This thinking seems to me fraught with dangerous non sequiturs, or at least unproven assumptions. You mention one: on what basis can we assume that the drug eff

This thinking seems to me fraught with dangerous non sequiturs, or at least unproven assumptions. You mention one: on what basis can we assume that the drug effect and the placebo effect are independent? We don't understand the placebo effect. We should make as few assumptions about it as possible. Here is another. If the drug is approved, it won't be given only to the "subgroup which is less sensitive to placebos" on which it was tested. It will be given to the general population. On what basis can you assume that since the drug beats placebo on the subgroup, it must also beat placebo on the general population? It seems weird to allow a random sample to be taken from a population that is not the population you're trying to make claims about. Are there precedents for this in other fields?