It’s the Shaking, Stupid

From The Quackometer I learn of the latest hilarious homeopathic complaints against the reality based community. Recent homeopaths’ letters to the Grauniad, include this previously unnoticed fundamental flaw in Ben Goldacre's reasoning:

Goldacre seems to think that homeopathic remedies are prepared by diluting substances. He omits the critical component of shaking ('succussion') between serial dilutions without which they would, indeed, be merely water rather than potentised substances.

Well of course – I see it now. Shaking.  Because without the shaking after each dilution, homeopathy would be patently ridiculous.  But now it makes perfect sense. Why didn’t they say so before? It’s shaking as well! Thanks for clearing that up.

You know, I think this argument proves one thing, namely that if homeopaths’ complaints were distributed according to homeopathic dilutions, they might actually be stronger.

Or less weak, anyway.

Maybe.

Comments

[Techskeptic]

Holy crap thats funny!

That must be why you must buy new solutions when you run low instead of diluting it down yourself, and having a stronger batch for free.

[Tom S. Fox]

What I wonder is, don't these people realize that the water we drink every day comes from sewage treatment plants?
I mean, you can put one and one together and come to the conclusion that, if all this homeopathy stuff were true, tap water would be really disgusting.

Oh wait, I forgot! The diluted substance has the opposite effect! Silly me!

[_Arthur]

How much research have been done in the most effective way of succussing ?

Is it up and down, right and ledt, north and south ?
23 times or 123 times ? Do you need to say a prayer, or just to focus your thought in bestowing healing powers to the water ?

Can you use a paint shaker (a paint succusser ?), does it works better by machine or by hand ?

Is the efficacity proportional to the number of times it's succussed ? If you shake it only one time, does that work ?

Inquiring minds want to know.
I guess Hanneman did all that basic research.

[genewitch]

i needed this laugh before bed, skeptico. well linked!

And Arthur, not to be a pedant - it's "efficacy"

[Tom Foss]

Is the efficacity proportional to the number of times it's succussed ? If you shake it only one time, does that work?

Hm...applying homeopathic justifications, it would seem that it's most powerful when you've done the least amount of shaking. So I don't know why these folks are complaining. Let's shake it once, to satisfy the shaking requirement, and then give the patients the most potent medicine!

[Mark]

Arthur - you can't use stodgy old scientific methodology for something like that. The way to succuss is for each person to 'feel' the right way to do it, otherwise the negative energy will destroy the positive forces flowing in the tapwater.

[Techskeptic]

I wonder if the homeopathy companies actually do the shaking part. Or do they know that they are just selling water and not bother with it to increase profits. Do they even bother with the dilution? Or do they just put water and sugar into some pretty colored glass with labels? Has anyone actually checked?

[Captain Al]

So if I were a terrorist I could put a couple of drops of strychnine in the river rapids upstream from a town's water supply and presto, the whole town's water supply is poisoned. Oops, I hope I haven't given them any ideas.

[Moxiequz]

"So if I were a terrorist I could put a couple of drops of strychnine in the river rapids upstream from a town's water supply and presto, the whole town's water supply is poisoned."

hahaha...Of course not silly. There's no way you could shake that entire river! And, as we all now know, shaking - excuse me, 'succussion' - is what makes homeopathy work!

[_Arthur]

"So if I were a terrorist I could put a couple of drops of strychnine in the river rapids upstream from a town's water supply and presto, the whole town's water supply is poisoned."

Captain Al, you got it backwards: strychnine is a perfectly correct nosode, so it would _cure_ the townspeople, not make them sick.

Anyways, the rapids won't provide a proper succussion. Remember, it is the shaking that provide the magik, not the mere dilution.

Many homeopaths contends that a glass container is essential for the succussion to work, with the speculative hypothesis that the water memory aggegate around tiny fragments of silica.

I'm not certain what amount of research has been done around that hypothesis.

But if you see an homeopath prepare his nostrum in a plastic container, be sure to denounce him as a quack.

[_Arthur]

Techskeptic, to answer your question, there's a raging debate in homeopathic circles on the proper way to dilute.

I heard that the "German Way" is to succuss the container, then dump the contents, fill it with pure water, succuss, and pour it away again. The dilution is provided by the droplets that cling to the sides of the glass container.

In you dilute too far, say 200CH, I suppose you just have to dilute it to prevent it to become too potent, although there's never any risk of side effects anyways.

[Skeptico]

Regarding strychnine etc:

According to homeopaths, homeopathic strychnine wouldn’t poison people because dilution makes the bad attributes diminish, but strengthens the good ones. How it knows which is which, is not explained.

[_Arthur]

All homeopathic remedies are based on (diluted) poisons.

