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You're going to disparage the scientific credibility of the entire medical profession because some practitioners are focused on isolating and synthesizing the e

You're going to disparage the scientific credibility of the entire medical profession because some practitioners are focused on isolating and synthesizing the effective components of medication? I guess Randi could have said "only the people who believe this crazy stuff believe this crazy stuff", but he did make it clear that his history wasn't complete and comprehensive. The damning evidence remains the same: I can go into an otherwise reputable store and pay for "medicine" that is just water with pseudoscientific incantations performed over it. And you have the chutzpah to call Randi dishonest?

Alex3917 14y ago
"You're going to disparage the scientific credibility of the entire medical profession because some practitioners are focused on isolating and synthesizing the effective components of medication?" My criticism of western medicine isn't that it focuses on new molecular entities (NMEs), but rather that it focuses only on NMEs despite loads of empirical evidence pointing out that much of the best medicine is potentially neither new nor a molecular entity. My point is that it's not fair to criticize alchemy for having guiding spiritual assumptions if you're not willing to admit that western medicine has its own spiritual assumptions.
- freshhawk 14y ago
  > despite loads of empirical evidence pointing out that much of the best medicine is potentially neither new nor a molecular entity Can you link to this empirical evidence? I'm honestly not aware of it.
  - Alex3917 14y ago
    I'm not aware of any single good source on this, but a couple interesting links: http://maps.org/ http://maps.org/ This is a non-profit pharma company working on getting MDMA through phase III trials. They've been getting tons of publicity lately, in part because of their very solid methodology and in part because of their results and the interestingness/importance of the project. No traditional pharma companies will do any research on the drug though because it can't be patented, not to mention it's schedule I meaning that each study can take literally several years to get approved. For a comparison of marijuana with marinol, this is a good link: http://norml.org/component/zoo/category/marinol-vs-natural-cannabis http://norml.org/component/zoo/category/marinol-vs-natural-c... There are lots of plants that compare well with pharma drugs safety and efficacy wise in preclinical studies, but there are basically zero actual clinical studies done on them because they can't be patented or prescribed. Andrew Weil has a great writeup on why plants are usually better than drugs here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-weil-md/why-plants-are-usually-be_b_785139.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-weil-md/why-plants-are-... Obviously there are many famous counterexamples where the isolated molecule really is much better, like with aspirin. But often with just the whole plant or some extract you can get at least 80% of the benefits but with only 10% of the side effects. (Plants kill only a couple hundred people in the US per year, whereas pharma drugs kill 200k+ per year.)
    - unimpressive 14y ago
      > (Plants kill only a couple hundred people in the US per year, whereas pharma drugs kill 200k+ per year.) Well in all fairness, the volume of people being treated with plants and the volume of people being treated with pharmaceuticals probably isn't near enough to proportional to make that a fair comparison.
      - Alex3917 14y ago
        That's true, but even the most benign of pharma drugs like aspirin, ibuprofen, and tylenol kill around 7,500 people per year combined. Whereas no one is dying from marijuana, aloe, cranberry juice, etc. Virtually all of the plant deaths in the US are from people eating poisonous plants, either accidentally or to commit suicide. Despite the tens of millions of Americans using plant medicines each year, I doubt there are more than a few dozen adverse drug events from all of them combined.
    - freshhawk 14y ago
      I'm not sure those support your points (except the huffpo article which I find ... unconvincing), isn't MDMA a "molecular entity"? There are many plants that work very well indeed, much of modern medicine is based on them. I'm just not sure why you would not take the next step and isolate the active ingredients and synthesize them so that people can benefit from something with predicable dosages and a price affected by economies of scale. In terms of drug research being hampered by prohibitionist drug laws we are in agreement. What I still don't understand is why you think that some beneficial compound that's adulterated and present in unpredictable amounts in plant form is better than the alternative? I'm definitely going to challenge you on this 80%/10% statement. Something either has a biological effect or it doesn't. The cases like aspirin (where the natural form also had a second active ingredient that acted as a buffering agent) are rare, it's more common that the plant form has other active ingredients that are harmful. I sympathize with your bias towards the naturalistic fallacy, since I'm prone to it as well the facts aren't on your side here.
      - Alex3917 14y ago

