Data Comparisons

Storm

35 Comments

When I’m not arguing about climate science on the internet, I enjoy getting into debates about the silliness known as alternative medicine. Living in San Francisco, its something I come across depressingly often in my daily life. I enjoy Orac’s blog on the subject, and recently came across a wonderfully funny video by Tim Minchin (warning, some profanity):

35 thoughts on “Storm”

  2. I guess alternative medicines could work as placebos. Even if there is no placebo effect, a person might attribute recovery to an alternative medicine when he was just getting better anyway.

    I enjoyed the video. Good animation. Good writing. I especially enjoyed the following lines:

    “Science adjusts its views based on what’s observed.

    Faith is the denial of what’s observed so that beliefs can be preserved.”

  3. Max_OK,

    Actually, one of the better arguments for the viability of alternative medicine I’ve heard is that practitioners tend to spend considerably more time with their patients than do conventional doctors, and more active involvement can lead to a stronger placebo effect. That and a number of alternative medical practices deal with basic things like nutrition and exercise that are well known to improve health (not that your doctor won’t recommend similar things, but you are more likely to work out doing, say, Yoga, than simply based on the advise of your doctor).

  4. Medical researchers are working on discovering ‘alternative medicine’ all the time.
    Have proponents of ‘alternative medicine’ ever generated ideas or overlooked paths of research that have helped advance medical science?
    It is not a rhetorical question.

  7. That’s terrific. I have a friend who is superstitious– some old biddy of a lady in England told her black was somehow an unlucky color for her (and she didn’t mean unattractive) so now she won’t wear black. (Which is too bad. She looks great in black.)

  9. I think there would be no debate if climate science was more like medical science.

  10. Bill Illis (Comment #77538)
    June 18th, 2011 at 7:46 am
    I think there would be no debate if climate science was more like medical science.
    ————————————
    The experiments just take longer (much longer). And we really can’t control the variables. Well, except for our current emending of the atmosphere by the emissions of the industrial age.

    In any case, the video was only in small part about alternative medicine.

  14. Very amusing. However, as alluded to in #77526 & #77528, alternative practitioners in such areas as homeopathy and acupuncture, often listen sympathetically to the distresses of their clients thereby providing them with de facto psychotherapy whose benefits are scientifically well proven.

  15. Bill Illis (Comment #77538)

    Actually, it has a lot in common with medical science. The areas where medical science has fallen down are those that have used questionable statistical methodology. You hear about them regularly on the news where meta studies or small uncontrolled studies are done and you’re told that something raises cancer risk x percent, or standing too near power lines causes cancer. Of course you can find other studies that contradict those, and they don’t control or know all the variables, and the answer may not really be statistically significant….

  16. Medical researchers are working on discovering ‘alternative medicine’ all the time.
    Have proponents of ‘alternative medicine’ ever generated ideas or overlooked paths of research that have helped advance medical science?
    It is not a rhetorical question.

    On occasion, yes. Some herbal or alternative treatments, like colace for constipation or melatonin for sleep, have been accepted. Some, like meditation for blood pressure, have pretty good data but have not been incorporated into allopathic practice.

    In general, these treatments are unscientific but harmless, and do no harm when used to treat things that get better on their own (which are a majority of the conditions that people seek medical care for.)

    In general I’m much more concerned with unscientific thinking in allopathic medicine as opposed to alternative medicine, both because the reach of allopathic medicine is much greater and because when we do unscientific, unhelpful things, they are much more likely to do serious harm (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/06/17/us/hospital-ct-scans.html?ref=health).

  17. Try looking up “Homeopathic A&E” on YouTube for a witty Mitchell & Webb sketch.

  18. > Have proponents of ‘alternative medicine’ ever generated ideas or overlooked paths of research that have helped advance medical science?

    Acupuncture — which my spouse is an adamant advocate of, among numerous alternative methods — can deliver the placebo benefits alluded to in earlier comments. Acupucturists are, in my experience, nice people and good listeners who are able to spend the time with patients to build rapport.

    In addition, there have been a number of well-designed studies that appear to show that it has utility beyond the placebo effect, in certain circumstances for certain conditions.

