As far as I can tell, most medicine is by guess and by golly. It's an art, not a science. There has been a lot of progress in the last 100 or so years, but even so it is pretty much a matter of seeing what works. Medical doctors are also incredibly arrogant given how little they know.
There is nothing wrong with leaving a space for "alternative" medicine; au contraire, it is a good potential resource for ideas and techniques that one might not otherwise come across or develop. It's probably a bad idea to overregulate this stuff as well, and I think we do. What's wrong with testing and requiring disclosure, then letting people do what they they like?
I am not sure that there is a particular association of "alternative medicine" and "the left." Maybe with the "counterculture," if that still exists, but maybe it does more than the left does.
jks
--- Michael Dawson -PSU <mdawson at pdx.edu> wrote:
> Amen, Doug, on all fronts. The only interesting
> question in all this is
> which is worse: the deception and exploitation of
> sick people or the
> immense damage done to the left by these kooks. One
> half expects to someday
> discover that "alternative medicine" was an FBI
> project launched to
> embarrass us and drive away droves of potential
> comrades who flip on WBAI
> (or KBOO here in Portland, OR), expecting to gain
> some new insights, only to
> find psychopathic megalomaniacs peddling snake oil
> and UFO theories.
>
> If acupuncture worked by anything other than its
> ritualized
> exoticism/placebo effect, the be a corporate
> "Needles 'R Us" on every street
> corner. Same goes for all the weed dusts that pass
> as alternative
> medicines.
>
> It'll be a great day when the left is strong enough
> to kick these yahoos off
> our radio stations.
>
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