Alex3917 14y ago

"You're going to disparage the scientific credibility of the entire medical profession because some practitioners are focused on isolating and synthesizing the effective components of medication?" My criticism of western medicine isn't that it focuses on new molecular entities (NMEs), but rather that it focuses only on NMEs despite loads of empirical evidence pointing out that much of the best medicine is potentially neither new nor a molecular entity. My point is that it's not fair to criticize alchemy for having guiding spiritual assumptions if you're not willing to admit that western medicine has its own spiritual assumptions.

freshhawk 14y ago
> despite loads of empirical evidence pointing out that much of the best medicine is potentially neither new nor a molecular entity Can you link to this empirical evidence? I'm honestly not aware of it.
- Alex3917 14y ago
  I'm not aware of any single good source on this, but a couple interesting links: http://maps.org/ http://maps.org/ This is a non-profit pharma company working on getting MDMA through phase III trials. They've been getting tons of publicity lately, in part because of their very solid methodology and in part because of their results and the interestingness/importance of the project. No traditional pharma companies will do any research on the drug though because it can't be patented, not to mention it's schedule I meaning that each study can take literally several years to get approved. For a comparison of marijuana with marinol, this is a good link: http://norml.org/component/zoo/category/marinol-vs-natural-cannabis http://norml.org/component/zoo/category/marinol-vs-natural-c... There are lots of plants that compare well with pharma drugs safety and efficacy wise in preclinical studies, but there are basically zero actual clinical studies done on them because they can't be patented or prescribed. Andrew Weil has a great writeup on why plants are usually better than drugs here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-weil-md/why-plants-are-usually-be_b_785139.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-weil-md/why-plants-are-... Obviously there are many famous counterexamples where the isolated molecule really is much better, like with aspirin. But often with just the whole plant or some extract you can get at least 80% of the benefits but with only 10% of the side effects. (Plants kill only a couple hundred people in the US per year, whereas pharma drugs kill 200k+ per year.)
  - unimpressive 14y ago
    > (Plants kill only a couple hundred people in the US per year, whereas pharma drugs kill 200k+ per year.) Well in all fairness, the volume of people being treated with plants and the volume of people being treated with pharmaceuticals probably isn't near enough to proportional to make that a fair comparison.
    - Alex3917 14y ago
      That's true, but even the most benign of pharma drugs like aspirin, ibuprofen, and tylenol kill around 7,500 people per year combined. Whereas no one is dying from marijuana, aloe, cranberry juice, etc. Virtually all of the plant deaths in the US are from people eating poisonous plants, either accidentally or to commit suicide. Despite the tens of millions of Americans using plant medicines each year, I doubt there are more than a few dozen adverse drug events from all of them combined.
  - freshhawk 14y ago
    I'm not sure those support your points (except the huffpo article which I find ... unconvincing), isn't MDMA a "molecular entity"? There are many plants that work very well indeed, much of modern medicine is based on them. I'm just not sure why you would not take the next step and isolate the active ingredients and synthesize them so that people can benefit from something with predicable dosages and a price affected by economies of scale. In terms of drug research being hampered by prohibitionist drug laws we are in agreement. What I still don't understand is why you think that some beneficial compound that's adulterated and present in unpredictable amounts in plant form is better than the alternative? I'm definitely going to challenge you on this 80%/10% statement. Something either has a biological effect or it doesn't. The cases like aspirin (where the natural form also had a second active ingredient that acted as a buffering agent) are rare, it's more common that the plant form has other active ingredients that are harmful. I sympathize with your bias towards the naturalistic fallacy, since I'm prone to it as well the facts aren't on your side here.
    - Alex3917 14y ago