So painful that celebs go down this pathway.
So much Placebo effect in the world.

I tell people about the ineffectiveness of C as a cold treatment whenever I have a good opportunity. Note that when they're actually taking it is NOT what I consider such an opportunity, as the placebo effect can still be real and I'd rather not fuck that up for them. I will tell other people nearby though, once out of earshot of the sicko. Would be nice if people stopped wasting their money on snake oil.

"that doesn't justify using people in laboratory experiments"

uhhh, exactly how does holodoc think medical science works?
We use people in laboratory experiments all the damn time. It's called double-blind testing and it means that very sick people get given a placebo that we know does nothing.

I don't remember this episode, but I'm surprised at this lack of nuance from Star Trek.

And holo-space-nazi is right... it's funny how ethics go out the window when one of the main cast members life is threatened. But if a red-shirt is on the table....

Anyway, there's a massive difference between USING knowledge obtained by unethical means and GAINING knowledge by unethical means.

Don't get me wrong, medical ethics is really important. But throwing away knowledge after the fact is not only pointless, it's immoral. Especially in this case, where you're not even using the person who did the research, just a digital representation of them.

Is that place-boing or placebo-ing?

1) The resurrection is absolutely not historical. Jesus the man MIGHT be.

There is a lot of scholarly research that says it is historical, especially in the last 80 years or so. There are volumes upon volumes of work, and there are a lot of things that deserve an honest and indepth discussion.

Almost all skeptical scholars affirm that Jesus was a historical person and that His disciples had an experience which convinced them that He was raised from the dead. Many agree that a group of women discovered the empty tomb. The origin of Christianity is something which must be accounted for, historically. You can't just wave your hand over it and say its all nonsense.

2) I know Christianity is a joke religion invented for political control by Constantine. That is a verifiable, historical fact.

On what do you base that conclusion?

3) mythos cannot verify mythos. You say Satan created other religions (many before Chritianity existed) to trick them out of worshiping Yahweh....why isn't that likely true of Christianity?

Because of the person of Jesus Christ, who is verified to be the Messiah from many lines of evidence. Some of these would include the fulfillment of dozens of prophecies, His life and ministry, and His resurrection from the dead.

4) not true. Verified truth can be proven and defended against being twisted with fact and evidence, at least to those willing to examine actual evidence and not rely on only propaganda and myth. God (if he existed) should have more backbone, and a clear, unambiguous word/voice. ( Your position seems to be he's not willing to stand behind his word and prefers most people burn in hell for their God given inability to distinguish which is which.)
How is it different from politicians? They aren't empowered by all powerful, vengeful gods....clearly neither are clergy.

I'm not sure why you think you are holding the keys of facts and evidence in your hand, first of all. Can your worldview account for these things? You would need to establish that before we can talk about what "verified truth" is. What is your worldview, by the way? I am assuming it is scientific materialism. Have you ever looked into whether it is correct or not?

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/is-scientific-materialism-almost-certainly-false/

5) ...you shall stone them to death.....thou shalt not kill. Not so clear.

I think that is easily explained. The laws you are looking at were civil laws which governed the nation of Israel. Consider that our society has a law against murder, yet we execute criminals. Same concept.

6) only those who believe are saved...so clearly the sin of disbelief is not erased and is worse than all others. If it's not automatic, he didn't die for MY sins or yours, he's trading being saved (from something he told you exists with zero evidence) for belief and obedience.

None of your sins would be erased if you reject Christ. You would be paying not only for unbelief, but for all of the other ones too. Unbelief is like any other sin execept that the consequence of the sin prevents you from receiving forgiveness. It is exactly like expecting your cancer to be cured without taking the cure.

Jesus died for the sins of the world, including mine and yours, but you cannot partake of the atonement unless you receive Him as Lord and Savior.

My evidence is not just what we are discussing. Jesus Christ is alive and He is with me every single day of my life. He comforts me in my distress. He encourages me when I feel stuck. He gives me strength to overcome things I otherwise couldn't. He gives me wisdom for every problem and situation. He gives me love for those I find difficult to love. He fills my heart with generosity when I want to be stringy. He helps me do the right thing when I am going to fall short. This is not abstract, but a living reality in my life that grows more and more. He has utterly changed me and made me into a completely different person just like He said He would.

7) things that only work if you believe are hokum or placebo, things that only exist if you believe enough are pure fantasy.

Without buying your system, I have no sin to repent so I should go straight to heaven and collect my $200.

That's kind of like saying you don't believe in the law so you think you won't be punished when you break it. You have to account for your sin whatever you believe you have any or not. Your conscience, however, tells you that you have done wrong things.

