4 ms·

I'm all for that. The key problem is defining it. There exist historical examples of quackery which wasn't, e.g. hand washing. Stricter rules about null hypoth

by grueful 14y ago

I'm all for that. The key problem is defining it. There exist historical examples of quackery which wasn't, e.g. hand washing. Stricter rules about null hypothesis testing would be a start, but the bigger problem is one of education. We're still plagued by government that gives the nod to creationism and horrifically distorted sex ed in public schools. I'd like to say we've become empirical enough about what practices we place belief in that we could just treat all cases of quackery as malicious fraud - but the very prevalence of such issues tends to support the opposite conclusion.

Alex3917 14y ago
"There exist historical examples of quackery which wasn't, e.g. hand washing." And homeopathy, which even James Randi admits was more effective than western medicine in the 1800s. (In the video that was submitted to HN recently.)
- derleth 14y ago
  > homeopathy, which even James Randi admits was more effective than western medicine in the 1800s I hope you realize how worthless this statement is in a discussion of modern medicine. Also, it's incredibly racist to call 'medicine that works' 'Western medicine'. Do you also call 'math that works' 'Western mathematics'?
  - Alex3917 14y ago
    "Also, it's incredibly racist to call 'medicine that works' 'Western medicine'." I assure you that's not how I'm using the phrase.
    - derleth 14y ago
      > I assure you that's not how I'm using the phrase. Except it is. Medicine can be practiced by anyone who knows how, not just people with the right-colored skin.
- TillE 14y ago
  The placebo effect is remarkably powerful. But there's nothing special about homeopathy.
- carbocation 14y ago
  That's very misleading without providing proper context. In Hahneman's time, medicine was actively harmful and virtually never actively helpful. The risk benefit analysis would not come out in favor of getting treatment. In contrast, homeopathy does nothing. It's placebo. And giving placebo, it turns out, is safer than actively sticking dirty instruments into your patient's bloodstream and giving them bacteremia. In that context, the statement makes sense, but is still obviously tongue in cheek. Homeopathy never worked, but medicine at the time actively harmed.
  - Alex3917 14y ago
    "In contrast, homeopathy does nothing. It's placebo." Well, yes and no. It is a placebo, but the research seems to show that placebos do significantly more than nothing, at least for some diseases (pain, depression, etc.). The comment I was replying to was asking for examples of where things that were once believed to be quackery were later vindicated. At the time homeopathy was believed to be quackery. In fact the reason the AMA was launched was to combat homeopathy because it was cutting into their profits; one of their first acts was to launch a 'propaganda department' to scare people off of homeopathy. (Essentially the AMA was founded to kill people. They knew they were less effective than homeopathy at the time and they knew they were killing people, but they just didn't care because they wanted the money.) The point is though that at the time homeopathy was actually significantly better than western medicine. Now if the definition of something not being quackery is if it's the best treatment available to us at the time, then homeopathy couldn't have been quackery by definition, since it was in fact the most scientifically advanced (or however you'd phrase it) form of medicine available at the time.
    - derleth 14y ago
      > At the time homeopathy was believed to be quackery. It still is believed to be quackery, because it still is quackery. > In fact the reason the AMA was launched was to combat homeopathy because it was cutting into their profits; one of their first acts was to launch a 'propaganda department' to scare people off of homeopathy. (Essentially the AMA was founded to kill people. They knew they were less effective than homeopathy at the time and they knew they were killing people, but they just didn't care because they wanted the money.) This sounds like conspiracist nonsense. Do you have a single cite for any of it?
- frobozz 14y ago
  Homeopathy was more effective in the 1800s because the patient was only under threat from their ailments, rather than having to worry about the doctor killing them as well. Early medicine was in a large portion, quackery. Some of it was actively harmful. Something that has no effect whatsoever will be more effective than something that harms and doesn't cure.
derleth 14y ago
> I'd like to say we've become empirical enough about what practices we place belief in that we could just treat all cases of quackery as malicious fraud - but the very prevalence of such issues tends to support the opposite conclusion. There are enough cognitive biases I can't support this conclusion. Confirmation bias alone accounts for a lot of this crap, I'm sure. Fundamentally, though, there's a big difference between crap we know doesn't and can't work, like homeopathy, and therapies that are in the pipeline and might be accepted or rejected on their merits. Homeopathy has had its turn and it failed. That goes for everything else I called quackery. Don't confuse that with something we haven't tried yet.
- grueful 14y ago
  Failed according to you, me, and the prevailing majority of the medical community isn't equivalent to failed in the minds of the overwhelming majority of the public. The segment which believes or doesn't strongly disbelieve things like homeopathy is manifestly non-negligible. Anti-vax nuts wouldn't be the public health threat that they are if there were two of them in a pool of hundreds of millions. The segment acting on these beliefs is manifestly large enough to enable outbreaks of diseases we otherwise could suppress almost totally.
  - stfu 14y ago
    For the sake of the argument let me try to defend Homeopathy for a moment. Sure, people can bash it all day long and it might have very little "measurable" effects. But as long as people believe in it, I expect that it leads to the same results as placebo effects. Placebo effects have been proven in many cases extremely strong and a main obstacle for the pharmaceutic industry to prove the statistical significance of their products. And as long as people get better, even if it is just by the believe in the effect, it is in my view a legitimate approach.
    - derleth 14y ago
      > And as long as people get better, even if it is just by the believe in the effect, it is in my view a legitimate approach. So fraud isn't really fraud if people are going to get better anyway?

