The Cult of the Result
There are two ways to go about "medical" research- either you
a.) try to find out how some system works, and then use that to develop an effective treatment, or you
b.) try to find a treatment that works, and backtrack to an explanation
It seems to me that most of the medical establishment uses (A), and most of the "alternative medicine" people (auras, herbology, magnetics, accupuncture, etc...) use (B).
I just realized that, although I could go into more detail on why B is a dumb approach, if I use any concrete examples, and my friends who believe this crap every stumble across my blog, then I'll wind up offending them. And if there's one thing I've learned about their type, it's that you can't attack their beliefs without them taking it personally, no matter how careful you are.
*sigh*. Imperfect world.
a.) try to find out how some system works, and then use that to develop an effective treatment, or you
b.) try to find a treatment that works, and backtrack to an explanation
It seems to me that most of the medical establishment uses (A), and most of the "alternative medicine" people (auras, herbology, magnetics, accupuncture, etc...) use (B).
I just realized that, although I could go into more detail on why B is a dumb approach, if I use any concrete examples, and my friends who believe this crap every stumble across my blog, then I'll wind up offending them. And if there's one thing I've learned about their type, it's that you can't attack their beliefs without them taking it personally, no matter how careful you are.
*sigh*. Imperfect world.
posted by Colin at
1:49 PM
1 Comments:
Hmm... I can't quite imagine wanting to randomly poke myself with needles hoping it fixed something. :)
Seriously though, I'm not sure medical research can be quite so easily classified. I've heard semi-scientific explantions for accupuncture as to it's stimulation of nerves causing different chemicals to be released by the brain. On the other hand, I wonder how much of our traditional medicine was developed as a result of doctors thourougly understanding the workings of the human body versus trying a variety of techniques and studying what works. Blood letting was at one time quite commonly used after all. :)
By
Laura, at 3:05 PM
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