9) You have cancer and some guy tells you God sent a car (he just needs $50 for telling you about it), it's invisible, and will take you to the cure, but you must believe the car exists, and when you die sitting in the freezing street he says it's your fault for not believing enough in God's magic cars. Duh. I'll buy my own plane ticket and get myself there, not wait for ethereal magic cars.

Let's say that you got a sign that the car was legitimate, but you still stubbornly chose not to go. For instance, you had a dream that a green car with a florida license plate drove up to your house, and a middle age woman got out and came up to your door and told you she was sent by God to take you to the cancer cure, and then it really happened. Does that change anything for you?

Mostly the questions are for you, in hope you might see the contradiction and self reinforcing mythos, but your answers do offer insight to your (and other people's) intractable mindsets. Thanks

God had revealed Himself to me, personally, and verified the scripture in my as true. I know that He loves me, personally, and I know that He loves you too. My hearts desire is that you would know that love. That is my mindset, primarily.

1) The resurrection is absolutely not historical. Jesus the man MIGHT be.

2) I know Christianity is a joke religion invented for political control by Constantine. That is a verifiable, historical fact.

3) mythos cannot verify mythos. You say Satan created other religions (many before Chritianity existed) to trick them out of worshiping Yahweh....why isn't that likely true of Christianity?

4) not true. Verified truth can be proven and defended against being twisted with fact and evidence, at least to those willing to examine actual evidence and not rely on only propaganda and myth. God (if he existed) should have more backbone, and a clear, unambiguous word/voice. ( Your position seems to be he's not willing to stand behind his word and prefers most people burn in hell for their God given inability to distinguish which is which.)
How is it different from politicians? They aren't empowered by all powerful, vengeful gods....clearly neither are clergy.

5) ...you shall stone them to death.....thou shalt not kill. Not so clear.

6) only those who believe are saved...so clearly the sin of disbelief is not erased and is worse than all others. If it's not automatic, he didn't die for MY sins or yours, he's trading being saved (from something he told you exists with zero evidence) for belief and obedience.

7) things that only work if you believe are hokum or placebo, things that only exist if you believe enough are pure fantasy.

Without buying your system, I have no sin to repent so I should go straight to heaven and collect my $200.

9) You have cancer and some guy tells you God sent a car (he just needs $50 for telling you about it), it's invisible, and will take you to the cure, but you must believe the car exists, and when you die sitting in the freezing street he says it's your fault for not believing enough in God's magic cars. Duh. I'll buy my own plane ticket and get myself there, not wait for ethereal magic cars.

Mostly the questions are for you, in hope you might see the contradiction and self reinforcing mythos, but your answers do offer insight to your (and other people's) intractable mindsets. Thanks

According to the JH website, it's not only wrong, the study could not show what you claim by it's design.
Excuse me...let me use their exact words....

Food Hypersensitivities and Their Link to RA

In some patients, specific foods have been shown to exacerbate the symptoms of RA.(ref 5) Avoiding these foods or food groups has been shown to have limited, short term benefits but no benefits long term. Even though different forms of dietary modification have reportedly improved symptoms in some patients, people with RA may have spontaneous temporary remissions. Therefore, it is important to perform double-blind, placebo controlled trials to differentiate diet effect from spontaneous remission. You may identify a food that is a particular trigger for you, and this phenomenon is real. However, the science is not able to reliably identify specific triggers for individuals.

Diet elimination therapy is a method of determining food hypersensitivities with patients. Elimination diets avoid a specific food or group of foods such as milk, meat or processed foods that are known to be prime allergy suspects. These foods are eliminated from the diet for a specific period of time. Foods are then gradually reintroduced one at a time, to determine whether any of them causes a reaction.

Panush and colleagues, demonstrated temporary improvement in the signs and symptoms of RA with diet elimination and modification in a controlled study where the symptoms associated with food sensitivities were studied.(ref 5) During this study when the patient was fasting or on a severely restricted diet, the patients symptoms improved significantly. However, when the patient had milk reintroduced into the diet, episodes of pain, swollen and tender joints and stiffness were experienced. Similarly, Kjeldsen-Kragh and colleagues(ref 6) noted that fasting may be effective in reducing the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, however most patients relapsed as new foods were reintroduced into the diet. Pain and discomfort frequently returned once a patient reverted to a normal diet. These studies are few in number and should be interpreted and extrapolated to real life only with careful thought and caution.

