{"id":12810,"date":"2014-11-27T11:05:24","date_gmt":"2014-11-27T16:05:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ianchadwick.com\/blog\/?p=12810"},"modified":"2014-11-27T11:05:24","modified_gmt":"2014-11-27T16:05:24","slug":"the-pinnacle-of-homeopathic-stupidity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ianchadwick.com\/blog\/the-pinnacle-of-homeopathic-stupidity\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pinnacle of Homeopathic Stupidity"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Toilet<\/a>“Have Homeopaths Reached Peak Stupid?”<\/strong> asks the headline on Quackometer.net<\/a>. It’s hard to imagine anyone getting dumber than a belief in homeopathy (aka The One Quackery to Rule Them All<\/a>), but apparently there are higher levels within their madness\u00a0that homeopaths continue to scale. This, however, looks like their Everest of stupidity.<\/p>\n

The story in question is about the plan by homeopaths to “heal the oceans” last week. Admirable\u00a0goal, but it’s the implementation that will make you laugh so hard you’ll snort your morning tea right out of your nose. You have been warned. I speak from experience.<\/p>\n

Here’s how they plan to heal the oceans: flush their pseudo-medicines down the toilet. Yes, I agree that’s ALWAYS the best thing to do with homeopathic nonsense. But according to a UK homeopathic wingnut, this is supposed to fix the oceans.<\/p>\n

Okay, you’re wondering how a vial of homeopathic magic potion – which is simply water – can heal the pollution of the massive oceans? Well, so is everyone. It can’t. But that didn’t stop them. Wait, it gets more amusing.<\/p>\n

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This nutty idea is the brainchild of uber-wingnut Grace DaSilva-Hill. On her website, Healing with Grace<\/a>, she notes:<\/p>\n

I hope that through Homeopathy, Emotional Freedom Technique, Energetic Flower Essences, and Allergy Elimination Technique I will be able to help you along your healing journey to fitness and to remain happy and healthy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I had to look up “energetic flower essences” and, as expected, found it’s another of those New Age magic potions. Apparently you need to contact your “nature angel<\/a>” to make one:<\/p>\n

We are guided each year to plant new gardens with the help of our nature Angels to ensure that the most useful essences are harvested for the coming year. The Angels, nature spirits, and guides help us to better understand the benefits and lessons that each flower has to offer.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That just shrieks codswallop, doesn’t it? Anything that involves “angels” you know right away is leading you by the hand\u00a0to\u00a0nuttiness – and usually with the other\u00a0hand in your pocket to take any loose cash you have.<\/p>\n

And what about “emotional freedom technique?” Wikipedia<\/a> tells us it’s also a bunch of balderdash shellacked with pseudo-scientific gibberish:<\/p>\n

…a form of counseling intervention that draws on various theories of alternative medicine including acupuncture, neuro-linguistic programming, energy medicine, and Thought Field Therapy (TFT)… A book examining pseudoscientific practices in psychology characterized EFT as one of a number of “fringe psychotherapeutic practices,”and a psychiatry handbook states EFT has “all the hallmarks of pseudoscience.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

She also practices “Nambudripad’s Allergy Elimination Technique” or NAET, which is a method of tapping on a body to cure it of allergies. How would this magic work, you wonder? Well as one site says<\/a>, it’s based on pure, unadulterated bunkum:<\/p>\n

The underlying theory of NAET suggests that allergies develop due to energy blockages, and that allergies can be eliminated by addressing these energy blockages through acupressure treatment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The official NAET site<\/a>\u00a0even claims they can sure autism by this method. That’s\u00a0irresponsible! It’s just another loony New Age pseudo-medical-magic technique designed to lure money from the wallets of the gullible, which the practitioners cheerfully acknowledge:<\/p>\n

One challenge of using NAET is that it is inconvenient, often requiring a large number of office visits. Based on a recent survey of NAET patients, some reported needing 50 or more office visits to resolve one allergy symptom. Another challenge of using NAET is that the allergy may return some time after the treatment is finished.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Fifty<\/em> visits and your allergy may still return? At how much a visit? So how does this compare to\u00a0the cost of\u00a0a box of over-the-counter allergy medicine which works effectively within a couple of hours? A fool and his money, as they say…<\/p>\n

And then there’s her other practice: “CEASE Therapy.” CEASE stands for “Complete Elimination of Autistic Spectrum Expression” and is more homeopathic pseudoscience claptrap. It’s supposed to cure autism by magic. The inventor of this nonsense writes on his website<\/a>:<\/p>\n

…autism is an accumulation of different causes and about 70% is due to vaccines, 25% to toxic medication and other toxic substances, 5% to some diseases.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This was magnificently debunked on the Science Blogs website<\/a> back in 2012, so I won’t repeat his effort. Worth a read, though. And that whole vaccines-cause-autism thing has been so thoroughly discredited that only someone who’s been brain dead these past five years doesn’t know that the anti-vaccine studies were faked.<\/p>\n

The bottom line about all of this stuff is that it’s quackery<\/strong>, all of it.*<\/span> But lets get back to Grace’s save-the-oceans campaign.<\/p>\n

Grace’s letter to fellow wingnuts is reprinted on the Quackometer website<\/a>, but it takes a bit of research to figure out just what she’s proposing. What is a “Leuticum (Syph) in the CM potency” supposed to be? For that I had to surf over to the Skeptophilia website<\/a>. And it turns out, it’s wackier than you ever imagined:<\/p>\n

And what is “Leuticum,” you may be wondering? According to a homeopathy website, Leuticum is a “nosode” — a “remedy” made from diluted bodily discharges. And if you’re not sufficiently disgusted yet, the bodily discharge involved in Leuticum is infected material from someone with syphilis.\u00a0Oh, but wait! Leuticum is good stuff! According to the site, it’s useful for treating people who:<\/p>\n