Time Immortal

Nicholas writes in again with a follow-up comment to something I said to him in this article. In a rare break from tradition, this response is addressed directly to Nicholas, instead of the the good Reader in general.

You’re mistaken, Ken. Individual patients’ conviction that homeopathic remedies helped them are not evidence. Ben Goldacre explains all that more clearly than I could. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/nov/16/sciencenews.g2

Isn’t it rather presumptuous, Nicholas, to assert, to my face, that the fact that I watched Grace — then my girlfriend, now my wife — survive her illness only because she abandoned what could be termed “Western” (or, if you prefer, pharmaceutical) medicine in favour of “naturalistic” remedies is not sufficient reason to accept that there is validity to homeopathic medicine? As I said before, it’s not even a question of belief for me: I watched all manner of pharmaceutical treatments make Grace steadily worse as she struggled to get her illness under control. And after finally exhausting herself trying to get well by what could be called “Western” methods, she took a friend’s advice and went to see a homeopathic doctor instead.

And she got well based on the treatments he suggested.

This wasn’t a “placebo effect” thing on her part — both of us were highly, highly skeptical about naturalistic medicine; she still occasionally likes to joke about her “witch doctor.” But as Chesterton noted, “There are two kinds of charlatan: the man who is called a charlatan, and the man who really is one. The first is the quack who cures you; the second is the highly qualified person who doesn’t.” I still have my reservations about some kinds of homeopathy (the sort that’s bizarre enough to get portrayed on CSI, for example), but there are other kinds I have seen work. And not just in my wife. Additionally, Grace is no longer taking the treatments, nor has she been for quite a while now — her good health cannot even be attributed to ongoing consumption of the remedies. The only reason she is healthy again today is because the homeopathic remedies she was told to try worked for her, and then to such an extent that she only needed to use them for a time (not unlike how pharmaceutical remedies are supposed to work).

I’m not dismissing any of Mr. Goldacre’s criticisms out of hand, but equally I am not dismissing what I have seen for myself. I watched a young woman get to such a point that even she will tell you that she was knocking on death’s door — she is now vibrant, healthy, very much alive, and carrying our first child to term with no detrimental effects to herself. Neither Grace nor I need to “believe” that homeopathy works when it is prescribed with due consideration by a competent medical professional, because we have seen it work. For us, it is out of the realm of belief, and into the realm of what is known.

Nicholas, maybe you have never been so ill that you will try, out of desperation, anything you can in order to get better. Maybe none of your loved ones have ever had to endure what Grace had to endure. And maybe nobody you know has ever tried homeopathic remedies before. To be honest, I do not know; I do not know you, nor the history of your life. But if in fact you have never tried homeopathy, how can you presume to preach to me (someone who has seen it work in the life of his wife) about a lack of evidence?

I realize that your atheism hampers your thinking, but I do hope that you are not so wedded to empiricism as your reply suggests.

I’ll grant that homeopathy doesn’t work for everyone. Equally, you must grant that pharmaceutical medicine does not work for everyone. Both things are especially true if the people prescribing the medicine (if anyone is prescribing it) are not fully competent in both the use of the medicine and its effects, and its applicability to the condition being treated. Conversely, in the hands of someone who “knows their stuff,” both homeopathic remedies and pharmaceutical treatments can be highly effective. This I know, having seen it.