So, no vegan has arthritis, but the entire medical community just missed that fact? Not true.
One more total misrepresentation of the science by your guru....the ACTUAL science, from Hopkins, says....
"In some patients, specific foods have been shown to exacerbate the symptoms of RA.(ref 5) Avoiding these foods or food groups has been shown to have limited, short term benefits but no benefits long term. Even though different forms of dietary modification have reportedly improved symptoms in some patients, people with RA may have spontaneous temporary remissions. Therefore, it is important to perform double-blind, placebo controlled trials to differentiate diet effect from spontaneous remission. You may identify a food that is a particular trigger for you, and this phenomenon is real. However, the science is not able to reliably identify specific triggers for individuals."
So only in hyper sensitive patients that have allergies to dairy, meats, or processed foods has this appeared to be somewhat effective temporarily, not long term, not for everyone....and it seems only anecdotally at this point (they imply that there have not been double blind, placebo controlled studies yet).
Fish oils are FAR more effective, but, you know, that's an animal product, so McDougal (as he is want to do at every turn) dismisses it in favor of false claims about miraculous veganism and misrepresentation of the science.

I downvoted your comment for using misrepresentational propaganda and unverified anecdote masquerading as scientific data from a known liar with undeniable bias to support your unsupportable position(s), that veganism cures everything including cancer.

All you mac people are so snowed or blind or just desperately trying to justify your money being wasted on a inferior product.

any thing can be done faster on a proper pc (proper meaning it uses the latest processor memory ssd and graphics card)

but the trouble comes from people when they get on pc they get cheap and expect to do their video editing in virtual dub (not knocking vdub by the way)

or try and find some other video tool they can use for free . they wont buy a proper video editing software package nor will they buy proper software tools for their jobs . they try and use free alternatives or try and pirate the software.

but when they use mac they by the video editing software and the tools they need .

it is such bs, macs are weaker hardware weaker operating system and a weaker overall tool . but since people have invested so much money into them they unjustly justify there purchases by derailing the pc as a lesser platform.

when it is not true.

pcs, can have dedicated storage that outperforms and also stores more than any mac can dream of .

pcs can be all self contained no need for plethora of external drives hanging form 4 may be 3 or is it 2? soon to become one port hanging off your mac in a needless chain of wires.

pcs can have higher resolution and better monitors better user input, better configuration options, and backwards and forward compatibility with previous and next gen software.

but no, mac users over shadow this with the base argument that their $1500 mac is some how better than the $300 desktop they love comparing to .

but when it becomes price point vs hardware mac users have no ground to stand on as they are using , even in their newest machines 3+ year old hard ware and even on a refresh they are already 1 year behind in technology.

mac is nothing more than a placebo for those who failed at using windows computers .

they constantly compare a custom 1500 dollar computer with a locked in user experience to a 300 dollar walmart special with a completely open user experience and lament the windows based product as inferior.

when in actuality it is the mac that is the inferior product.

did you know that your $2000++ mac has a 5400 rpm hardrive in it configured to work with 128gb ssd in such a way that if either of the two fail your entire data set is trashed?

yeah ... thats a well built product .

Um... a panacea does actually cure a condition (actually, all conditions). Are you thinking of placebo? Opiate? Paxil? Panodil? Pandaxodil?

ugh...watching that was painful.
reminds me of my time running a metaphysical shop with my girlfriend at the time.

she had got it in her head that she wanted to take the shop in a new direction which was in the form of similar "miracle" cures such as this.

the arguments we had were epic!

i just didnt see a need nor a reason.we already had massage therapy,aroma therapy and reiki.we made our own lotions and soaps and had a massive line of candles.why would she want to delve into supplements? that were unproven and possibly dangerous?

well,i lost that argument and after a few months i understood her reasoning=money.
good lord our customers would spend a fortune on these supplements,which made all kinds of claims (all with zippo research to back those claims up),and all unregulated.

and our customers SWORE that these bullshit remedies worked and that they felt better,more energetic and clear-minded.placebo effect on steroids.

of course my girlfriend would never actually admit that profit was her motive.that would go against her own professed morality,but that is what it was:greed.

that was the beginning of the end for our relationship.i was sincerely attempting to help people and her behavior was a disillusionment that my moral compass just could not assimilate.

i am a man of faith,and every aspect of my life is directed by that faith,from politics to personal interactions,and i had lost faith in her.

i find it reprehensible and disgusting to profit off of people when they are the most fragile and vulnerable,and i refuse to engage in that form of vile practice.

*promote the grifting!

The Strange Science of the Placebo Effect has been added as a related post - related requested by PlayhousePals on that post.

Brand Name Placebos Are More Effective than Generic Placebos has been added as a related post - related requested by PlayhousePals.

*related=http://videosift.com/video/Brand-Name-Placebos-Are-More-Effective-than-Generic-Placebos

*related=http://videosift.com/video/Brand-Name-Placebos-Are-More-Effective-than-Generic-Placebos