It is here that I face a difficult question, but one that I believe, I have a decent answer for. It has been observed that conventional medicine has historically taken a theory derived from a scientific principle and made a treatment out of it, while nearly all forms of alternative medicine have a heritage of someone discovering a treatment that worked and developing a theory that explained it. Which is more scientific? Well, technically the former. The scientific process, which is the gold standard of western thought, dictates that you must declare a hypothesis before the test and subsequently form a theory. This is an important rule and departure from it could lead to a great deal of wackiness and the justification of all kinds of things. But, the fact remains that acupuncture homeopathy, balneotherapy (spa treatment), chiropractic manipulation, etc. really do work regardless of historical or philosophical background.
It is easy to dismiss and say that's it's all due to the placebo effect and the hypochondriacs who come to alternative practitioners will believe anything their told, and perhaps there is some truth to that. I would like to interject that nearly all such patients only arrive at the doors of an alternative clinic because conventional medicine has failed to recognize their ailment, be it psychologically induced or not. Perhaps a caring listener who gives the patient the confidence to believe she will get better is all that a lot people need. But, I would argue that there is a great deal more to these healing methods that.
There exists great difficulty in studying many of these methods because their approach is holistic, meaning they treat a person as a whole functional unit, whereas a drug isolates a single biochemical pathogens and just kills it which is much easier to test, alternative methods treat a human being. In other words, how would you test a homeopathic remedy when two people with the same diagnoses gets two different homeopathic treatments? How do you conduct a blind clinical trial of acupuncture (the control group might notice the lack of needles)? How do you fake a spinal manipulation? etc. My point is that conventional scientific methods are not easily adaptable to alternative modalities.
It is important to remember that many scientific theories have been rejected for lack of evidence only to be later vindicated. One such example of that is Rikli's "light and air baths" which he profusely advocated. Little did he know two hundred years ago the now well documented and scientific evidence for the benefits of Vitamin D. So my challenge to the scientific community is that we not be guilty of scientific bigotry, but step up to the challenge before us. Let's endever to understand the science of vitality and the art of healing in the many ways in which we find it happening.
