Homeopathy in Times Higher Education 2013 and the Naturopathillogical

here, I cite from and comment upon recent reporting in the UK regarding science and homeopathy [see 001., below]; then, speaking of homeopathy and higher education, I illustrate 'North American higher education homeopathy false labeling' [see 002., below]:

001. timeshighereducation.co.uk states in "MP Triggers Homeopathy Dispute at Science Committee" (2013-03-12; my comments are in unquoted bold):

"[as reported by Paul Jump] addressing the Commons Science and Technology Committee [...] Sir John Beddington [...] the government’s outgoing chief scientific advisor [...] rejected a suggestion by [committee member!] Conservative MP David Tredinnick [that Wiki article points out that DT supports medical astrology, no lie!...and] prominent supporter of homeopathy [...] that, given its 'widespread use' around the world, more scientific 'effort' should be expended on investigating how homeopathy works [...stating] there is no case for further scientific investigation into the 'manifestly nonsensical' mechanism by which homeopathy is supposed to work [...that homeopathy is] 'manifestly nonsensical in terms of the underlying science' [...and does] not merit further investigation [...]";

hear, hear.  Since homeopathy is known NOT to work, there is NO mechanism to investigate.  So many people CAN be wrong.  Scientist versus politician, interesting.  By the way, the big-heavy-lifting was done in 2009 in the UK.

"Sir John [...] suggested that homeopathy supporters who believed their rejection of common scientific opinion would ultimately be proved right had, like climate change skeptics [aka DENIERS], fallen for the 'Galileo fallacy' [...]";

reminds me of one of my favorite Carl Sagan quotes, to paraphrase, 'sure they laughed at Galileo, but they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.'

002 meanwhile, in naturopathyland, homeopathy is QUITE falsely labeled a clinical science on the naturopathy board exam [see its page 6]:

there [page 2], of course, we are assured that naturopathy, as higher education, is accredited:

"an approved naturopathic medical program is a program that has accreditation or pre-accreditation from the Council on Naturopathic Medical Education (CNME) and offers a minimum four-academic-year, in-residence curriculum in biomedical science and clinical didactic studies, as well as clinical (experiential) training leading to an N.D. degree (U.S.) or diploma (Canada)."  

ah, the APPROVED biomedical science curriculum that leads to homeopathy nonsense.

the root "scien" occurs in that pdf 47 times!   And, of course, there's the AANP telling us that homeopathy is a science, to this day continuing the racket.

and by the way, recently in NDNR, NCNM's PhD President wrote in "Literacy + Numeracy + Health Literacy = the New Hidden Curriculum" (2013-02):

"graduate school 'entrance' competition examinations [much like the NPLEX as a gateway to licensure], despite their being field specific, seek not only content knowledge, but also scan for strong literacy, numeracy, and critical thinking skills."

oh where or where art thou scientific literacy, NPLEX?  While all the while, NCNM's principles page is abjectly illiterate in terms of science, falsely labeling the patently science-ejected as able to survive scientific scrutiny "in fact".

this is the naturoPATHillogical at its finest.

Changelog 2013-03-10 and ND Video

here, I summarize recent additions to my public naturopathy database.  I also link to an ND's video each changelog, quote from, and tag the video in some detail: 

001. added:

the vitalism of:

ND Brannick;

ND Brandeis;

to Appendix B.05.i.a.05.;

ND Campbell;

to Appendix B.05.i.bb01.;

ND Chanderbhan;

ND Churchill;

ND Chow;

to Appendix B.05.i.bb02.;

ND MacDonald;

NDs Mammone;

 to Appendix B.05.i.d.02.;

Medscape;

to Appendix B.04.b.;

the Naturopathic Medical Student Association

to Appendix B.02.; 

ND Steelsmith;

to Appendix B.05.i.i.03.; 

ND Theriault;

to Appendix B.05.i.k.;

the science claims of:

the AANP;

to Appendix I.02.; 

ND Beaty;

to Appendix I.05.b.;

ND Colicci; 

ND Czeranko;

to Appendix I.05.c.;

ND Fainstat; 

