Person A: I’ve discovered this wonderful procedure
Person B: How does it work?
Person A: I dunno. I guess it stimulates the humors. I can tell you it works, tho
Person B: There’s no such thing as humors. You’re full of shit and I am dead-certain your procedure is useless, because in my cynical state I can’t think of one good reason it could work.
Surprisingly, someone raised an alternate idea. Maybe it’s the smoke that has an effect, nd_n8 said. Of course, everyone promptly ignored him. Assholes like nd_n8 always come up trying to poop on the let’s-make-fun-of-idiots parties.
Cupping, a form of bloodletting that induces bruising instead of external bleeding, was and continues to be used…extensively…in former Soviet countries, Asia (where they think it’s related to accupuncture) and many other places. Bloodletting in various forms has millenia of momentum behind it across the entire world. Without a doubt, it is a mass delusion.
No. What he said was maybe some of what people were feeling was caused by the smoke. But, these people were also making other claims, such as the candles being able to “suck out” ear wax. This is obviously bullshit, since the linked study clearly found an ash layer on the cerumen deposits in every tested ear.
Just because millions of people believe something doesn’t make it true.
Trephining (cutting a hole in someone’s skull to let the evil spirits escape) dates back to prehistoric times too. Does that mean we should accept it (beyond it’s present very limited surgical use)? How about purging? The fact that something has been practiced for millenia does not in and of itself mean it is useful.
Which reminds me, lots of people believe that urine is full of curative properties and you should drink it daily. Or that you can buy electrical gadgets to give yourself mild shocks to kill your internal parasites (you know, the ones that cause all cancers and most other diseases). Or drink expensive water under the impression that it contains homeopathic properties.
Can’t contradict any of those people with logic and sound science.
They believe, and that’s enough. Besides, too many cynics and it might not work. :eek:
To those perceiving an improvement, even those guessing it’s to do with the smoke. Hearing is highly subjective and the brain does all sorts of processing of the signals from the inner ear before it’s “sound” to you. Sticking a cone over your ear is going to change your perception of sound, and doing so for long enough for the candle to burn down is going to make your already pretty worthless subjective evaluation of your own hearing complete garbage.
Without any actual objective hearing tests there’s no reason to speculate on the cause of improvement, they’re very likely all in your mind.
Okay, it’s fairly obvious from the context you’re not really calling nd_n8 an asshole. But next time you try something like that it might not be so clear. That could lead to serious consequences, especially since you’ve been warned before about personal insults outside the BBQ Pit. Please try to choose your words more carefully to avoid any misunderstanding.
I think what’s clear is I’m pushing all of your buttons. It’s pretty clear you guys don’t have much of a leg to stand on in calling these people, and many others, quacks and idiots. You’re just in it for the sport, the ‘us’ vs ‘them.’ And you twist reasoning to fit that. For example, you think that by disproving what some layman or salesman offers as an explanation, you’ve disproved the whole phenomenon. Or you think that because there’s no unequivocal study for, it’s nearly as good as unequivocal evidence as against. You rely on your own probabilistic thinking, but despise the probabilistic thinking of others.
Anyway, there’s really no reason for me to try to convince you otherwise. What would man be without sport and conflict? For all your pretensions, you’re men too.
Self-flagellation has huge precedence. Hard do say what’s its benefit exactly, but it makes many people feel good about themselves. Electroshock therapy has solid basis in medicine, being used in this day and age to treat severe depression, and in ages past a whole slew of psychological disorders.
You can have all the fun you want laughing at electrocuted parasites. You have to be flat out dumb. No, that’s not fair. Just cynical. To think that proves anything.
Heck, there are people doing that today, to their own skulls, using power tools. Let’s see – yep, Cecil did a column on it: What’s the story on trepanation?
Are you building a scarecrow army or something? Enough strawmen to take over a small country. No, my credulous friend, what we think is that since NO ONE has proven in a scientifically rigorous manner that ear candling has any benefit whatsoever, then it’s clear it does not work as claimed. You show me a replicated, peer-reviewed study that shows otherwise, then we can talk. Until then, you’re just blowing hot air.
*And it seems to me that it’s pretty dumb
To put a candle in your ear
Never knowing what you’ll burn off
With that hot wax, dear
And you should have learned what quacks are
When you were just a kid
Your candle burned out long before
The earwax ever did.*
– Elton John
I’m not laughing - I think we should ban electrocution in favor of lifetime incarceration.
But seriously - the low-level “zappers” sold to the credulous aren’t powerful enough to electrocute any internal parasite, assuming the dupes who buy them actually have any sort of parasite (this is a common delusion). On the other hand, who’s to say that minute amounts of voltage don’t cure depression in parasites?
A happy worm is an efficient worm, or so I’ve heard. :dubious:
I would like to take this opportunity to formally apologize for threadshitting on your lets-make-fun-of-idiots party. I’m afraid I have been cursed by both the irrational belief that sound reasoning outweighs blind rationalization and the even more absurd belief that it is better to fight the ignorance rather than fighting with the ignorant. I realize that this is a paltry excuse and do intend to ratify my evil ways by disclaiming any anachronistic or otherwise flaky medical claims immediately.
