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Homeopathy And Its Kindred Delusions
''Homœopathy and Its Kindred Delusions'' is a work by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., based upon two lectures he gave in 1842, ''Medical Delusions'' and ''Homœopathy''. The work criticizes homeopathy, which he considered to be akin to "astrology, palmistry and other methods of getting a living out of the weakness and credulity of mankind and womankind". It is considered to be a classic text, one of Holmes' most important works, as well as one of the earliest criticisms of homeopathy. Synopsis ''Homeopathy and Its Kindred Delusions'' is composed of two parts. In the first, Holmes explains how the placebo effect can produce false positives, and describes numerous forms of popular but ineffective quackery (including the royal touch, the tractors of Elisha Perkins, and the powder of sympathy Powder of sympathy was a form of sympathetic medicine, current in the 17th century in Europe, whereby a remedy was applied to the weapon that had caused a wound with the aim of healing the inju ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. (; August 29, 1809 – October 7, 1894) was an American physician, poet, and polymath based in Boston. Grouped among the fireside poets, he was acclaimed by his peers as one of the best writers of the day. His most famous prose works are the "Breakfast-Table" series, which began with '' The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table'' (1858). He was also an important medical reformer. In addition to his work as an author and poet, Holmes also served as a physician, professor, lecturer, inventor, and, although he never practiced it, he received formal training in law. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Holmes was educated at Phillips Academy and Harvard College. After graduating from Harvard in 1829, he briefly studied law before turning to the medical profession. He began writing poetry at an early age; one of his most famous works, " Old Ironsides", was published in 1830 and was influential in the eventual preservation of the USS ''Constitution''. Following trai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, movies/videos, moving images, and millions of books. In addition to its archiving function, the Archive is an activist organization, advocating a free and open Internet. , the Internet Archive holds over 35 million books and texts, 8.5 million movies, videos and TV shows, 894 thousand software programs, 14 million audio files, 4.4 million images, 2.4 million TV clips, 241 thousand concerts, and over 734 billion web pages in the Wayback Machine. The Internet Archive allows the public to upload and download digital material to its data cluster, but the bulk of its data is collected automatically by its web crawlers, which work to preserve as much of the public web as possible. Its web archiving, web archive, the Wayback Machine, contains hu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homeopathy
Homeopathy or homoeopathy is a pseudoscientific system of alternative medicine. It was conceived in 1796 by the German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Its practitioners, called homeopaths, believe that a substance that causes symptoms of a disease in healthy people can cure similar symptoms in sick people; this doctrine is called '' similia similibus curentur'', or "like cures like". Homeopathic preparations are termed ''remedies'' and are made using homeopathic dilution. In this process, the selected substance is repeatedly diluted until the final product is chemically indistinguishable from the diluent. Often not even a single molecule of the original substance can be expected to remain in the product. Between each dilution homeopaths may hit and/or shake the product, claiming this makes the diluent remember the original substance after its removal. Practitioners claim that such preparations, upon oral intake, can treat or cure disease. All relevant scientific knowledge about ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Placebo
A placebo ( ) is a substance or treatment which is designed to have no therapeutic value. Common placebos include inert tablets (like sugar pills), inert injections (like Saline (medicine), saline), sham surgery, and other procedures. In general, placebos can affect how patients perceive their condition and encourage the body's chemical processes for relieving pain and a few other symptoms, but have no impact on the disease itself. Improvements that patients experience after being treated with a placebo can also be due to unrelated factors, such as regression to the mean (a statistical effect where an unusually high or low measurement is likely to be followed by a less extreme one). The use of placebos in clinical medicine raises ethical concerns, especially if they are disguised as an active treatment, as this introduces dishonesty into the doctor–patient relationship and bypasses informed consent. While it was once assumed that this deception was necessary for placebos to have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quackery
Quackery, often synonymous with health fraud, is the promotion of fraudulent or ignorant medical practices. A quack is a "fraudulent or ignorant pretender to medical skill" or "a person who pretends, professionally or publicly, to have skill, knowledge, qualification or credentials they do not possess; a charlatan or snake oil salesman". The term ''quack'' is a clipped form of the archaic term ', from nl, kwakzalver a "hawker of salve". In the Middle Ages the term ''quack'' meant "shouting". The quacksalvers sold their wares on the market shouting in a loud voice. Common elements of general quackery include questionable diagnoses using questionable diagnostic tests, as well as untested or refuted treatments, especially for serious diseases such as cancer. Quackery is often described as "health fraud" with the salient characteristic of aggressive promotion. Definition Psychiatrist and author Stephen Barrett of Quackwatch defines quackery "as the promotion of unsubstanti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Touch