ND Fleck;

to Appendix I.05.e.; 

ND Hannan; 

NDs Holk and White;

ND Henderson;

to Appendix I.05.g.; 

the Naturopathic Medical Student Association

to Appendix I.02.;

ND Rose;

to Appendix I.05.n.;

the University of Bridgeport;

to Appendix I.01.a8.;

the University of Bridgeport in the Connecticut Post;

to Appendix I.07.01.;

the 'naturopathy is not science, is pseudoscience and / or quackery' claim of:

MD Crislip;
 JD Bellamy; 

both of sciencebasedmedicine.org 

to Appendix K.00.;

002. video of the week link [not to pun]:

Steelsmith, L. (ND Bastyr 1993) in 'Change Your Attitude, Change Your Life with Joan Herrmann' "Dr. Laurie Steelsmith: Natural Health Choices"(2012)[vsc 2013-03-10; my comments are in unquoted bold]:
.

.

tags: #NDSteelsmith #qi #chi #vitalism #lifeforce #vitalforce #TCM #detox #incrediblepromises #acupuncture #allopathic #expertiseclaim

.

"[host] Dr. Steelsmith is a leading spokesperson on natural medicine [...] the book is 'Natural Choices For Women's Health' [...]";

ah, leading natural medicine spokesperson.  I guess that means the contents here I'll be sharing has a little more weight?  Here's the book, (ISBN 140004796X 978-1400047963), this video mentions, at Amazon.  Unfortunately, it is not searchable there, but, a used copy can be had for about $7 shipped. 

"[host] you say that our body has the power to heal itself [...LS] your body has an incredibly innate ability to not only heal from a cut but actually to heal from most of the things that you may be suffering from [...] by supporting these ten different organs in our bodies we can resolve many of these common health issues [...] symptoms that our bodies give us are really our bodies' wisdom [...] that something is out of balance [...] energy, people want more energy, they want more vitality [...] ultimately what we need to do, we need to rekindle this powerful life force in them which we call chi.  Chi is from Chinese medicine [...] in my book I have it all outlined for the reader on how they can rekindle this powerful life force.  This powerful life force is a creative force, and it's vitality, and it's the energy that you need to live a happy wonderful life, and have creative energy so you an manifest the things that you want in your life [...] we actually have an innate knowledge on how to heal ourselves [...] ";

ye grand old vitalism at the heart of naturopathy's context.

"acupuncture [...] it works on tapping into a person's body's own life force and their own chi and it helps to redirect that energy [...] it's actually tapping in to the body's own vital force, their own energy [...] to create wellness [...] pushing the body's energy in the right direction [...] it's very beneficial [...] if you have physical and structural issues, it's phenomenal [...] it is a phenomenal form of medicine [...] you want to see someone whose done a three to four year post-graduate program [...] it's just a very effective form of medicine [...]";

ah, quackupuncture, from chi-nese medicine.  Based on science-ejected vitalism, of course, and given this quite absurd label of "phenomenal."  Now, just to point out the equations: healing power = energy = vitality = life force = chi = vital force.  I'd say overall they come from naturopathy subset acupuncture and homeopathy.   A lot of really good science has been done on acupuncture, and the better the study, the more indistinguishable treatment effect is from nontreatment effect.  In other words, it doesn't work beyond a mundane and very weak noxious stimuli effect.  No, not phenomenal, not very effective at all: about as effective as chewing a chili pepper.  And it always amazes me how a graduate-level [she says post-graduate but means graduate-level] supposed masters in science can be so, essentially, hokey, which is what an MS in acupuncture or TCM is.

"I've been doing Chinese medicine for close to twenty years now [...] this medicine was formed thousands of years ago and it still holds true today [...] in fact, a lot of the theories in Chinese medicine are being confirmed by Western research [...] for instance, in Chinese medicine they talk about how the liver stores the blood and blood is a form of chi, and in Western medicine we find that when people are at rest the liver stores most of your body's blood [...]";

TCM holds as true today as alchemy and astrology.  And the example!  I think if your liver was storing "most" of the body's blood...you'd be dead.  'Therefore, she's a duck' kind of logic.  Now, it has been a while since I was in a physiology classroom, but it's the spleen not the liver that stores any noncirculating erythrocytes.  And blood is real, not a fantasy like chi.  Holds true?  I think not.  This is fake physiology posed as "true".

