How to convince a believer that Homeopathy is BS.

[th!nk]

I have used all the knowledge I have to show my mom that homeopathy ( and herbal medicines ) are ridiculous. Not only do i use logic, i also use basic knowledge of chemistry, biology, and whatever scientific evidence i can provide; nothing will convince her otherwise. She keeps trying to force feed me this colon cleanse crap which i know has no effect whatsoever since it has no effect at all on someone like me who doesnt believe in it. (placebo anyone?) she also spends good money on worthless remedies (thanks again for that phrase Mr. Randi :) ). Any Ideas on how to prove to her that science kicks ass?

[In My Spare Time]

I have used all the knowledge I have to show my mom that homeopathy ( and herbal medicines ) are ridiculous. Not only do i use logic, i also use basic knowledge of chemistry, biology, and whatever scientific evidence i can provide; nothing will convince her otherwise. She keeps trying to force feed me this colon cleanse crap which i know has no effect whatsoever since it has no effect at all on someone like me who doesnt believe in it. (placebo anyone?) she also spends good money on worthless remedies (thanks again for that phrase Mr. Randi :) ). Any Ideas on how to prove to her that science kicks ass?

Welcome to the forums!
I'd go with a homeopathic suicide. After verifying that the colon clense stuff REALLY IS HOMEOPATHIC! (seriously. There's lots of stuff out there that's labeled homeopathic that isn't), take a whole bottle at once in her presence. After that, fail to have negative side effects.

[Rolfe]

Colon cleansing isn't homoeopathy. Somebody has their wires crossed.

Rolfe.

[th!nk]

Sorry, i seem to have sidetracked myself in my first post. the colon cleanse is separate from the homeopathy. personally, i believe both are ridiculous. most herbal remedies are just an agglomeration of useless ingredients. but she believes in both. for now at least, im trying to get her to understand why homeopathy is bs because it just SO DAMN ridiculous. the herbal stuff, like dr. schultz or whatever is not even evaluated by the FDA. thats one of the first signs of quack medicine.

[blutoski]

Colon cleansing isn't homoeopathy. Somebody has their wires crossed.

Rolfe.

I find that at work, the conversation goes sideways pretty fast, because there's no good understanding of the terms.

For example, our employer buckled to pressure and provided an alternative version of the flu vaccine for employees who balked at conventional vaccines. The offer was a 'homeopathic' flu vaccine called Pascoleucyn. See link: [Pascoleucyn (http://www.pascoecanada.com/en/product/35/PASCOLEUCYN/)]

I had a look at the ingredients and observed the following:

1. the active substances were known to suppress symptoms, rather than cause them - ie: no law of similars

2. the active substances were actually very concentrated, rather than diluted. eg: dose contained 400mg of the main active ingredient - Echinacea.

So, what we had was a naturopathic treatment, falsely labelled as an homeopathic treatment. The discussion never got past my attempt to explain that this was a discrepancy.

[Ashles]

I have used all the knowledge I have to show my mom that homeopathy ( and herbal medicines ) are ridiculous. Not only do i use logic, i also use basic knowledge of chemistry, biology, and whatever scientific evidence i can provide; nothing will convince her otherwise. She keeps trying to force feed me this colon cleanse crap which i know has no effect whatsoever since it has no effect at all on someone like me who doesnt believe in it. (placebo anyone?) she also spends good money on worthless remedies (thanks again for that phrase Mr. Randi :) ). Any Ideas on how to prove to her that science kicks ass?
I find just asking the person what they believe homeopathy to be is a good first step.

They are usually completely wrong. I explain what it actually is.

Then I explain what, for example, a 10x solution actually is.

So far that's been enough for them to not bring it up again.

I think I've been lucky.

[EeneyMinnieMoe]

Use the homeopathic solution to water your plants, to show that it is nothing but water. Or feed it to your cat or dog or hamster or any other pet you have. There should be no harm whatsoever done to them.

Edit: You could also drink the whole bottle or several bottles- 50 or 100 doses- to show that it does nothing. A poster here did that- look for the thread titled "Failed Suicide Attempt".

Edit 2: Also, don't feed a pet anything that might actually be a diluted dose of real medication. That might actually kill him/her.

[th!nk]

I tried that, but you seem to be luckier then I . The problem was my mom went to this homeopath lady who filled her head with all this crap about body energies and the more extreme forms of homeopathy. I went with her and was laughing the entire way home, even though i was still about 10 back then. I told her that it is chemically (and logically) impossible for dilution of such a magnitude to yield a single molecule of medicine in a solution but she counters with this crap about homeopathy working with your body to stop the problems.. the usually junk. Homeopathy falls apart when you think about all the times we encounter water in our lives without realizing it. the air itself is part water vapor. since water vapor comes from places that would likely have solutes in them, like the ocean for example, then we would be constantly bombarded with "remedies" . High blood pressure? let sodium water fresh from the ocean fix it. Just breathe deeply.

