From “Straight Dope” column printed in C-VILLE Weekly in Feb. 2000:
Dear Cecil:
This friend of mine is taking a homeopathic remedy for a cold. He explained
that it’s “the vibration of the molecules of the plant” that is the active
remedy here. What’s up with this?
–Joanne Keefe, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Cecil replies:
Homeopathy! I can’t believe this has made a comeback. The last time
homeopathy was big, Ulysses S. Grant was president. Now here it is, two
months into the year 2000, and you walk into one of these pricey organic
supermarkets and see aisles full of homeopathic nostrums, all of which have
a proven effectiveness on a par with eye of newt. So, recognizing the
complete futility of the effort, I feel obliged to state for the record:
Come on, folks. This is nuts.
Homeopathy was founded by the German physician Samuel Hahnemann
(1755-1843). He enunciated what remain today the guiding principles of
homeopathic medicine, the foremost of which is the Law of Similars: if a
large amount of medicine produces a given symptom, then a small amount of
the medicine will stimulate the body to combat that symptom. This isn’t a
completely crazy concept; modern vaccines use the same basic idea. The
twist with homeopathic medicines is that they reverse the usual
understanding of dose effectiveness. Mainstream science holds that,
generally speaking, the potency of a drug increases with the dose.
Homeopathy–in particular, the Law of Infinitesimals–says the medicine’s
effectiveness decreases with the dose. The less you use, the better it
works! Which would lead one to conclude that it works best if you don’t use
any at all.
Homeopaths don’t say that, of course, but it’s the practical impact of the
fantastic dilutions they employ. Two scales are used, X and C. A 1X
solution means the original medicine (the “mother tincture”) was diluted
with water, alcohol, or whatever to one part in ten, or 1/10; 2X is 1/100;
3X is 1/1,000; etc. A 1C solution is 1/100, 2C is 1/10,000, 3C is
1/1,000,000, and so on. Most homeopathic remedies range from 6X to 30X. At
30X, chances are that a given dose of the medicine doesn’t contain a single
molecule of the original, but some dilutions go a lot higher than that.
I’ve heard of one cold remedy with a dilution of 200C, which mathematically
is less than one molecule per all the known matter in the universe.
How, then, can homeopathy possibly work? Apologists fall back on
far-fetched explanations involving energy and vibrations and so on. A key
step in the manufacture of homeopathic medicines is “succussion,” in which
the mixture is vigorously shaken at each stage of the dilution process.
This miraculously unlocks the healing power of the medicinal substance.
Could be just my Catholic background talking, but that sounds like making
holy water to me.
Homeopathic remedies can legally be sold as drugs in the U.S. owing to an
odd circumstance–one of the key sponsors of the Federal Food, Drug, and
Cosmetic Act of 1938 was a homeopathic physician, and he was able to get
the entire homeopathic pharmacopoeia (nux vomica, arsenicum album, et al)
officially recognized. Homeopathy has enjoyed a quasi-protected status ever
since, with federal regulators generally taking the view that the practice
is harmless and that any attempt to suppress it would likely have political
repercussions. There have even been studies in journals with varying
degrees of credibility purporting to show that homeopathy actually works.
These have been roundly criticized on methodological grounds, and the
universal view among scientists is that any perceived benefit is simply a
placebo effect–you think something is going to help you, so it does.
Why does belief in homeopathy persist? Well, for most routine,
common-cold-type health complaints, it’s not noticeably less effective than
mainstream medicine, or noticeably different in its therapeutic approach.
People catch “bugs” that are never diagnosed (and which, if viral, have no
cure anyway), take some over-the-counter remedy that claims to address the
symptoms, and eventually get better. Did the over-the-counter remedy help?
Who knows? It’s silly to believe in homeopathic cures, but I’m not seeing
that it’s smarter to place your faith in Sudafed instead.
Cecil Adams can deliver the Straight Dope on any topic. Write Cecil at the
Chicago Reader, 11 E. Illinois, Chicago 60611, or E-mail him at
cecil@chicagoreader.com.
Dear C-VILLE Editors,
Your readership has been done a grave disservice by the narrow-minded, ignorant, arrogant, scientistic bigotry promulgated by Mr. Cecil Adams in his column “StraightDope: Good Vibrations” in the February 29, 2000, issue of the C-VILLE Weekly. Mr. Adams is seriously misinformed about the history, scientific basis and therapeutic effectiveness of homeopathic medicine. C-VILLE Weekly needs to be far more circumspect in their choice of self-proclaimed ‘expert’ columnists.
Contrary to his erroneous belief, homeopathic medicine is today practiced by many thousands of well-trained physicians and licensed health care practitioners treating tens of millions of patients worldwide. Homeopathy is acknowledged by the World Health Organization and homeopathic health care is subsidized by the governments of many nations due to its recognized cost-effectiveness. Homeopathic medicine was very popular and widely practiced in the U.S. for at least 30 years beyond Ulysses Grant’s tenure in the oval office. Political and economic subterfuge, fostered by the pharmaceutical industry and AMA, lead to the virtual suppression of homeopathy and other complementary alternative medicine in the U.S. by the 1920s and 1930s. This is well-documented in the treatise on the history of medicine in America by the world-renowned historian, Dr. Harris Coulter (“Divided Legacy: The Conflict between Homeopathy and the AMA, Vol. 3”). Fortunately, due to an increasingly educated and better informed American public, and a general dissatisfaction with the failures of conventional, orthodox medicine, widespread utilization of homeopathy and other CAM therapies has been revitalized in the U.S. since the early 1970s.
Mr. Adams misstated the fundamental principle of Nature underlying homeopathic medical practice, the Law of Similars. It is actually defined as: a medicinal substance that can produce a certain set of symptoms in a healthy person, in a controlled clinical trial, can be used to stimulate a curative process in a sick person with a similar set of symptoms. The Law of Similars is a ‘qualitative’ principle, not a ‘quantitative’ one, as Mr. Adams infers. Orthodox medicine makes occassional, unwitting use of this principle – vaccinations, allergic desensitization, and the use of Ritalin, a central nervous system stimulant, in the treatment of hyperactive children are some examples. Homeopathy, on the other hand, represents an entire system of health care based upon this unerring, fundamental principle of Nature.
He is further in error about the scientific principles underlying homeopathic pharmacology, which in essence, is designed to extract, purify and concentrate the electromagnetic resonance qualities within the original material substance that is undergoing the potentization process. This process of potentization enables the homeopathic physician to prescribe medicines which possess an enhanced curative effectiveness and essentially no toxic side effects, in sharp contrast to current orthodox drugs. Advances in modern science in the last century and beyond, e.g., quantum mechanics and unified field theory, chaos theory, small cluster theory, the electromagnetic memory of water, new concepts of the higher states of ‘ice’ crystallization, etc., all strongly support the scientific foundations of homeopathic medicine. Clinical research, published in respected, conventional