Allow me to start by saying how ridiculous it is to think that pain and fever relief can come from chewing on tree bark. Cite.Cite.
Or that urine would have any therapeutic properties at all. Cite. Cite.
And don’t even get me started about how idiotic using leeches was. Cite.
In short please allow me to retract my question about the “actual” cause of confirmation bias concerning the efficacy of ear candling and replace it with my best Red Foreman-ish “Dumbass”.
Fair enough… in theory. What you say, about testing things directly is absolutely on the mark. Yet look at the wikipedia ear candling page criticism section (for the sake of argument). 1996 study concludes no negative pressure. Several studies show the residue is the same in vivo or not. 2007 paper says the claimed mechanism has not been verified. Cecil’s column does nothing but attack the mechanism.
Where is the actual testing of the thing directly?
This game gets played over and over and over again. People only want to argue against the supposed mechanisms, and feel confident that by disproving those often incorrect hypotheses, they disprove the claim. I see it everywhere, again and again, and I can’t stress that enough. Honestly, I think this unending pattern is the biggest fallacy in modern scientific thought.
I don’t want to start theorizing about why this style of thought keeps repeating. But you’ll just hate me for not giving you a mechanism, won’t you?
Actually, I’ll give you a mechanism. This pattern is convenient. Understanding the mechanism behind a phenomenon is the hardest part of science, to be sure. The mark of genius is to uncover them. To concentrate your attacks against mechanisms, to make it out that if your opponent can’t figure one out he doesn’t have a case, guarantees the best chances of “winning.”
Another thing is also valid. It’s very easy to refuse to understand a mechanism or to ignore it, because understanding mechanisms is the second most difficult part of science. The mark of high intelligence is to understand explanations. Yet not even the geniuses can do so immediately, impartially, and when entrenched in their own position.
Of course, there’s more to it. There are more reasons why the battlefield ends up where it does. And by offering you this partial mechanism, conceived by a man who is not a genius to be understood by people who are intelligent but not impartial or unentrenched, I only give you reason to disregard my entire point.
Anyway, I’m rambling. But I dare you. Take the time when reading about contentious, non-mainstream positions or even ordinary contentions to note how often it’s the explanations that are under utmost scrutiny. And how often opponents don’t take the time to consider all the possible ones.
Oh, and don’t think that what I’m on about is exclusively relevant to controversies. There are many clear non-controversies that get simply ignored because there’s no good mechanism for them.
An example is calorie restriction. It is the only technique ever discovered that extends, in most species, life as well as youth by as much as 50%. Has the overwhelming evidence for it done anything to change our views of anorexia or has it entered the public imagination? Absolutely not, and in part it’s because there’s no good mechanism for it. (In part, it’s also because it’s been tested in many organisms, including primates, but not humans, for whom there are ethical concerns.)
Another example from medicine is hormesis. This is the phenomenon where a stressor, in doses lower than those which exhibit negative effects, will often actually be a positive stimulus. This, for example, is the deal with sulfides and ethanol in wine (and arsenic commercially fed to chickens). Hormesis is far-reaching and has huge implications, especially for our understanding of many ‘alternative’ techniques. Yet because there’s no explanation for it, noone really talks about it. Few are even aware of the phenomenon.
There are other examples of ideas that aren’t all that controversial with good scientific support, but which don’t get the time of day because the “why” is missing.
Btw, if smoke helps to clear up the ears, it would be an example of hormesis. In nd_n8’s speculative words, “The smoke also irritated my ear canal and eustasion tube so that it felt dry and scratchy. I believe (again no scientific proof or cite, just a personal opinion) that this irritation triggered a reaction in my body to start focusing on the irritated area which lead to clearer sinuses and fewer alergy problems.”
Actually, it’s no more than a convenient catch-all excuse for why some alt med treatment might work, disregarding that there’s no good evidence that the treatment actually does work. Another excuse used by alties when rigorous testing proves some “natural” substance to be useless is that one must consume it as the whole herb or as part of a complex mixture, because of some mysterious Grand Synergy of Mother Gaia, which remains unproven as well.
The claim that cynics and doubters focus entirely on dubious mechanisms and not results is a strawman. Results obtained under controlled conditions including clinical trials are the best form of evidence, even if we don’t completely understand the mechanisms involved (which has been the case with some effective drugs). If a lack of proven results is combined with a totally bullshit-sounding theory (as in the case of homeopathy), the level of doubt and ridicule is naturally higher.
By the way, nd_n8, your “cites” on the “therapeutic value of urine” add up to only one factoid: that hormones extracted from the urine of pregnant mares are used to make an estrogen replacement drug (Premarin). That’s not exactly overwhelming evidence to support drinking your own urine. :rolleyes: