# Nootropics **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 11, 2008, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699 "2008-12-11T08:09:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699/21 "2008-12-12T16:32:43Z")
> [@jakesteele](#): > > I appriciate your input, JayJay, but there are some things I would like to point out to you: > > 1. An “herb” is defined as a plant with medicinal properties; tobacco, coffee, pot, opium, cocaine, foxglove(digitalis), aspirin is derived from the bark of a certain tree. Most medicines come from a plant originally. I have been into herbs for many years and have found many of them to be efficacious to varying degrees. > > 2. The nutrional industry is a big business and like all other big business it exists to make money. They will try to tout the “miracle benefits” of what I call “The Herb of the Year” syndrome. Just as Excedrin aspirn has come out with their special Migraine formula which gives the impression that it is somehow better than original when it is really nothing but the same product repackaged. > > There is a lot of deception and hype surrounding herbs as their is OTC meds. I can tell you from experience that herbs like Cat’s Claw, a powerful astringent, is extremely beneficial for ulcers and ginko does help memory (I have been tested on two occasions before and after and have noticed marked differences). > > There are many other herbs that work to varying degrees with different ailments but like the latin phrase says, Caveat Emptor (let the buyer beware). Don’t be in such a hurry to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but make sure you throw all the bathwater out. You give us the essence of anecdotal reportage and also show why anecdotes cannot be substituted for knowledge. There is no way for me - or for you yourself, for that matter - to know whether the herbs you took helped you in any way. You don’t say - and I assume you don’t know - whether other factors were involved. What about other medications, prescription, OTC, or herbal, that you might also have been taking? Did you make changes in your diet? Does you exercise more? Reduce your stress levels? Gain or lose weight? Stop or start smoking, or drinking, or taking illicit drugs? Any of hundreds of changes in your life could have had an effect instead of or in combination with these herbs. We’ll never know and neither will you. A good clinical study will try to reduce or control for these other factors. And it will group the results from a large enough number of people that the varying factors will balance out or be submerged and the true effect of the drug shown, at least to a statistical significance. Remember that even in failed drug trials, some people are always helped by the medication. The proper question is not whether some particular people were helped but whether a large enough percentage are helped so that mere chance can’t be the sole factor involved. Your report shows why anecdotal evidence is literally valueless. If a hundred more people were to come in and give the same glowing take, it wouldn’t make any difference. 100 valueless statements don’t magically add together to a worthwhile one. The underlying problem is not with the effectiveness of any particular herb. It’s that people simply don’t understand why anecdotal evidence needs to ignored. I have no way of knowing whether your experience means that my experience will be positive, negative, or neutral. I can hope that a clinical trial gives me some basis for knowledge. Even there, the results of many clinical trials are overturned by later - larger, better managed, or more focused - trials. If that’s so, why do you think that your individual statement of selective information should sway my behavior? I repeat my earlier statement. Don’t rely on anecdotes from anybody. Clinical trials are the best information we have, and even those should be evaluated carefully to study whether they properly apply to you. If this means throwing out the entire herbal industry, so be it. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699/22 "2008-12-12T18:27:28Z")
Quoth **Bill Door** : > [@](#): > > Well, yeah, but who is going to pay for these studies? Nobody, as long as people are still allowed to sell these supposed cure-alls with no regulatory oversight whatsoever. If the herb industry were required to prove the effectiveness of their products like the drug industry is, or even if they were required to prove safety like the food industry is, then the drug companies (either current ones, or formed from the remnants of the herb companies) would start doing these studies to determine which ones were safe and effective, so they could sell them. That’s why we need to regulate herbs the same way as any other drug, so we can get safe herbal drugs to market. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699/23 "2008-12-12T18:33:34Z")
> [@Bill\_Door](#): > > Well, yeah, but who is going to pay for these studies? It can cost millions in animal and human clinical trials to bring a drug to market, and what pharmaceutical company is going to invest that in something that you can grow on your window sill in a Chia garden? You can grow garlic anywhere, or buy it for a pittance in the produce aisle, and yet my pharmacy sells out of garlic pills routinely. Whoever came up with the idea of garlic and cinnamon pills (also selling out in my pharmacy) clearly is making money even though both are readily available via innumerable means. Back it up with clinical proof that it actually does something good, and some people will be stuffing garlic and cinnamon pills into every orifice. ---
**Author:** ![Cluricaun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bb73d2/32.png) [@Cluricaun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cluricaun)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2008, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699/24 "2008-12-12T18:38:44Z")
> [@jakesteele](#): > > I’ve tried a Habanero suppository once. I felt much better afterward. Afterward of course meaning “after I removed said searing chemical ember from my nether reigons” of course. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nootropics/476699.md?page=1)