[Rolfe]

There is a certain level of belief in homoeopathy that no rational argument will shake. If your mother is at that level, you may be on a loser.

One thing we have noted about homoeopathy is that believers have devised a system of "excuses" whereby absolutely anything that happens after a remedy is given is explained as being evidence that the remedy has some sort of activity. Thus, it is unfalsifiable. There is literally nothing that can happen that will be accepted by its proponents as contrary evidence.

Still, your mother doesn't sound as far gone as some of the woos who come on here. It may well be that if you make good arguments, she'll think about them in her own good time and come to some more reasonable conclusions.

She may not necessarily tell you if she does, though!

Rolfe.

[JcR]

I have used all the knowledge I have to show my mom that homeopathy ( and herbal medicines ) are ridiculous. Not only do i use logic, i also use basic knowledge of chemistry, biology, and whatever scientific evidence i can provide; nothing will convince her otherwise. She keeps trying to force feed me this colon cleanse crap which i know has no effect whatsoever since it has no effect at all on someone like me who doesnt believe in it. (placebo anyone?) she also spends good money on worthless remedies (thanks again for that phrase Mr. Randi :) ). Any Ideas on how to prove to her that science kicks ass?

Well I wouldn't suggest that someone ingest a full bottle of homeopathic remedy, unless you are 100 percent sure of it's contents. Can you really trust the label.
As far as herbal remedies, definitely not such a good idea. Compounds in herbal remedies (especially if they contain extractions from medicinal plants) are also used in our prescription drugs. I just believe a great deal of caution should be used with them.
I hear a lot of people I know claim "it is natural, they can't do any harm."
I dismiss cure all remedies, but medicinal plants can have real effects on us and our animals.
As for homeopathic remedies. Even if you're certain it's just a water based
solution (with a super diluted substance somewhere in it) :)
and you were to swallow a full bottle of the solution to prove a point.
Do you think that would convince a homeopathic believer?

[athon]

It really depends on several factors. But, unfortunately, I doubt you will be able to make any big impact.

People form beliefs based on a set of criteria that are based on what they personally feel to be important factors. For most people here, this hierarchy of factors is topped by concepts such as 'logic', 'internal consistency', 'objectivity'...basically the same principles that led to the development of the scientific methodology.

Now, it's difficult for us to imagine that other people might evaluate beliefs against other criteria. After all, logic is so mathematical, it's difficult to think something could be both illogical and still right. Yet our social brains are wired to make this possible. So, if enough people in your social group (be it family, wider community, country, knitting group etc.) believe in something, that will be a dominant factor in the hierarchy. If there's the sense of historical acceptance of a belief, again, it might dominate any internal consistency in an idea or sense of logic.

This means you can point out the flaws, the scientific tests and irrationality of an idea until you're blue in the face. In order to preserve that hierarchy of values against which they evaluate all of their information, they will create all manner of excuses.

How do you change a person's values? It can be quite tricky, since they are often embedded from such an early age. Finding an association with a different social group can do it with time - if your mother found an affinity with people who shared an appreciation of scientific principles, it's possible those cognitive values might change enough for her to evaluate those claims differently.

This probably isn't the answer you wanted, I know. We'd all like that magic bullet. Yet if it existed, and if it were possible to change minds easily, it's unlikely magical thinking and pseudoscience would be the problems they are today.

Athon

[Gr8wight]

Everyone keeps suggesting that one consume "a whole bottle" of whatever homeopathic remedy is in question, but this argument is useless. One of the basic tenets of homeopathy is the law of infinitesimals. The less of the substance present in a remedy, the stronger it is (they say). So, consuming an entire bottle of homeopathic "sleeping pills" makes them work less, not more (they say). It is impossible, according to homeopaths, to overdose on homeopathic medicine, because the more you take, the weaker it is (they say).

Simply explaining that to someone should make them roll their eyes and laugh at how ridiculous the concept of homeopathy is. If it doesn't, they are too far gone to help.

[PbFoot]

One thing you could try is playing the appropriate episodes of Dr. Crislips "Quackcast" and Brian Dunnings "Skeptoid" podcasts. They do a fantastic job of explaining it. Maybe she will accepts an argument from authority, but this time in the right direction.

[Soapy Sam]

Have you tried a baseball bat?

[RandomJSF]

Everyone keeps suggesting that one consume "a whole bottle" of whatever homeopathic remedy is in question, but this argument is useless. One of the basic tenets of homeopathy is the law of infinitesimals. The less of the substance present in a remedy, the stronger it is (they say). So, consuming an entire bottle of homeopathic "sleeping pills" makes them work less, not more (they say). It is impossible, according to homeopaths, to overdose on homeopathic medicine, because the more you take, the weaker it is (they say).

