[WikiEN-l] rampant scientism

Mon Dec 8 01:56:09 UTC 2003

Viajero wrote:

>Hi all,
>
>I am the last person who want to see Wikipedia turned into a repository 
>for flaky, New Age esotericisms, but at the same time the scientism which
>has manifested itself in the past few days in response to Mr Natural
>Health's questionable contributions is also profoundly disturbing and
>likewise a very insidious form of non-neutrality.
>
I think we have a basis for agreement here.

>Take for example this comment by user Snoyes on the [[Alternative 
>medicine]] talk page:
>
>>The thing is that once numerous randomized controlled trials and 
>>
>double-blind experiments have shown a treatment to be effective, it is  by
>definition not an alternative medicine anymore. It is therefore quite
>simply a case of the rigour of science vs. unsubstantiated claims by 
>wonder-healers. -- snoyes
>
>Obviously, it has a certain logic to it, but such an attitude is *so*
>dualistic and dogmatic. 
>
The quote starts from a reasonable premise, but draws improper 
conclusions.  The rigour of science becomes the rigidity of science, and 
the fallacy of the excluded middle.  It presumes that any thing which is 
"unsubstantiated", or unknown, or unidentified is ipso facto false.  An 
Unidentified Flying Object may very well turn out to be an illusion, but 
it is unscientific to presume that.  I prefer to accept the fact that it 
is unidentified, and go on with life with a compulsive need to answer 
what cannot be answered.  And "wonder-healers" is certainly a straw man. 
 There are surely some alternative practitioners who make extravagant 
claims or send out "penis enlarger" spam, but I would venture to say 
that there are far more who (like most physicians) quietly see patients 
in their treatment rooms, doing the best they can.

>Or take this edit summary from the page history of the same article by
>user Robert Merkel:
>
>>(cur) (last) . . 01:30, 7 Dec 2003 . . Robert Merkel (put a big fat
>>
>"doctors think this stuff is bogus" sentence near the top of the article,
>where it belongs, rather than burying it at the bottom)
>
>This individual hasn't a shred of impartiality regarding the subject.
>
The fallacy of authority.  If the person making the statement is 
sufficiently authoritative, everybody will uncritically accept it as true.

>I am the only one disturbed by this?
>
No!

>Perhaps it is because I live in Northern Europe, where these issues are
>less polarized, but for me issue is anything but black and white.
>Alternative medicine is well-established here.  My health insurance pays
>for various forms of it (some but not all).  My GP is an MD with a
>conventional medical training, but anthroposophic orientation (Rudolf
>Steiner stuff).  That means he prescribes both mainstream medicines as
>well as alternative therapies as he sees fit.
>
Steiner certainly believed in a more wholistic approach.

>I realize that double-blind trials are the gold standard in Western 
>science, and I don't want to argue with that; however, there vast realms
>of human knowledge which have not yet been verified by these means, and to
>dismiss such empirical knowledge out of hand is both foolish and not our
>job.  
>
The priests of scientism have become today's grand inquisitor's.  It 
takes nothing less than one of Kuhn's paradigm shifts to shake things up.

>For example, I have travelled extensively in South American and one
>sees that vast amount of "alternative medicine" practiced there (I put it
>in quotes because for people there it is not "alternative").  I doubt that
>chewing coca leaves has ever been "proven" effective by Western scientific
>protocols for altitude sickness but millions of people in the Sierra
>believe it does.  I was in a small village in the Altiplano once where the
>women cultivated a small, bitter green potato for its birth control
>properties.  Again, something which I doubt has ever been "proven", but at
>the same time something one can't simply dismiss as quaint folklore.
>
The big multinational pharmaceutical companies are aware of these 
things.  For them the question is can it be patented?  If the plants 
could be used just as they are found in the wild, there would be no 
profit in that.

>Can we get away from looking at healing as two opposing factions and see
>it rather as a broad spectrum of techniques, ranging from nuclear medicine
>to voodoo, of which some is "scientific", some is pragmatic, and all which
>have pros and cons?
>
I've consistently supported that approach.

>In any case, at the moment the [[Alternative medicine]] article is una
>gran porquer.
>
Indeed!

Ec