The royal touch (also known as the king's touch) was a form of laying on of hands, whereby French and English monarchs touched their subjects, regardless of social classes, with the intent to cure them of various diseases and conditions. The thaumaturgic touch was most commonly applied to people suffering from tuberculous cervical lymphadenitis (better known as scrofula or the King's Evil), and exclusively to them from the 16th century onwards. The disease rarely resulted in death and often went into remission on its own, giving the impression that the monarch's touch cured it. The claimed power was most notably exercised by monarchs who sought to demonstrate the legitimacy of their reign and of their newly founded dynasties. Origins The kings and queens regnant of England and the kings of France were the only Christian rulers who claimed the divine gift (''divinitus'') to cure by touching or stroking the diseased. This special aptitude was thought to be evidence of God's hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elisha Perkins
Elisha Perkins (January 16, 1741September 6, 1799) was a United States physician who created a fraudulent medical device, the Perkins Patent Tractors. Although they were made of steel and brass, Perkins claimed that they were made of unusual metal alloys. Perkins claimed his rods cured inflammation, rheumatism and pain in the head and the face; he applied the points on the aching body part and passed them over the part for about 20 minutes. The device was later the subject of the first placebo research. Biography Elisha Perkins was born 1741 in Norwich, Connecticut. He was educated by his father Joseph Perkins in Plainfield, Connecticut, where he later practiced medicine with success. When the American Revolutionary War broke out, Elisha Perkins served as a surgeon for the Continental Army during the Battle of Bunker Hill in the Siege of Boston. During the late 18th century, the progression of medicine due to the Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment increased the consumer demand fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Powder Of Sympathy
Powder of sympathy was a form of sympathetic medicine, current in the 17th century in Europe, whereby a remedy was applied to the weapon that had caused a wound with the aim of healing the injury it had made. Weapon salve was a preparation, again applied to the weapon, but based on material from the wounded patient rather than on any remedy for the wound. History The powder is said to have consisted of green vitriol, first dissolved in water and afterward recrystallized or calcined in the sun. The Duke of Buckingham testified that Kenelm Digby had healed his secretary of a gangrenous wound by simply soaking the bloody bandage in a solution of the powder (possibly due to the oligodynamic effect). Digby claimed to have got the secret remedy from a Carmelite monk in Florence, and attributed its potency to the fact that the sun's rays extracted the spirits of the blood and the vitriol, while, at the same time, the heat of the wound caused the healing principle thus produced to be at ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anecdotal Evidence
Anecdotal evidence is evidence based only on personal observation, collected in a casual or non-systematic manner. The term is sometimes used in a legal context to describe certain kinds of testimony which are uncorroborated by objective, independent evidence such as notarized documentation, photographs, audio-visual recordings, etc. When used in advertising or promotion of a product, service, or idea, anecdotal reports are often called a testimonial, which are highly regulated in some jurisdictions. When compared to other types of evidence, anecdotal evidence is generally regarded as limited in value due to a number of potential weaknesses, but may be considered within the scope of scientific method as some anecdotal evidence can be both empirical and verifiable, e.g. in the use of case studies in medicine. Other anecdotal evidence, however, does not qualify as scientific evidence, because its nature prevents it from being investigated by the scientific method. Where only one or ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1842 Non-fiction Books
__NOTOC__ Year 184 ( CLXXXIV) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Eggius and Aelianus (or, less frequently, year 937 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 184 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place China * The Yellow Turban Rebellion and Liang Province Rebellion break out in China. * The Disasters of the Partisan Prohibitions ends. * Zhang Jue leads the peasant revolt against Emperor Ling of Han of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Heading for the capital of Luoyang, his massive and undisciplined army (360,000 men), burns and destroys government offices and outposts. * June – Ling of Han places his brother-in-law, He Jin, in command of the imperial army and sends them to attack the Yellow Turban rebels. * Winter – Zha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Literature About Homeopathy
Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include oral literature, much of which has been transcribed. Literature is a method of recording, preserving, and transmitting knowledge and entertainment, and can also have a social, psychological, spiritual, or political role. Literature, as an art form, can also include works in various non-fiction genres, such as biography, diaries, memoir, letters, and the essay. Within its broad definition, literature includes non-fictional books, articles or other printed information on a particular subject.''OED'' Etymologically, the term derives from Latin ''literatura/litteratura'' "learning, a writing, grammar," originally "writing formed with letters," from ''litera/littera'' "letter". In spite of this, the term has also been applied to spoken or s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Medical Books
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness. Contemporary medicine applies biomedical sciences, biomedical research, genetics, and medical technology to diagnose, treat, and prevent injury and disease, typically through pharmaceuticals or surgery, but also through therapies as diverse as psychotherapy, external splints and traction, medical devices, biologics, and ionizing radiation, amongst others. Medicine has been practiced since prehistoric times, and for most of this time it was an art (an area of skill and knowledge), frequently having connections to the religious and philosophical beliefs of local culture. For example, a medicine man would apply herbs and say prayers for healing, o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