Simply explaining that to someone should make them roll their eyes and laugh at how ridiculous the concept of homeopathy is. If it doesn't, they are too far gone to help.


For the sake of humor alone, I recently took it upon myself to explain to my housemates the basic principles of the "potencies" of homoeopathic remedies, and how they are made (based on my limited understanding of the process, the succussion bit and all that delightful jazz). All three of my housemates are usually skeptical, and are at the very least of a logical bent, though two of them are self-proclaimed pagans... My point being that I can usually trust that they'll respond to woo in the same manner that I do, so long as I don't start tearing down the foundations of their paganism.

I was quite pleased to hear them break down in laughter at hearing the ridiculous ideas behind standard practice homoeopathy. I didn't even go into the idea that taking more of the already diluted medicine will reduce the effect, but I suppose I felt that went without saying.

I'm honestly not sure what I would have done if one of them had voiced an opinion that they saw some logic behind the homoeopathic process. As you said, Gr8wight, at that point, I guess they would be too far gone.

[Legend]

I started a topic entitled "My Mum Is Making Me Take Homeopathic Medicine".

Or something of the similar.

It has great information in it, try and dig it out.

Being the nice guy I am, here it is (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=131741&highlight=making+homeopathic).

Alex.

[Tapio]

Personally, as a former believer in homeopathy, I found a lot just by reading the appropriate threads in this forum!

Also, reading Ernst and Singhs' book: Trick or Treatment-alternative medicine on trial, has given a fresh perspective. In the book you can find some incredibly simple points, that for many believers just don't seem to "come to mind".

First and foremost, I think it's a matter of understanding the scientific method, how it was developed and refined and just why it's the most reliable and honest way of examining the effects of things we know of.

[Professor Yaffle]

Steal her homeopathic pills and replace them with sweeteners or something like that. Leave it for a couple of months and ask if the homeopathy has still been working well, before you tell her...

;)

[Dave Rogers]

I'd go with a homeopathic suicide. After verifying that the colon clense stuff REALLY IS HOMEOPATHIC! (seriously. There's lots of stuff out there that's labeled homeopathic that isn't), take a whole bottle at once in her presence.

And if she really believes in it, the sight might cleanse her colon.

Dave

[Worm]

One approach I've considered taking, but never got round to, is to actually make a 'homeopathic' remedy.

Take, for instance, 10g of salt and dilute it in 1L of water, then take 100ml of the mixture and make up to 1L with water, and so on.

Go to 12C or even 30C and see if you can still taste salt compared with the original mixture?

Or is that just silly?

You could even get into the succession bit and start banging things around if it helps :)

[skeen]

I didn't even know what homeopathy was. When I started hearing it, I looked it up, found out what it was, and bam - didn't "believe". I don't "believe" in anything. Plain logic told me it had to be B.S., then I discovered that of course, it was, B.S.

Same with everything. If people aren't convinced by downright obvious logic, then there may be no hope!

[Ashles]

Steal her homeopathic pills and replace them with sweeteners or something like that. Leave it for a couple of months and ask if the homeopathy has still been working well, before you tell her...

;)
It's cruel, it's sneaky, it makes the homeopathic believer look silly.

Yup, that's my favourite.

[Professor Yaffle]

Having said that, my usual tactic is to pretend not to be quite so knowledgable as I am and say things like - "I used to use homeopathy too, but then I read something in the newspaper about how there is actually nothing in the pills and it is just you getting better on your own". Doesn't work with close family obviously, but my immediate family are not very woo prone.

[SusanB-M1]

#1
Do you think your mother would read the chapter on homeopathy in Ben Goldacre's bookk, 'Bad Science'? Or maybe a photocopy of a couple of pages from that chapter?

[TheSkepticCanuck]

[...] I hear a lot of people I know claim "it is natural, they can't do any harm." [...]

I love it when people use this line! My automatic response is something like "Arsenic, E-Coli, and cobra venom are also natural." There are lots of natural substances that are quite deadly if taken in a sufficient quantity, which is not very much for some of them. That makes that statement totally meaningless and quite dangerous if someone were to actually believe it.

[Monza]

Rather than try to convince her that homeopathy is crap, I think it is better to first explain what it is that homeopathy medicine is claiming. Some homeopathic medicines are said to be 24C or 30C solutions. This is not possible. A 24C solution is a simple ratio. Assuming you have one molecule of ingredient, then you would need vast amounts of water to achieve that ratio. I don't remember exactly what the final volume is, but it is on the order of many times the volume of the earth. I calculated it out once and posted it in another thread here.

