Corwin

Monkey, dear... ki/chi/qi/however you want to spell it, works. Like it or not. Whatever it is, however it works, I don't know. I've been given an explanation of it, one which I'm not entirely sure I believe. However... the scientist in me is 'humble before the facts.' The fact is, in my experience, it works.

Would I like to know how it works? Yes. Do I have to in order to use it? No.

Is accupuncture attributable to ki? I have no idea. Have I known people who got the same results with accupuncture that they had previously gotten with painkillers? Yes. And without the addictive side effects.

NialScorva

Which specific claim are we discussing here? I haven't seen any in quite a while. I think we should take a step back and look at what specific claims we should evaluate instead of discussing generics across all possible claims.

It's not a matter of "good things don't always have to come out of a lab", it's that if it's a good thing, it will be confirmed as such after being put through a lab. Medical science isn't anything special, it's merely a formalization of doing the same thing that folk medicine has been doing for years. There's *no* difference between the methodology of alternative medicine and the methodology of mainstream medicine 100 years ago.

Monkeybot

Not to devalue your experience, but surely you realize that your personal experience does not constitute proof, or even conclusive evidence, for chi? Considering that I have never had a "chi" experience, I'm not inclined to take it as a "fact" -- not without further convincing. I mean, you could have had a psychosomatic experience, hallucinated, ate something funny that day, or any number of possibilities. I have no way of knowing what the true explanation is (which, before you jump down my throat, could very well be chi! - I'm just saying that you haven't done a lot to rule out other possibilities in this discussion).

You would first have to demonstrate the existence of chi before attributing anything to it.

And here, I'm more than willing to admit the possibility that there's a physiological mechanism by which acupuncture can relieve symptoms. However, you're still using anecdotes to support your claims, which as has been shown are not the soundest of evidence.

Furthermore, you still haven't specified which claims were brought into the discussion that have not been claimed by acupuncturists.

[ September 20, 2002: Message edited by: Monkeybot ]</p>

Corwin

Let's use the aforementioned cancer cure? The entire argument was hypothetical anyway... (for that matter Tron didn't bring up specifics about which claims he wasn't sure on either.)

And in answer to the chi points, they're well established. No drugs, no hallucinations... I didn't imagine being able to put a guy twice my size flat on his back, nor did I imagine getting thrown by a japanese girl half my size.

It works. I don't know how, I don't know why, and unlike christians I don't expect you to live a life according to rules not in your best interest simply because I claim it works. However, any aikidoka can show you that however it works, it does.

Linda

I don't know anything about Chi or Ki and didn't even know that acupuncture was based on Chi or Ki but here is a true story, make of it what you will. It did not happen to a friend of a friend, it happened to me; therefore, I know that it is true.

Over ten years ago, I went to my doctor because of a painfully swollen finger. He thought it was broken. I had been unable to use it, because of the extreme swelling and pain for several months. The doc took x-rays and determined that it was not broken. Because I had severely injured the finger when I was in 6th grade, the doc determined that I had 'traumatic arthritis' in the finger. (Meaning the arthritis was caused by an earlier injury and not by old age.) The doc prescribed some anti-inflammatory drugs (don't remember what) and I used them until they were gone with little results. I figured I would just have to learn to live with the situation.

Several months later, I was trying to stop smoking. A friend told me that her husband went to (are you ready for this?) a doctor (M.D.) who used acupuncture on him and he was able to quit. I was very skeptical, but really wanted to stop smoking so decided to give it a try.

When I went to the new doc, he put lots of pins in my face and neck for the stop smoking deal. He then said, let me help your finger. I didn't even want him to touch it because it still hurt so much. He put just 2 or 3 pins in it.

The result of this visit was that (1) it did not help the smoking at all and (2) by the next morning, all the swelling was gone in my finger and ten years later, the problem with my finger has never returned.

Anecdotal, for sure. Experiential proof, too.

Go figure.

Glory

You obviously experiemced some sort of phenomenon. How do you know that the phenomenon was chi at work? How do you know that the phenomenon which cured your pain is the same as the phenomnenon which allowed a smaller person to throw you?

Earlier you mentioned the spirit of the willow tree. It sounds to me like Chi is your willow spirit. You experienced something you didn't understand and cannot explain. Your conclusion: An unseen, undetectable organic force is responsible. Why is this invisble power any more credible than the willow spirit?

Glory

Corwin

Invoking the willow spirit has a dramatically inferior success rate, and can't be done on demand.

When I ask christians to prove their god, I get a bunch of empty platitudes about faith and not needing answers and the innocence (ignorance) of a child.

When I asked my sensei to prove what he was saying, the response I got was 'Hit me. If you can.' His proof of 'I can use this, force, energy, spirit, whatever it is, whatever you want to call it, to do this' was physical, tangible, and on demand. He was also able to give physiological explanations for the entirely physiological parts of the discipline. (As in, grab the wrist, push the elbow through the center of the body, your attacker goes down. He has to. Look, here... it has to do with this part... how the joint is built...) However, his explanations of the more mystical aspects, (visualize such and such) were just as effective.

Part of it is just controlling ordinary forces, in a fairly ordinary way. (Inertia, gravity, momentum, etc...) Part of it I still can't explain. It just works.

Jeremy Pallant

Ladies and gentlemen, this is Science and Skepticism, not Abuse. If you can't be polite, don't participate.

Linda

I think we already turned the page on that problem.

sentinel00

I find it funny how psuedoscientists are always willing to offer an answer for what happened right after they say, "I don't know what happened."

Corwin's basic premise here is: I don't know what it was, so it must be chi.

That is bunk. You know it. If I had a similar experience, yet claimed the reason behind the effect was angels, telekinesis, invisible unicorns, or chi... I'd have equal value in all of those claims (zero).

Answering a question with a bigger question is no answer at all. I ask what makes acupuncture work, you say chi. I ask what chi is... I get no answer. It's the same as saying "Goddidit."