  19. Alternative medicine? What we really need is alternative energy. Roll on homeopathic petrol (gas to Americans).

  21. The power of the mind and properly selected inappropriate statistical methodology can cure nearly anything 50% of the time. 🙂

  22. For those interested Simon Singh & Edzard Ernst’s book “Trick or Treatment” (http://www.simonsingh.net/books/trick-or-treatment/) does an extensive & sceptical survey of a wide range of alternative treatments with summaries of the evidence behind them (or largely the lack of evidence behid them).

    As for Tim Minchin – if you can catch a live show he is very, very entertaining.

  23. Another excellent book in a similar vein to “Trick or Treatment” is Ben Goldacre’s “Bad Science”. I have a doctor friend who on occasion tells patients that he’s prescribing them a placebo. He claims it’s just as effective as not telling them.

  25. Speaking of alternative medicines and placebos.

    The Depressing News About Antidepressants. “Studies suggest that the popular drugs are no more effective than a placebo. In fact, they may be worse.” LIke Robert, bad research practice in allopathic medicine has far greater consequences than in alternative “quackery” medicine.

    Technically, from my perspective, “faith is belief in absence of proof” and “dogmatism is denial of evidence so that belief may be maintained.”

  26. Zeke,

    I find the “better” argument you mention to be unconvincing. It also sets up a false dichotomy; expensive, unsympathetic “real” medical treatment versus inexpensive, feel-good “alternative” treatment. “Alternative medicine” practitioners can spend more time with their “patients” primarily because they are unskilled and thus paid much less than an experienced medical doctor. The fact that they are cheap labor and that developing sympathetic listening skills is much easier then passing medical school (much less surviving a two year residency), is entirely unrelated to whether their dowsing rods, magic rocks or mysterious water have any worthwhile benefit above placebo (they don’t).

    Thus, the argument is really about comparing various methods of delivering a form of treatment that includes:

    a) Medical advice counseling from a sympathetic authority figure who is good at listening and providing obvious medical advice in a reassuring yet authoritative manner such that the patient is actually more likely to do the things they already know they should be doing.

    b) Delivery of some placebo medical-ish experience in a way that causes the patient to experience the maximum possible placebo effect.

    I would argue that this form of medical treatment could be provided less expensively, more efficiently and far more safely by a new kind of non-“alternative” practitioner specifically hired and trained to deliver this form of supplementary treatment.

    The reason is that at least some and perhaps many alternative practitioners actually believe their own magical thinking, thus they are at risk of acting in unpredictable ways that may not be in the patient’s true interest. For example, if I’m the kind of person that believes my hands contain actual “healing energy”, I could also randomly believe one day that my hands won’t work for a certain patient and that the patient will need to travel again to see me on another day, thus increasing expense and delaying delivery of the placebo treatment. A “practitioner” who is non-deluded would not suffer from this obvious downside. Our placebo treatment would remain at a constant level of maximum efficacy unaffected by the intermittent availability of various energy fields, auras, celestial alignments, chakras or spirit guides.

    Next, some of the various sham therapies that alternative practitioners subject patients to can be dangerous including certain forms of aggressive massage or misapplied/non-sterile acupuncture or contaminated homeopathic water or accidental injury by chiropractic “adjustments”. For more effective would be a placebo treatment specifically developed to be a safer, less costly alternative to “alternative medicine”. That way we could ensure that our placebo is “doing no harm” physically to our patient (something that “alternative medicine” has, sadly, been unable to do).

    Perhaps most important is that some alternative practitioners are hostile or disparaging of actual medical treatments (primarily private or independent alternative practitioners). They can actively work to convince patients to cease or postpone certain real medical treatments. This is the danger of letting “magical thinkers” anywhere near our scientifically-based medical thinking process.

    The alternative placebo treatment that I propose wouldn’t suffer from this dangerous problem because it would actually be part of the normal medical treatment and overseen (indirectly) by the real medical professional driving the patient’s entire treatment as part of a comprehensive approach. In fact, if a patient is about to undergo a difficult portion of their real treatment (say chemo), the timing can be coordinated, with the placebo practitioner ramping up the “P-Effect” at the most beneficial moment. Coordinated placebo timing is certainly far superior to uncoordinated, random placebo timing.

    I believe this proposal is inarguably a far superior alternative to “alternative medicine”. It would “work” better, be safer, more reliable and cost even less.

  27. “LIke Robert, bad research practice in allopathic medicine has far greater consequences than in alternative “quackery” medicine.”