Hanneman the Law of Similars, "likes cure like", by taking an overdose of Chinchona bark, and observing that it caused sweat and tremors, just like malaria, for whick Chinchona was a known cure.

From that master experiment, Hannemann developped the tenets of his medecine. I'm not sure if he ever came up with a successful cure for Malaria, which was his objective. I heard homeopatic malaria remedies are being sold, with the caveat to also take clhoroquine or other medicaments as prescribed by a real doctor.

So, if strychnine causes muscles spasms and convulsions, properly diluted (and succussed) strychnine should be the perfect cure for cramps.

According to Wikipedia, common poisons used for Homeopatic water nostrus are Natrum muriaticum (salt), Lachesis muta (viper venom), Oscillococcinum (rotten duck liver), Arsenic, Belladona, etc...

[Bronze Dog]

If you want to poison the town, you'll need to take something that would cure poison and dilute that. Like take a homeopathic snake bite cure and dilute that.

...Wait.

[Captain Al]

Looks like I have a lot to learn about being a homeopathy terrorist. What if there was an earthquake after I dumped in the poison (or anti-poison)? Would that shake it up enough? :)

[valhar2000]

Well, you know... maybe we should be promoting Homeopathy in the Middle East. Imagine what would have happened if the 9/11 kooks had attempted to dilute the crashes in order to make stronger...

[Yojimbo]

Wait a minute? Shouldn't the water in a homeopathic remedy make you dehydrated? And shouldn't taking less of it make the condition worse? So, here's a question - can you may a homeopathic cure for dehydration?

[pv]

And so ends this week's episode of "The Homeopathy Story". Written by Lewis Carroll and starring Alice Liddell as Alice, Theophilus Carter as the Mad Hanneman...

[Chayanov]

I suppose jumping up and down while not drinking water would be a homeopathic cure for dehydration. But if you jump too much, you might risk drowning your kidneys.

[Crispin]

I have a theory about the development of homeopathy. Initially the "law of similars" seems to make some sense. If the processes of the body induce a particular response to an ailment, that response is in some cases an attempt by the body to return to homeostasis. Thus Hahnemann's "law" seems to make sense as it is a manual inducement of a similar biological state that can help the body fight the illness. So initially we have some medical tests and studies in this area published in early works like "Materia Medica Pura". But then things seem to take a diversion. High doses of the substances might cause illness (there are some truly horrid things given to people and some truly horrible reactions documented in Materia Medica Pura) so we'll give them less dosage. Over time this becomes less and less and "succussion" and excessive dilution becomes the norm. Could this be some level of economic greed perverting the development of the medicine? Without any double blind trials, and with the strength of the pacebo effect, maybe some 'enterprising' individual (Hahnemann?) along the way figures he can make a packet by basically selling water. And compared to some of the other medical practices of the day (like blood letting), drinking water would probably be a better course of action, and so would seem in comparison to be an effective treatment. So that's my theory. In an age of ignorance about the causes of disease, an enterprising individual makes a packet selling water as a cure.

[HCN]

Crispin, that is an idea. Though Hahnemann may have been more influenced by a philosophy of that day where science is what you "think up", not what you get through real experimentation.

And it does not excuse the bawlderization of real science in the 21st century by the modern day homeopaths (where is is actually treated more like a religous cult than a medical science).

This is an interesting online book:
HOMEOPATHY IN PERSPECTIVE: MYTH AND REALITY

From page 65: "Homeopathy is an inspired science, which is the only true kind of science; all the rest is mere opinion."

[lalit]

I find the above comments by all very ridiculous.
Homeopathy has been used for a long time now. I would say let the world be, unless it is actually affecting your businesses and you dont like it - do you?

[Tom Foss]

I find the above comments by all very ridiculous.

I find it ridiculous that you clearly haven't read any of the above comments.

Homeopathy has been used for a long time now.

So has trepanation. "Old" and "works" are not synonyms.

I would say let the world be, unless it is actually affecting your businesses and you dont like it - do you?

Ah, yes. Because something is only wrong if it directly affects you. Evil doesn't triumph when good men do nothing; if you don't speak up for the Jews and the Trade Unionists, I'm sure there'll be someone left to speak up for you.

Charlatans lying to people with real medical illnesses and trading them fake medicine for real money is evil, whether or not it's happening to me (or "my business"). And, color me crazy, but I don't think it's okay to let evil go unchecked.

[Skeptico]

Lalit

I find your comment very ridiculous.

We have known or a long time now that homeopathy doesn’t work. I would say point out its flaws, unless it is actually affecting your businesses and you don’t like the loss in your revenue.

Is that your objection?