From: turpin@cs.utexas.edu (Russell Turpin)
Newsgroups: sci.med
Subject: On pre-scientific traditions of medicine (was: Use of term allopath)
Followup-To: sci.med
Date: 31 Jul 1992 11:04:15 -0500
Organization: U Texas Dept of Computer Sciences, Austin TX
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu
Summary: Millenia of tradition means little.

-*----
In article <1992Jul30.190339.6160@island.COM> green@island.COM (Robert Greenstein) writes:
> What? Untested you say? Chinese and auyervedic medicine have both been
> extensively tested and refined for several thousand years. How much
> more testing do you need? Please don't use the excuse that they were
> not using double-blind experiments. There is enough empirical evidence
> compiled with tens of thousands of observations, that this medicine 
> absolutely works, and not on account of the placebo effect.  
>
> Why is it that most M.D.'s, including the ones on this net seem to be
> unable to even entertain the possibility that other forms of medicine
> have anything worthwhile to contribute? Is this just ethnocentrism, or
> a turf battle?

The better question is this: why do so many whole-hearted
advocates of pre-scientific traditions of medicine refuse to
recognize the advances that have been made in investigating
whether something works? 

Conventional medicine is full of treatments and cures that have
been borrowed from other traditions.  While there are undoubtedly
cases where ethnocentrism has prevented the adoption of some
treatments, it is also the case that western science -- in
contrast to most medical traditions throughout history -- has
greedily turned its eye on other cultures, past and present, to
learn about their treatments and drugs.

But what western science learns when it turns its eye on another
culture's medicine is rarely a straightforward repetition of the
other culture's medical theory.  One of the things such
investigation has discovered is the haphazard results of
pre-scientific traditions.  Many things that have "been
extensively tested and refined for several thousand years" turn
out to be worthless, marginally effective, or effective only for
a small portion of the cases to which they are traditionally
applied.  Moreover, the theories on which many such treatments
are based are wrong.

The problem with pre-scientific medical traditions is not *just*
that their empirical studies were not up to today's standards
(though this is a real problem and not just an "excuse"), but
more generally, that their theoretical understanding of empirical
investigation and its importance is insufficient.  For example,
medieval physicians saw no need to study what arteries did,
because they relied on the ancient Greek physicians who told them
this.  Thus, in the west, circulation of the blood was not
discovered until Harvey did his experiments in the 17th century.
Two millenia of tradition was wrong about a very simple and very
important anatomical fact. 

If you want us to take traditional Chinese medicine at face
value, don't give us a bunch of bullshit about millenia of
tradition and observation.  Instead, tell us the basic
experiments that show the existence of "qi".  Tell us what it is.
Tell us its empirical characteristics.  Tell us how it interacts
with other things.  Tell us how we will recognize it.  Tell us
which organs create it, and which organs use it.  Tell us how to
detect it and measure it.  And if millenia of tradition are built
around a basic theory that is wrong, don't expect anyone with a
grain of sense to accept -- without further testing -- that what
it says about some treatment is right.

Russell
Newsgroups: sci.med