"our livers are so important for detoxification [...] why do we need to detoxify? [...] if we don't take the garbage out of our bodies, things get pretty uncomfortable and often will manifest in all kinds of rashes and headaches and digestive disturbances etc. [...] detox is super-important [...] in my book I have an extensive cleanse people can do, one for the liver one for the digestive system [...]";

detox is considered a scam. 

"[host] doctor what is naturopathic medicine? [...LS] we are trained physicians.  We go to accredited medical school .  Naturopathic medicine focuses on treating the underlying cause of disease. It utilizes medicines that help to stimulate the bodies own healing process, it doesn't just suppress symptoms [...]";

I think if you are basing your medicine on invisible, underlying, science-ejected forces...then you are actually, more correctly, a metaphysician and not a physician.  And NDs go to naturopathic school, not medical school.  Suppression, which is a typical accusation naturopaths make regarding regular medicine, specifically refers to harming that imaginary vital force and its detoxification pathways.

"naturopathic medicine and holistic medicine when it is practiced as naturopathic physicians, we are not interested in saying you can never take an allopathic or traditional Western medicine [...] we are blending the best of both worlds [...] often there's a misconception that our training is suboptimal [...] or that we don't really go to accredited medical colleges [...] in fact we actually have a four year post graduate training [...] we've got the medical knowledge [...] allopathic or traditional Western medicine [...] our depth of knowledge [...]";

I'm marinating in the irony, presently. 

"food really is our medicine [...]";

no it's not.  Food is as much medicine as chi is energy!  Food matters but medicine is medicine, food is food, or you'd need a prescription for a banana.

"and what I call mind-spirit [...]";

of course, the mind is a supernatural occurrence? Tell that to the whole field of modern psychology, which bases itself on methodological naturalism.

"you want to eat organic food [...]";

organic is not justified.

ND Kellum in NDNR 2013: "A Spiritually Based Medical Science" is the Answer to Naturopathy's Present Crisis (Science Subset Supernaturalism!)

here, I quote from a Naturopathic Doctor News and Review [NDNR] series by ND Kellum which ran 2012-11 to 2013-02 wherein: the author speaks of the vitalistic-supernatural basis of naturopathy [see 001., below], and then argues that science must include such science-exterior untestables [see 002., below]. Then, I point out that such epistemic conflation is right up naturopathy's alley, by way of the ND's alma mater, NCNM [see 003., below].  Finally, I cite from national science standards regarding how science actually is done in order to legitimately be science [see 004., below]:

001. ye old vitalism-supernaturalism!  Now, often we get naturopathy subset vitalism and spiritism in a sort of separate shopping list of principles, but, Kellum here illustrates how naturopathy's vitalistic animatism is truly a form of supernaturalism-spiritism.  In fact, I usually term it vfs, "vital force spirit."  ND Kellum (ND NCNM 2004) writes:

001.a. in "The Current Healing Crisis: Naturopathic Medicine and the Curative Value of Anthroposophic Medicine - Part 1" (NDNR 2012-11)[vsc 2013-02-26]:

"human beings have the capability of self-healing [CSH...] the naturopathic concept of 'the vital force' [VF...is] a spiritual restorative capability [SRC] to overcome disease (vis medicatrix naturae) [VMN...with naturopathy's homeopathy's goal] to release the spiritual healing power [SHP] of the remedy and promote the vital force of the patient [...] our profession grows out of a tradition that has spanned centuries in which understanding the spiritual vital forces [SVF] behind substances and illness has been seen as the key to healing [...] the vital force (vis medicatrix naturae) [...is] one of naturopathy’s core and distinguishing concepts [...] the vital force must first and foremost be conceived as a spiritual concept ('spirit' as the animating or vital force [SAVF] underlying life, as in spiritus, or breath) [...this] lie[s] at the root of naturopathic medicine [...]";

it sure does.  So, therein are some equations: CSH = VF = SRC = VMN = SHP = SVF = SAVF.  Nobody would contest that the body can heal itself.  It's a simple fact though that naturopathy has turned that biological observation into an unnecessarily superstitious, supernaturalised, mystical dogma -- a conflation of a kind of spirituality and biology which can historically be called sectarian medicine.

