Homeopathy conference ends in chaos after delegates take hallucinogenic drug

[Martinus]

For the record, my mum is a homeopathy afficionado (she used to practice as a "normal" doctor until her mum died of very painful cancer and she suffered a crisis of "faith" in Western medicine). This is not to say she would use homeopathy to cure cancer, but I see nothing harmful in her reading books on it and taking sugar pills (and feeding them to my dad) when she gets common cold or a bruise.

She certainly does less harm than if she was sending her money to some preacher or church.

http://www.antivaccinebodycount.com/Anti-Vaccine_Body_Count/Home.html

My mom is not an anti-vaxxer.

Okay, here https://sciencebasedpharmacy.wordpress.com/2013/11/23/use-of-homeopathy-kills-child/  Now show me where the act of donating money to a preacher killed someone.

Have you heard of Scott Lively? He uses money collected by his church to lobby for many anti-gay laws around the world, including the infamous "Kill the Gays" bill in Uganda. These laws (and accompanying social attitudes) resulted in deaths of many people.

There are also various preachers who advocate faith healing to the exclusion of normal medicine; and sects that prohibit life saving medical treatments.

[Martinus]

Well it kind of depends upon who the preacher is.

It does not matter what kind of preacher it is.  Marty said giving money to a church, so someone has to be harmed simply by giving money, not how the church spends it.  I can not think of anyone who has died from giving money.

Oh this is just dumb sophistry. Sorry, I forgot I am dealing with a Raz.

[Valmy]

Ok so your statement earlier about Tarot was just inaccurate. If your position is "I would hold someone who avoided responsibility through unjustified dependency on an external factor" then it is neither very problematic nor particularly unique - though not sure why you needed to single out Tarot.

Exactly. And I didn't intend to single out Tarot, I was using it as an example.

[Hamilcar]

Can we just all agree that homeopathy is a pile of championship grade bullshit and leave this thread at that.

[Martinus]

Who knew Marti and I could be more open-minded than the Vster?

Am I known for being open-minded? How nice.

I mean I do all the woo-woo hippie stuff all the time. I do the meditation and do have Tarot Cards and taken readings on things. But you need to understand that stuff is there to feed your irrational mind and to find new ways of looking at things. They themselves have no magical powers.

Than us two hags? I'd think so.

Well I don't really judge on that. If someone wants to take in some hokey spiritual advice to help them make decisions, I don't really mind much.  It isn't like human intuition is some great, infallible source.

Actually, to me Tarot cards and other similar tools are just there to kick-start one's intuition. I think intuition is great, it just gets shouted down by ego too often.

[lustindarkness]

Can we just all agree that homeopathy is a pile of championship grade bullshit and leave this thread at that.

And take it away from people tying to once again show to us how stupid they are?

[garbon]

Ok so your statement earlier about Tarot was just inaccurate. If your position is "I would hold someone who avoided responsibility through unjustified dependency on an external factor" then it is neither very problematic nor particularly unique - though not sure why you needed to single out Tarot.

Exactly. And I didn't intend to single out Tarot, I was using it as an example.

Okay I get it now, but surely you must see there is a difference between the position Marti outlined (and you espouse) and:

"Sure and there is nothing harmful about any other sort of mojo so long everybody is aware it is just mojo. I think Tarot Cards are cool, and enjoy fooling around with them, but I would have contempt for somebody who thought there was actually something magical about them."

That says nothing about a slavish dependence and simply just contempt for said belief in something you think is hooey.

[garbon]

Can we just all agree that homeopathy is a pile of championship grade bullshit and leave this thread at that.

Makes for a dull conversation, no?

[Valmy]

Okay I get it now, but surely you must see there is a difference between the position Marti outlined (and you espouse) and:

"Sure and there is nothing harmful about any other sort of mojo so long everybody is aware it is just mojo. I think Tarot Cards are cool, and enjoy fooling around with them, but I would have contempt for somebody who thought there was actually something magical about them."

That says nothing about a slavish dependence and simply just contempt for said belief in something you think is hooey.

There is a reason I tend to keep my commentary on things here on Languish but that was what I was trying to say.

[Razgovory]

Well it kind of depends upon who the preacher is.

It does not matter what kind of preacher it is.  Marty said giving money to a church, so someone has to be harmed simply by giving money, not how the church spends it.  I can not think of anyone who has died from giving money.

Oh this is just dumb sophistry. Sorry, I forgot I am dealing with a Raz.

I would have thought that a Lawyer would choose his words more carefully and not say things when he means other things.  Focusing on what the preacher does makes a poor comparison because it depends on the action of a third party.  If a doctor treats someone and that person goes on to kill someone, that doesn't mean the doctor is responsible for the murder.  That doesn't make sense.  Likewise giving to a charity (like a church) is not comparable to murder.  Instead the comparison of giving to a charity and a doctor giving out fake medicine seems valid since the central act is transferring something from one party to another.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

Can we just all agree that homeopathy is a pile of championship grade bullshit and leave this thread at that.

I second the motion.

[Valmy]

Yeah it is total nonsense. But I guess if pre-modern pseudo-medicine was going to survive until today in some form we could have done a lot worse.

[Hamilcar]

Yeah it is total nonsense. But I guess if pre-modern pseudo-medicine was going to survive until today in some form we could have done a lot worse.

Like retrophrenology?
http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Retrophrenology

[Martinus]

Okay I get it now, but surely you must see there is a difference between the position Marti outlined (and you espouse) and:

"Sure and there is nothing harmful about any other sort of mojo so long everybody is aware it is just mojo. I think Tarot Cards are cool, and enjoy fooling around with them, but I would have contempt for somebody who thought there was actually something magical about them."

That says nothing about a slavish dependence and simply just contempt for said belief in something you think is hooey.

There is a reason I tend to keep my commentary on things here on Languish but that was what I was trying to say.

[Martinus]

Yeah it is total nonsense. But I guess if pre-modern pseudo-medicine was going to survive until today in some form we could have done a lot worse.

Like retrophrenology?
http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Retrophrenology

I haven't heard about it before, and without opening the link let me guess - is this science believing that you can cause behaviour changes in a person by distorting their skull?