Veil of Fire

Kally: I've crossed a line?

You mean the one you've been jumping up and down on the far side of for the last couple months?

Since when did you become the Gemma Therese of atheism? You go into a thread that's going a-ok, post two lines of insulting non-sequitor, throw in a jpeg, and call that 'contribution'??

You ARE useless, and you ARE a bitch. All you ever talk about is how stupid everyone else is, and how bad your mother screwed you up. As if the latter justifies the former. Here's a happy thought: maybe the reason you can't just get the hell over it is because you enjoy bringing it up all the time, in every thread you ever post in.

***

Rick: Ok. So you can't draw obvious parallels, and you can't understand hypothetical metaphors as an explanitive to an argument. No wonder you haven't contributed anything but insults, you're too thick to understand what anyone else is saying. How did you get your degree, again?

You claimed IN SO MANY WORDS (scroll up, dumbass) that it didn't matter where a claim came from in regards to acupuncture, if it could be disproven acupuncture was debunked. You said that in DIRECT RESPONSE to Corwin's assertions that non-acupunturists were setting up straw men in regards to acupuncture practices. It's RIGHT THERE ON THE GODDAMNED PAGE. And you're going to call anyone who brings it up a liar?

Veil of Fire

Because if HYPOTHETICAL METAPHOR person 'Bill' says "Acupuncture is supposed to cure cancer, but it doesn't, therefore acupuncture is false," Rick's statement denying that the source of the claim has any relevance NECESSARILY means that acupuncture is false because it couldn't live up to Bill's straw man.

You get so pissed when the "cat from dog" arguments come up, but when some non-pracitioner goes around making claims about something you DON'T like, you embrace them whole-heartedly! How is that 'skepticism' or 'science'??

[ September 20, 2002: Message edited by: Veil of Fire ]</p>

MadMordigan

it's ok for you to be a prick if someone else is too?

Yes.

Once again, atheists show complete dismissal of the golden rule.

If I'm a prick, I welcome, even EXPECT people to be pricks back to me.

Veil of Fire

MM: That's not the golden rule.

The rule is "treat others how you would want to be treated", NOT "treat others how they SHOULD treat me once I start treating them like shit".

Monkeybot

If I am not mistaken, Dr. Rick was attempting to say that if we have X, Y, and Z claims about acupuncture, it doesn't matter if Albert Einstein, Brad Pitt, or Charles Manson is making the claim, so long as there is evidence to support it.

In this case, IMHO, there is little evidence of "chi" or "fixing bodily imbalances" (unless perhaps one is referring to chemicals in the brain, which is not the impression I've gotten from what reading I've done on the subject. Correct me if I'm wrong of course).

However, sure, there may be a mechanism by which pins stuck in certain parts of the body influence bodily actions (very vague summary, I know). I don't come down either way on this. Since some people do report good experiences, it may be a topic worth exploring. As a lot of people have noted, it's not a fully understood subject.

However, the way to properly undestand this is via studies. Not anecdotes. Anecdotes merely tell us of a few FOAFs' (friend of a friend) experiences with acupuncture. They do not quantify. They do not suggest for what percentage of the population acupuncture may or may not be effective. They do not control for variables such as age, sex, race, blood type, medical history, or any number of factors that could influence the outcome of an acupuncture treatment. As such, they are essentially worthless as far as demonstrating the efficacy of acupuncture as a whole.

As it is, it seems that (from my limited understanding), these studies haven't conclusively demonstrated the effectiveness of acupuncture either way. As such, it seems premature at this time to make any hard and fast claims about it.

Now if you've had a great experience with acupuncture, I totally respect that. It neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket. But honestly, I don't see why an argument about sticking pins in people for Bog's sake has to turn into 7 pages of vitrolic, nasty, ugly personal attacks from both sides. I'm guilty of flaming people now and then myself but, with all due respect to the participants, this is ridiculous.

Veil of Fire

That's what I got out of it too. And it's wrong. If James Randi makes claim X about acupuncture, and the UberHighAcupuncturist of China says that claim X is a straw man, we shouldn't be evaluating the efficacy of acupuncture based on its failure to live up to claim X.

NialScorva

Actually no, it doesn't matter that much. Remember that the end result is going to be a statement that "Acupuncture does not do X". UberHighAcupuncturist isn't going to be surprised or shocked that it's true, but it doesn't make the claim a straw man. What would make it a straw man is "because acupuncture doesn't support X, it is bunk". That has not been said here.

What *has* been said is that there is nothing that acupuncture has been found to do that's supported beyond friend of a friend anecdotal evidence. To support that statement, it doesn't matter who said X. We're evaluating across a sample of all possible claims for acupuncture, not looking at unique claims. The central thesis is that accupuncture has not shown efficacy against any possible X, regardless of whether the ability X is claimed by acupuncturists or not.

Monkeybot

However, the "efficacy of acupuncture" is a broad statement to make. Many acupuncture proponents (and I realize not all of them do) claim that acupuncture functions by manipulating chi. Since there isn't a lot of evidence for this "chi," it truly doesn't matter who it's coming from. Until evidece for "chi" is found, I think it's safe to dismiss these claims.

Other sources (presumably not strawmen?) claim that acupuncture has some effect, but it uses some unknown physiological mechanism. As I said in my previous post, sure, this could be right. However, studies have been inconclusive - so we can't make a hard and fast statement yet.

Disproving one may not necessarily disprove acupuncture's efficacy as a whole. This is why I believe Dr. Rick used the word "claims," in the plural, indicating that he realized that there are more than one theories/beliefs/etc. on acupuncture. Who holds them is not relevant to the truth of these claims - and to claim it is is an appeal to authority.

I agree that knocking down a straw man of acupuncture does nothing to disprove it. However, with regards to this thread, I think it's stayed pretty far well away from straw men. Frankly, almost all of the pro-acupuncture websites I've found attribute acupuncture's efficacy to chi. These are practitioners and proponents of acupuncture themselves, not skeptics' websites with statements like "acupuncturists claim the moon is made of green cheese."

If you want to draw a parallel between acupuncture and evolution, I think a better comparison would be between TalkOrigins and AnswersInGenesis. If AnswersInGenesis, a notoriously pro-creationism website, made the claim that "evolutionary theory states that dogs give birth to cats," you'd be well served to take the bias of AIG into account. If TalkOrigins, a generally respected library of information on evolution, made the same claim, I'd stop and think.

Admittedly, this is a simplistic analogy, since I don't trust websites for all of my information; but I do think it speaks volumes that pro-acupuncture websites (multitudes of them) seem to heartily endorse concepts like chi.

Corwin

If X isn't claimed by acupuncturists... why even bother to bring it up in the first place?

Oh, that's right.... it's important to discredit any form of alternative culture, medicine, science, or society.... by any means necessary.

I forgot this was a war. My bad. After all... we can't have people thinking that good things don't always have to come out of a lab, I mean.... if people start are allowed to think that items that can't be commoditized can work... where does that leave commoditizers?

No no. We have to crush this now. Regardless of whether or not it works.

Monkeybot

What X in particular are you talking about? I'm asking honestly - it's probably buried on page 3 of this thread.