Note: now, oddly enough, this article also cites "Jean M. Tsigonis, MD, Chair, Alaska State Medical Board" who wrote in "a letter written to the Governor of Alaska, dated March 1, 2010":

"the principles of naturopathy are based on the belief that the body is self healing, that the patient’s 'vital force' is restored by ridding the body of toxins. As scientists, we find this simplistic approach to human ailments to be in direct conflict with the science-based knowledge of body physiology and pathology as taught to MDs and DOs [...] all forms of naturopathic education include concepts incompatible with basic science and do not necessarily prepare a practitioner to make appropriate diagnosis or referrals."

what I want to point out here is that his argument is that naturopathy's ideas are not scientific, first and foremost, not that it is simply a turf or guild battle between regular medicine and naturopathy.  The issue first and foremost is epistemic: modern medicine is an applied science, naturopathy's essential contents are actually science-ejected or -refuted!  I think it matters greatly that a medical practitioner use reliable scientific knowledge, and not a Ouija board of mystical, subjective revelation because if I was REALLY sick, I want my practitioner's head in reality and not cloud-cuckoo land.

I'll excerpt more from that MD Tsigonis letter, which is up on the Alaska legislature site:

"Governor Parnell, the Alaska State Medical Board urges you and your colleagues in the legislature to defeat House Bill 282 that creates a 'naturopathic medical board' and gives certain rights and recognitions to naturopaths in Alaska [...citing MD Atwood] 'to be considered a health profession, an occupation must be able to demonstrate an objective, scientific, and ethical basis. Naturopathy fails to meet this standard' [...] the public will not be served."

agreed.  What ND Kellum will argue for is easing the rigors needed in order to be scientific knowledge: that supernatural beliefs that cannot be tested and are not needed to explain any data that actual science produces can be absurdly labeled science in this day and age.  So, in large measure, we are asked to pose as objective fact things that cannot be supported by evidence.  'Close your eyes and imagine' is equated with 'look at the world and figure out how it works.'

001.b. in "The Current Healing Crisis -- Part 2: Why Anthroposophically Enhanced Medicine?" (NDNR 2012-12)[vsc 2013-02-28]:

"the vital force [...] this etheric body [EB] is what Paracelsus termed the archaeus [A],  what Hahnemann called the vital force [VF], and what Lindlahr knew as the 'constructive principle' [CP...] the etheric life forces of nature [ELFN...] neural transmission ('qi') [NT, Q...] whether we use the term archaeus, as Paracelsus did, or our term, the etheric body [...] our etheric body like the archaeus of Paracelsus [...] the extra-terrestrial forces associated with the archaeus [ETFAA...] 'vital force' and 'spirits of life' [SL...]";

more equations: EB = A = VF = CP = ELFN = NT = Q = ETFAA = SL.  I'm especially loving the exta-terrestrial, as anthroposophy is rather cosmic.  How this enhances medical knowledge I've no idea.

001.c. in "The Current Healing Crisis – Part 3: Healing as a Spiritual Process" [vsc 2013-02-28]:

"our historical romance with the vital force is a doorway to this kind of practice [...] as the vital force of past conceptions, it is the etheric body [...] a vibrant living vital force, or etheric body [...]";

hardcore anthroposophy.  And yes, the title of that entry is "healing is a spiritual process"  My skeptical retort: prove it.  Oh, I forgot: you're saying science no longer requires evidence, so therein doesn't have to fight that fight, that basically I'm to take as real your imagined claims based on the authority of your conviction.

001.d. in "The Current Healing Crisis—Part 4: Science is Not Monolithic" [vsc 2013-02-28]:

"there is an animating spiritual force behind the order in all systems [...]";

well, I don't know how you get to that conclusion from science.  How did you get BEHIND things?  Such is an article of faith that has no scientific data to back it up and no phenomena to explain.

