Energy Healing

The thing I'm not getting is that you can convince a person that you've 'healed' them - but what real, presenting problem can you actually fix and how exactly would a low-Chi hamster thank you for your healing?    How would you measure success - apart from a bank balance?

If you had an open mind it would be worth responding. I think I'll simply suggest you do your own research.

complete scam  you will never be able to present credible evidence this ever works  and isn't just the action of the placebo effect

i didnt even look,, why bother ? 

Peter said:

So your argument is hands on healing isn't compatible with a double blind study?

No, my 'explanation' is that by default of description ‘hands on healing’ is as a methodological practice compatible with a double-blind studies, with you 'arguing' that it is not on the basis of imagining that patients must be partitioned from the therapists in order that the patients do not know if they are receiving the treatment or not ~ which would exclude the placebo effect based upon the fact that the patient must believe that they have been treated.

Again but hopefully more informative, double blind studies involve one group of patients being given for example capsules that contain the active ingredient such as a painkiller, and the other group being given capsules that contain no active ingredient ~ usually sugar, so that neither the doctors nor the patients in either group know that they have been given the capsules with the active ingredient in not ~ hence both groups (or cohorts) being ‘blind’ (unaware) about whether they have administered or taken the painkiller in a sugar capsule, or just a sugar capsule.

Peter said:

But why does it have to be hands on? 

Well that is what it is called because of what it involves, just as an oral medicine involves swallowing that type of medicine and injectable medicine involves injecting that type of medicine. Plus those that are not aware of energetic interactions within themselves would not receive the placebo effect from those posing as energetic therapists and just as such placing their hands accordingly.

Peter said:

If its an energy field doing the work mere proximity should be enough.

As explained above the reality of the placebo effect is required, as the patient must know for certain that they have been treated at least with touch ~ hence pharmacological medicines and placebo medicines being given in sugar capsules, as most people like sweetness as establishes a positive experience from taking the placebo tablets.

Peter said:

If the energy field can't extend the few millimetres through a thin barrier how can it extend into the body through the skin?

It is not that healing energy cannot extend from either a few millimetres or from the other side of the world, as with distance healing, but that the patient must know they have been treated with at least the positioning of hands so that the placebo effect and therefore the double blind study actually works ~ and this is so regardless of whether the experimental treatment, what ever it may be, produces the required amount of effect to be proven or disproven as effective.

Peter said:

What if we got two people on their backs, one a genuine patient and one a fake. And then we get in an energy healer and a trained masseuse and have them treat the two 'patients' but the masseuse is merely copying precisely the movements of the healer. Neither the healer or the masseuse would know which was the real patient and the real patient wouldn't know which was the real healer. Why has this experiment not been done in your list?

You cannot measure the effectiveness of a treatment without both groups of patients actually having the same condition ~ such as Leukaemia with white blood-cell platelet numbers returning from low unhealthy levels to normal healthy levels, or not, for instance.

There is also the incredibly large problem that if double-blind studies were in principle carried out as you suggest with fake patients ~ there would in pharmacological trials be risk that fake patient cohorts would not receive the placebo dose, and therefore become sick or possibly even die from receiving an overdose of medication for an illness that they do not have, and thereby also there would be no improvement beyond the placebo effect for the cohort of actual patients ~ suffering from the illness in question.

Due to the original poster being particular unimpressed with the credibility of energy healing being debated and her question not being productively addressed ~ as follows:

Lemon Lady said:

For heavens sake. It's like a Political convention here. I asked one question yet you're having a completely different discussion.

Shut the eff up already!

So if you still need to carry on with this discussion ~ post a link for the new thread below, or else type @ and my username in the new thread, so as not to cause any further distress for the original poster.

see that's a meta study. It doesn't really go into the rigour with which for example, actors follow the methods of the healers. They are kind of like a whole package I expect. Their voices, mannerisms. To the extent its picking up an effect all it may actually be picking up is that people who believe they have special powers are better at exuding an air of calm that helps people relax.

If you want to make it scientific make them both wear masks to hide their faces and remain silent. Immobilise the reiki healers arm and have a mechanism move it to where it's meant to be so it moves in precisely the same way every time. Effectively remove all aesthetic and relaxing aspects of the treatment, examine the effect of the energy field alone.

one was published in 

J Evid Based Complementary Altern Med.

LMAO

So your argument is hands on healing isn't compatible with a double blind study? But why does it have to be hands on? If its an energy field doing the work mere proximity should be enough. If the energy field can't extend the few millimetres through a thin barrier how can it extend into the body through the skin?

What if we got two people on their backs, one a genuine patient and one a fake. And then we get in an energy healer and a trained masseuse and have them treat the two 'patients' but the masseuse is merely copying precisely the movements of the healer. Neither the healer or the masseuse would know which was the real patient and the real patient wouldn't know which was the real healer. Why has this experiment not been done in your list?

Peter said:

been double blind. In a double blind study you would have some sort of opaque thin partition between the 'energy healer' and patient and arrange the experiment so that neither the healer nor patient could be sure someone was actually on the other side. It appears the healers and patients had communication and physical touch in at least most of these studies.

That does not apply with "hands-on" healing by default of description, and double blind studies involve neither participants or experimenters knowing if they are the placebo group or not.

Again respectfully no. Skimming these studies they don't appear to have been double blind. In a double blind study you would have some sort of opaque thin partition between the 'energy healer' and patient and arrange the experiment so that neither the healer nor patient could be sure someone was actually on the other side. It appears the healers and patients had communication and physical touch in at least most of these studies.

Peter said:

Respectfully I don't believe any of these studies are double blind?

A double blind study involves neither the participants or the experimenters knowing who is receiving the actual treatment (such as pills full of an active substance) or the placebo treatment (such as pills full an inactive substance), and the results are assessed according to the measured results produced in both groups along with a control group that have not received either the actual or the placebo treatment ~ peer review boards (a group of experts in the field of research) would not have allowed the studies to have been published if they had not been accurately and accordingly double blind, just as a tax inspecting would not accept a tax return without accurate and according double entry book keeping.

Respectfully I don't believe any of these studies are double blind?

aidie said:

complete scam ignore this rubbish

Is that complete ignorance on your behalf or do you actually have evidence to disprove the evidence presented?

aidie said:

complete scam ignore this rubbish

Is that complete ignorance on your behalf or do you actually have evidence to disprove the evidence presented?