So we know for a fact that a solution in a small bottle cannot possibly be a 24C solution. Forget if it works or not. The label is simply wrong. And since homeopaths claim that the more dilute solutions are actually more effective, she is being ripped off. She wants to buy a 24C solution but is only getting a 4C solution or pure water (i.e. no active ingredient) at best.

Regardless of the efficacy of homeopathic medicine, the bottle's label is not accurate with respect to the contents for anything above about 12C.

[Tempest_Rage]

Trying to change her mind will most likely just make her defensive and back into a corner clutching her homeopathic paraphernalia to her chest. Especially if you're going to be derisive and opinionated about it. (I'm just guessing :D )

Just leave it be. But if she gets something that needs real medical attention, strap her down for it.

[Ivor the Engineer]

<snip>

She keeps trying to force feed me this colon cleanse crap...

<snip>

Are you sure it isn't just that her cooking is not very good?

[Ladewig]

It's cruel, it's sneaky, it makes the homeopathic believer look silly.

Yup, that's my favourite.

I know you and Professor Yaffle are joking, but it really should be said that this approach is a gross violation of trust. If a homeopathy-believing relative replaced my physician-prescribed medicine with sugar pills, words could not describe the anger I would feel.

[ponderingturtle]

Steal her homeopathic pills and replace them with sweeteners or something like that. Leave it for a couple of months and ask if the homeopathy has still been working well, before you tell her...

;)

But that would only make the pills more powerful. It would increase the dillution thus makeing them too strong. That could kill her.

[ponderingturtle]

And if she really believes in it, the sight might cleanse her colon.

Dave

If she believes it and understands it, I don't see why it should. IF she does not understand it, explaining it should work.

[ponderingturtle]

Rather than try to convince her that homeopathy is crap, I think it is better to first explain what it is that homeopathy medicine is claiming. Some homeopathic medicines are said to be 24C or 30C solutions. This is not possible. A 24C solution is a simple ratio. Assuming you have one molecule of ingredient, then you would need vast amounts of water to achieve that ratio. I don't remember exactly what the final volume is, but it is on the order of many times the volume of the earth. I calculated it out once and posted it in another thread here.

Lets see I get 3.1E19 km This is larger than the orbit of the earth by a lot. In fact it is thousands of light years in radius. Call it 1400 light years in radius for a volume of water. Per molicule.

[Tanja]

I found it effective to tell homeopathy believers what some of the more ridiculous remedies are made from. My favourite is Berlin Wall. Yes, it's a real homeopathic remedy. I found out that lots of people will intuitivelly think that a remedy made out of plants will somehow work (especially if they don't grasp the concept of extreme dillutions), but most people will intuitivelly agree that a dilluted block of concrete is not medicine.

[ponderingturtle]

Lets see I get 3.1E19 km This is larger than the orbit of the earth by a lot. In fact it is thousands of light years in radius. Call it 1400 light years in radius for a volume of water. Per molicule.

Oopps, I messed up a unit conversion(going from moles of water to CC of water, using the molecular weight of water and the density of water) It should be a radius of 2500 light years.

That is a lot of water.

[Nucular]

I think you shouldn't set your sights too high. In my (very anecdotal) experience of this sort of thing, rational approaches to treasured yet barmy beliefs rarely affect the belief itself. However, sometimes you'll notice that a side effect of your banging on sort of inoculates against new barmy beliefs - they'll still swear by homeopathy, but know exactly what's wrong with, say, crystal healing.

However, a useful approach to actually challenging that sort of belief is finding out what your Mum doesn't believe in, and why; then get her to apply that to her own thing. A bit like that quote "I contend we are both atheists; I simply believe in one fewer gods than you" - I'm sure she is a sceptic, just not of homeopathy. Find something she does think critically about, then ask why she doesn't apply the same logic here.

[Doug Higley]

Choice #1: "I thought you were smarter than that."

Choice #2 "I didn't realize how stupid you really are."

Choice #3 "That's nice."

[Lanzy]

Everyone keeps suggesting that one consume "a whole bottle" of whatever homeopathic remedy is in question, but this argument is useless. One of the basic tenets of homeopathy is the law of infinitesimals. The less of the substance present in a remedy, the stronger it is (they say). So, consuming an entire bottle of homeopathic "sleeping pills" makes them work less, not more (they say). It is impossible, according to homeopaths, to overdose on homeopathic medicine, because the more you take, the weaker it is (they say).

Simply explaining that to someone should make them roll their eyes and laugh at how ridiculous the concept of homeopathy is. If it doesn't, they are too far gone to help.


So the less you take the better it works? Those of us not taking any should be the healthiest of all.

[backstab]

I guess you can explain the science behind it..

[ChongLee]

Often time, belief goes deeper than science (to the believers, that is). I know a number of parents who are like your mother. In my case, it's a "culture/generation" gap, but regardless, when I find a good method, I'll let you know too. :D