002. that ND Kellum meta-science [by which I mean BEYOND science] design:

002.a. in "The Current Healing Crisis: Naturopathic Medicine and the Curative Value of Anthroposophic Medicine - Part 1" (NDNR 2012-11)[vsc 2013-02-26]:

"[naturopathy] has been so pressured under allopathic criticism as 'pseudoscience' [...via] the Western science paradigm [...]";

actually, allopathy is a nonsensical label for modern medicine.  Unfortunately, MD Tsigonis used the term along with osteopathy, too, but, anyhoo...  Science may be historically Western but that's irrelevant as to why its rigors must be relaxed to allow for fairies under the garden, magic beans, and unicorn tears.  And paradigm is just one of those added obfuscating layers that elaborate on NOTHING: why not say 'model' or 'methodology.'

"the answer to this question must ultimately come not from more torturous and authoritarian elaborations of becoming 'more scientific' but from a living vision we bring to the very conception of what science is [...] a scientific paradigm that expands on our identity [...] a nature-based holistic science [...]";

ah, there we go.  The request that the goal posts be moved closer!  That subjective, unverifiable, untestable, unfalsifiable ideas aka the supernatural / figmentations / subjective imagings / the metaphysical be permitted to be called 'science' / and absurdly therein objectively 'in-evidence.'  That to me is the ultimate authoritarianism. And holistic is about as useful as the word paradigm.  It always severely interests me how "nature-based" is essentially supernatural-based, and science subset natural is therein nonscience, for naturopathy.  It's as though categories are not allowed: evidence equals no-evidence, subjective equals objective, sense equals nonsense.  As I've often said, regarding this absurd expansion of what legitimately is science: in naturopathy, science is the sword of sectarianism and naturopathy is the reversal of all values.

"Western materialist science [...] a narrowly defined scientific culture [...] we need our own vision of science [...] a higher science [...] a spiritually based medical science [...] the science of the spirit [...] a science of naturopathic medicine that is anthroposophically enhanced [...]";

ND Kellum is upset that true science only supports the actual physically present in-evidence universe and not the universes of our fondest idealistic, metaphysical and religious wishes. I don't see how anyone benefits from a relaxation of the rigors that entail 'scientific knowledge production' except for fringe groups with fringe ideas then content that others are now sharing their fantasies as supposedly objectively in-evidence.  I'm all for freedom of conscience, and freedom to practice or not practice faith methods and knowledge, but please, enough with the conflation of science and religion, of evidence and faith.  They are categorically reasonably different things and have been for a few hundred years.  The Church may have wanted the Earth to be the center of the universe...but it isn't.  And it's absurd to argue that we need to return to the now-apparent ignorance of that science-ejected claim.

002.b. in "The Current Healing Crisis -- Part 2: Why Anthroposophically Enhanced Medicine?" (NDNR 2012-12)[vsc 2013-02-28]:

"the science of ancient traditions [...]";

there is this simple fact: science isn't ancient.  The knowledge humankind had before science began developing in the 1600s is PRESCIENTIFIC.  Some of it was right and useful, but until it is scientifically tested and survives such rigor, it isn't science.

002.c. in "The Current Healing Crisis – Part 3: Healing as a Spiritual Process" (NDNR 2013-01)[vsc 2013-02-28]:

"the spiritual science of Steiner [...]";

no thanks.

002.d. in "The Current Healing Crisis—Part 4: Science is Not Monolithic" (NDNR 2013-02) [vsc 2013-02-28]:

"we are already immersed in religion in the present form of 'science' that we have today [...] science itself today celebrates a religion [...] what we know as modern science today. Our science, then, is a construction of a particular political, economic, and religious persuasion [...]";

here we have postmodernist epistemic nihilism visit us finally!  Science is not a religion, period: "there's no one who's views are not subject to question."

