Energy Healing

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?

Plastic said:

Have you ever see James Randi take all these scams apart?    He's only ever asked for a demonstration under controlled conditions and yet none ever proved a single thing - or normally ended up exposing their shtick to ridicule.

The people who blindly 'believe' are almost universally thinking 'there must be something more' so it becomes a new religion to them - they will find (extremely shaky)   'proof' for confirmation bias and when someone just pops up and says 'I'll do this for money', then there is no end of hollow people needing their faith-fix.         If that makes it true for them, then more power to them..

Well when I first experienced having a Reiki session it was like as if having a really hot internal sauna spread throughout my body from the top of my head to below my feet as the healer placed their hand on and about me accordingly ~ so no blind faith there.

Plus other people used to experience unusually warm, cold and fizzy sensations when I touched them too ~ and that was before I ever got into complementary therapies as a practitioner, as being an experiential means of self discovery and all that.

So be careful about making faith-fix assertions where they do not apply.

Plastic said:

I'm having to take a lot of things on faith - I have to trust my oncologist has my best interests at the heart of his decision making,        I have to trust the nurses getting their treatments correct.    

The biggest trust is my death-bargain with the hospice to help me smoothly transition without being aware or in pain.       

That's a really, really big lump of faith required - no chance to complain to the management afterwards..    

Would you ever, seriously, bet your life on something?  

I have to.

I am very much aware of the path you are on with your treatment and wish only that your final steps are experiential light and uplifting.

Plastic said:

There are plenty of charlatans offering all sorts of miracle cures - and when I still die, it's my fault for not having enough faith.    Ah - I see how that works now......

Yeah charlatan double-blags like that don't fit the ethical or moral code of conduct at all, as everybody attends the 'university of life' to explore the range of their sensibilities and to contrast those sensibilities with others as being similar, dissimilar and or otherwise. So basically it is no one's fault for having faith to the extent that they do ~ problems only arise when faith is used to coerce people without respecting their sensibilities.     

Plastic said:

If any of this was real, then it would be regulated and available on the NHS -

You had not then read the listing I gave where Reiki has been made available on the NHS ~ with the first of the four A listings being:

Aberdeen Royal Infirmary

Reiki treatments offered to compliment conventional cancer treatments.

And the last and only Y listing being:

York Teaching Hospitals NHS, York and Scarborough

Reiki treatments offered to compliment conventional cancer treatments.

Plastic said:

- what a money-spinner - just someone sat doing the 'cosmic-ordering' deliveries to dispense in little prayer-doses and everyone is cured.

Bless you Plastic ~  you are projecting the virtual reality of your mind as involving partial realities in the world as if they are actually a complete all-inclusive reality, such as just above exemplified with Reiki being available on the NHS whilst you were imagining and maintaining that it wasn't.

Plastic said:

Meanwhile, back in reality, it's still a scam.

Or maybe if you still believe that it is as you suggested a faith-fix for you at least.

Oops ~ completely forgot due to a seizure fragging last night, that we really should be having this discussion on another thread, on account of:

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 want to carry on with this discussion post a link for the new thread below.

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.

A sojourner for 4chan? Remember guys don't feel the trolls! :P

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.

Lucky for us souls don't exist. 

It's the internet - if people need to vent, I'm happy for them to vent.     If they need a target, I'm happy to be their target.

My house is in Harry Potter?   Does that count?  

I don't live like everyone else.    I have all the magic I can ever need in the faces of my friends.

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.

Have you ever see James Randi take all these scams apart?    He's only ever asked for a demonstration under controlled conditions and yet none ever proved a single thing - or normally ended up exposing their shtick to ridicule.

The people who blindly 'believe' are almost universally thinking 'there must be something more' so it becomes a new religion to them - they will find (extremely shaky)   'proof' for confirmation bias and when someone just pops up and says 'I'll do this for money', then there is no end of hollow people needing their faith-fix.         If that makes it true for them, then more power to them..

I'm having to take a lot of things on faith - I have to trust my oncologist has my best interests at the heart of his decision making,        I have to trust the nurses getting their treatments correct.    

The biggest trust is my death-bargain with the hospice to help me smoothly transition without being aware or in pain.       

That's a really, really big lump of faith required - no chance to complain to the management afterwards..    

Would you ever, seriously, bet your life on something?  

I have to.

There are plenty of charlatans offering all sorts of miracle cures - and when I still die, it's my fault for not having enough faith.    Ah - I see how that works now......

If any of this was real, then it would be regulated and available on the NHS - what a money-spinner - just someone sat doing the 'cosmic-ordering' deliveries to dispense in little prayer-doses and everyone is cured.

Meanwhile, back in reality, it's still a scam.

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

Definitely something you need to filter through twigs.

I had to look up energy healing in animals as I don't know anything about it. This is something that I found. Healing for Animals (thehealingtrust.org.uk) My understanding is that it wouldn't help the 'Autism' as such. But the stress and anxiety that can be caused as a result. I think that if you are going to help others, regardless of if they are animal or human, it would help to understand your own stress and find ways to manage it before you are able to offer assistance. This could be what is making it more difficult for you. I personally use Buddhist philosophy and guided meditation to help understand the world around me and to help deal with my anxiety. It's not always easy but it allows me to gain perspective, find balance etc, and by default allows me to work on my physical health. As I said, I don't know anything about energy healing. My opinion is that if something is legitimate medical practice, it wouldn't be referred to as alternate medicine. It would simply be medicine.

Having said that, there are benefits to lowering stress and anxiety, it can help to manage physical issues. Animals can also struggle with stress. I know that some animals like Kangaroos can physically die if they become too stressed. I'm pleased to see that you mentioned that the energy healing was only one part of your course. It suggests that there are a number of other things being taught to you. On it's own, I don't think energy healing would be of much use. But as a part of a varied toolbox, it could be used effectively. 

let me guess, Theakstons old peculier ?

....... said:

Hey Plastic soul... I feel sorry for you even more than ever now I have seen what you've written.

Please don't feel sorry for me.    I am strong enough to weather any storm - and when I die,  I will do so knowing I've always done my best to help those in need and defend against to who would do them harm.      I am prepared to meet my maker -  and take them out for a pint.  

thats very offensive.