by grueful 14y ago

Alex3917 14y ago

"There exist historical examples of quackery which wasn't, e.g. hand washing." And homeopathy, which even James Randi admits was more effective than western medicine in the 1800s. (In the video that was submitted to HN recently.)

derleth 14y ago
> homeopathy, which even James Randi admits was more effective than western medicine in the 1800s I hope you realize how worthless this statement is in a discussion of modern medicine. Also, it's incredibly racist to call 'medicine that works' 'Western medicine'. Do you also call 'math that works' 'Western mathematics'?
- Alex3917 14y ago
  "Also, it's incredibly racist to call 'medicine that works' 'Western medicine'." I assure you that's not how I'm using the phrase.
  - derleth 14y ago
    > I assure you that's not how I'm using the phrase. Except it is. Medicine can be practiced by anyone who knows how, not just people with the right-colored skin.
TillE 14y ago
The placebo effect is remarkably powerful. But there's nothing special about homeopathy.
carbocation 14y ago
That's very misleading without providing proper context. In Hahneman's time, medicine was actively harmful and virtually never actively helpful. The risk benefit analysis would not come out in favor of getting treatment. In contrast, homeopathy does nothing. It's placebo. And giving placebo, it turns out, is safer than actively sticking dirty instruments into your patient's bloodstream and giving them bacteremia. In that context, the statement makes sense, but is still obviously tongue in cheek. Homeopathy never worked, but medicine at the time actively harmed.
- Alex3917 14y ago
  "In contrast, homeopathy does nothing. It's placebo." Well, yes and no. It is a placebo, but the research seems to show that placebos do significantly more than nothing, at least for some diseases (pain, depression, etc.). The comment I was replying to was asking for examples of where things that were once believed to be quackery were later vindicated. At the time homeopathy was believed to be quackery. In fact the reason the AMA was launched was to combat homeopathy because it was cutting into their profits; one of their first acts was to launch a 'propaganda department' to scare people off of homeopathy. (Essentially the AMA was founded to kill people. They knew they were less effective than homeopathy at the time and they knew they were killing people, but they just didn't care because they wanted the money.) The point is though that at the time homeopathy was actually significantly better than western medicine. Now if the definition of something not being quackery is if it's the best treatment available to us at the time, then homeopathy couldn't have been quackery by definition, since it was in fact the most scientifically advanced (or however you'd phrase it) form of medicine available at the time.
  - derleth 14y ago
    > At the time homeopathy was believed to be quackery. It still is believed to be quackery, because it still is quackery. > In fact the reason the AMA was launched was to combat homeopathy because it was cutting into their profits; one of their first acts was to launch a 'propaganda department' to scare people off of homeopathy. (Essentially the AMA was founded to kill people. They knew they were less effective than homeopathy at the time and they knew they were killing people, but they just didn't care because they wanted the money.) This sounds like conspiracist nonsense. Do you have a single cite for any of it?
frobozz 14y ago
Homeopathy was more effective in the 1800s because the patient was only under threat from their ailments, rather than having to worry about the doctor killing them as well. Early medicine was in a large portion, quackery. Some of it was actively harmful. Something that has no effect whatsoever will be more effective than something that harms and doesn't cure.

derleth 14y ago

> I'd like to say we've become empirical enough about what practices we place belief in that we could just treat all cases of quackery as malicious fraud - but the very prevalence of such issues tends to support the opposite conclusion. There are enough cognitive biases I can't support this conclusion. Confirmation bias alone accounts for a lot of this crap, I'm sure. Fundamentally, though, there's a big difference between crap we know doesn't and can't work, like homeopathy, and therapies that are in the pipeline and might be accepted or rejected on their merits. Homeopathy has had its turn and it failed. That goes for everything else I called quackery. Don't confuse that with something we haven't tried yet.

grueful 14y ago
Failed according to you, me, and the prevailing majority of the medical community isn't equivalent to failed in the minds of the overwhelming majority of the public. The segment which believes or doesn't strongly disbelieve things like homeopathy is manifestly non-negligible. Anti-vax nuts wouldn't be the public health threat that they are if there were two of them in a pool of hundreds of millions. The segment acting on these beliefs is manifestly large enough to enable outbreaks of diseases we otherwise could suppress almost totally.
- stfu 14y ago
  For the sake of the argument let me try to defend Homeopathy for a moment. Sure, people can bash it all day long and it might have very little "measurable" effects. But as long as people believe in it, I expect that it leads to the same results as placebo effects. Placebo effects have been proven in many cases extremely strong and a main obstacle for the pharmaceutic industry to prove the statistical significance of their products. And as long as people get better, even if it is just by the believe in the effect, it is in my view a legitimate approach.
  - derleth 14y ago
    > And as long as people get better, even if it is just by the believe in the effect, it is in my view a legitimate approach. So fraud isn't really fraud if people are going to get better anyway?