"the word science, on the other hand, comes to us from the Latin root scientia, 'knowledge,' and from sciens (present perfect of scire, 'to know') as originally meaning 'to separate one thing from another, to distinguish,' as related to scindere, 'to cut, divide' [...]";

oooo, a history and etymology lesson!  My irony meter is getting into the red.  As I see it, "scientia" now has a specific meaning in the sense of modern science, and ONCE meant 'any kind of knowledge.'  For a point of view that seeks to unnecessarily blend / conflate, it is rather amusing that we are now hearing from ND Kellum about distinguishing / analysis!

"we need a science that sees the establishment of scientific knowledge as a creative process [...] we need a medical science that is integrative [...] an integrated spiritual science [...]";

I'd argue that what is really being desired isn't "a creative process" but 'an imagined context not subject to objective verification.'  The implementation of the scientific method can be quite a creative process towards understanding reality.  Integrative simply means to blend or conflate, and science blended with what actual science holds as exterior to science is NONSENSE.

003. at NCNM and AANP:

as I've pointed out on this blog time and time again, naturopathy already has accommodated such an epistemic or knowledge-type conflation, wherein, such as at NCNM, that which is not-science-for-decades-and-centuries [vitalism, supernaturalism, homeopathy...] is falsely labeled, at AANP, as 'able-to-survive-rigorous-scientific-scrutiny.'

004.  national science standards and supernaturalism:

the National Institutes of Health and National Institute of General Medical Sciences in partnership with the BSCS Center for Curriculum Development writes in "Doing Science: The Process of Scientific Inquiry" (2005; ISBN 1929614209):

"according to the NSES [the National Science Education Standards], 'explanations of how the natural world changes based on myths, personal beliefs, religious values, mystical inspiration, superstition, or authority may be personally useful and socially relevant, but they are not scientific' [...] testable questions are not answered by personal opinions or belief in the supernatural [...] science excludes supernatural explanations and personal wishes [...] questions that cannot be answered through scientific investigation are those that relate to personal preference, moral values, the supernatural, or unmeasurable phenomena [...] after completing this lesson, students will be able to identify questions that depend on personal preferences or moral values, or that relate to the supernatural or phenomena that cannot be measured [...] try to elicit the following characteristics of questions that are not scientifically testable: their answers depend on personal preference, their answers depend on moral values, they relate to the supernatural, they relate to phenomena that cannot be measured [...] questions should not relate to personal beliefs, moral values, or the supernatural [...] testable questions do not relate to the supernatural [x3...] or to nonmeasurable phenomena."

perhaps science, in some regards ND Kellum, IS MONOLITHIC!  For one thing, science is naturalistic, not supernaturalistic.  So, I'd basically argue, ND Kellum has NO legitimate DATA because he hasn't MEASURED anything.  How could you measure an invisible, immaterial, spiritual entity or force BEHIND things reliably?  And how could something be called supernatural at all if it ends up behaving as a component of the natural world as measured in that way?  Therein, there's no data to explain with supernaturalism!  Therein, his argument isn't from within science at all.  It is religious rhetoric, of a kind.  Appealing to the supernatural under the label science to me is like showing up to bat at a baseball game dressed and equipped as an Olympic archer.

and that's a solution to what?  I think usually people do respect others' right to believe or not believe various articles of faith of their own choosing, acknowledging that science is a different kind of knowledge, and such articles of faith are private matters.  The conflation of science and religion, though -- as ND Kellum's writings are, obviously -- to me results in an unjustifiable form of thought-muddle thuggery.  Imagine the consequences: blood pressure measured by Ouija board, etc.

Note: by the way, here's what NDs/NMDs say about NDNR, according to NDNR:
 

“NDNR is a solid publication with well-written and well-researched articles [...] a source of intelligent pragmatic advice for practitioners of naturopathic medicine [...] the extensive spectrum of medical topics covered is sustained by the underlying principles of naturopathic medicine coupled with modern scientific methodologies and enduring naturopathic techniques. It’s like having a naturopathic medical education delivered to you on a monthly basis! [...] NDNR is an innovative, peer-reviewed publication with high standards of evidence by some of the best doctors we have [...] you give a realistic presentation of our naturopathic fabric."