    Bad research with real consequences has more consequences than bad research with no consequences. However the distinction is unclear. Quackery that promotes non-functioning ‘alternatives’ to actual treatments may be deadly. Quasi-complimentray “research” aimed at spreading alarm about vaccines is already leading to increase in a range of ailments such as measles – ailments that can be deadly to be people with weak or supressed immune systems.

  28. “I believe this proposal is inarguably a far superior alternative to “alternative medicine”. It would “work” better, be safer, more reliable and cost even less.”

    Interesting but ethically tricky.

  29. Nyg,

    Yes, I realize I forgot to include in my post the part about “…assuming you are ethically ok with lying to a paying customer who has placed their trust and health in your hands”. I certainly would not be, however the argument that Zeke refers to (I’m unclear if he actually endorses any part of it) takes as a given that the “stronger placebo effect” is desired, so I was approaching this from a viewpoint of “well, if that’s your goal – you’re going about it all wrong” and offering a better alternative.

    I believe that alternative medicine is fraught with ethical peril because it has an implied “to” in the middle like so: “alternative to medicine” because if it demonstrably worked it would just be called medicine (as the video so eloquently said).

  30. (continued from previous post)
    As an interesting aside, can the same bit of semantic coolness can be fairly applied to “Alternative Energy”? If it really met all the needs that normal energy meets and did so at a comparable cost, wouldn’t it just be called “energy”.

    Kind of by definition “alternative” means that it’s either less efficient, more expensive or ill-suited in some other way. “Alternative” does not mean “new” or “non-fossil”. If it did, nuke energy would be “alternative”.

  31. “As an interesting aside, can the same bit of semantic coolness can be fairly applied to “Alternative Energy”? If it really met all the needs that normal energy meets and did so at a comparable cost, wouldn’t it just be called “energy”. ”

    I would think that as “alternative” energy sources increase as a proportion of general energy production the term will be used to a lesser extent. I don’t think the analogy really works with “alternative medicine”. There is no doubt that alternative energy sources do actually produce energy. The equivalent for “alternative medicince” would be perpetual motion machines etc

  32. Josh

    Just love it! Tim’s stuff is fun but even better with the animation. Thanks for sharing

    .Hmmmmm
    @timminchin Tim Minchin

    Yo, climate change sceptics, will “climategate” hyperbole end now? Or is it all part of CONSPIRACY?

    Seems your going to need new comedy heros. Dara O’Briain, Eddie Izzard, Stephen Fry, Frankie Boyle and loads more will also be out.

    You should stick to people who share your views, Jim Davidson and that sort 😉

  33. Monckton actually displays a Swastika at a presentation.

    As a sort of “grand finale” to a presentation at a conference earlier this month in Los Angeles, climate “sceptic” Lord Christopher Monckton displayed on the giant conference screen a large Nazi swastika next to a quote from Adolf Hitler.

    A few seconds later came another quote, next to another large swastika – an emblem still offensive to most people seven decades after the end of WWII. The quote this time was from Australia’s climate change advisor Professor Ross Garnaut, which suggested that “on a balance of probabilities, the mainstream science is right” on human-caused climate change.

  34. Andrew_KY (Comment #77536)
    June 18th, 2011 at 6:56 am
    “placebo effect”
    Regulate C02 and the weather gets better.
    ———————–
    Pretty good, Andrew.

  35. One of the things that drives this is that as recently as 100 years ago, going to see a physician was as likely to make your situation worse as better, so going to see a quack was not irrational, at least you got some hope, and of course, the skill of a quack is to give you confidence in their quackery.

    They do this, by among other things casting doubt on science based medicine, bragging about how good they are, etc. In the meantime, the introduction of scientific studies,have given us effective drugs, vaccines and science based testing. The truly dangerous time is when scientific medicine comes up with a cure or care for a previously incurable disease. When previously quackery was not harmful, except to pocketbooks, continuing along that way after a cure has been found has murderous consequences.

    Now, in case this doesn’t remind you of someone, perhaps you should check these claims out
    —————————
    2008-present: RESURREXI Pharmaceutical: Director responsible for invention and development of a broad-spectrum cure for infectious diseases. Patents have now been filed. Patients have been cured of various infectious diseases, including Graves’ Disease, multiple sclerosis, influenza, and herpes simplex VI. Our first HIV patient had his viral titre reduced by 38% in five days, with no side-effects. Tests continue.
    ——————————

    and yes, murderous nonsense is well distributed

Comments are closed.