiropractic, ones that have no scientific basis whatsoever, and have not been proven to work or have been proven to not work.