Naturopaths Hate Rhinos

Neurologica discusses a photo gallery entitled, Unorthodox Cures.  Many of the pics are wacky.

But this one made me tearful:

It reminded me of this:

"Poachers have butchered the last adult rhinoceros at a South African game reserve, cutting off her horn and letting her bleed to death, the chief game ranger says." Link.

The world rhino population has been decimated by more than 90 percent over the past 40 years, thanks to Traditional Chinese Medicine.

"Natural" medicine never says, "We tested treatment X and discovered it doesn't work and therefore we don't use it any more." 

And that is why so-called "natural" medicine is evil.

HURR DURR FOR NATUROPATHY!!!!

For the lives wasted studying nonsense.

Naturopathy is witchcraft

Two days until the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians holds their annual meeting. This year the United States government will be honoring them by sending Dr. Josephine Briggs, director of the National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine, to speak. Our tax dollars at work!

Naturopathy is a religion with the "Vital Force" as the supreme being dictating what is good and what is evil, what is holy and what is unclean.

Naturopathy is also witchcraft –a set of rituals and practices believed to ward off misfortune via the manipulation of unseen, supernatural forces.

Naturopathy in this country is also a political movement. Its enemy is "materialism," and thus it finds allies among those who like their government with a bit of old-school divine blessing and guidance.

My government involving itself with naturopathy forgets its Enlightenment foundation. America was to be a nation of individuals capable of self-rule via appeals to reason and evidence rather than divine or "natural" authority.

What’s up, Dr. Briggs?

The Hermit Thrush

The last minute of this video captures the haunting, flute-like song of hermit thrush nicely.

If you've wandered through a forest on a summer day and suddenly felt a moment of enchantment, it's possible the hermit thrush had cast a spell upon you.

Like all ground nesting birds, the hermit thrush is having a hard time in many places.  The reasons: 1) habitat loss and 2) cats. 

Cats are not native to North America but were introduced by European settlers.  Consequently, there are several American mammals and birds ill equipped to deal with the selective pressure of cat predation. 

Basically, anything that nests on the ground is toast if cats are allowed to roam free.

As the human population has expanded into woodlands and wetlands, so too have the cats.  We must raise awareness of the problem of cat predation now if we hope to reverse the steady decline in song bird populations along the eastern United States.

Keep your cat indoors, please --especially if you live near a river or a lake where birds tend to nest.

Weta Trimaran Sailboat

I now has.



Woohoo!

Naturopathy: the choice of many thousands!

Naturopathy (aka "natural medicine") is Retarded

Exhibit B: Polarity



Dude looks like he knows his way around the herbs, lol.

I find the woman's confidence strangely charming. Baffling, yes. But also charming.

Naturopathy is Subjectivity Run Amok: Exhibit A

Mercola talks with someone pimping something called "Matrix Energentics."  Just from the title, you know "quantum" will get a shout out.


 
Why doesn't Mercola use The Force to imagine up himself a nice head of hair?  That shiny dome can't feel good in direct sunlight.

Naturopathy is a Joke

Everyone is groaning about Dr. Josephine Briggs, the Director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) appearing on the speaker's list at the 25th Anniversary Convention of the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians (AANP) from August 11-15 in Portland, OR.

Dr. Kimball Atwood wrote her a letter.

Dr. David Gorski thinks it would be awesome if Dr. Briggs were to speak science to woo, but isn't getting his hopes up.

I wondered if Dr. Briggs might have once fallen in love with someone into naturopathy, maybe when she lived in Germany where naturopathy has a following. Love can make smart, sane people buy into the most unbelievable bullshit sometimes.

The pro-science bloggers I've chatted with seem generally disappointed in Dr. Briggs for her decision to party with the naturopaths next month.

I remember reading something on homeopathy about ten years ago, explaining that the volume of water needed to dilute one molecule of active ingredient would fill the entire solar system. I laughed out loud. I shared the article with my husband and he laughed out loud.

Before that moment I had only a vague awareness of homeopathy, which I imagined was a collection of olde timey herbal nostrums. I had no idea the basic tenets of "like cures like" was so profoundly idiotic.

Public awareness of the joke that is homeopathy has been growing in Europe and the US, thanks to skeptics.

Now, in my humble opinion, would be an excellent time to spot a similar light upon the lulzcow known as "naturopathy."

Naturopathy, being a confused set of varied practices, doesn't provide the same neat target as homeopathy. And naturopaths generally talk like sane people about things like diet, exercise, and stress management when faced with an audience of non-believers, so the crazy stuff isn't immediately apparent.

But the crazy is there. And more importantly, the lulz are there also.

Think of homeopathic "provings." The homeopath ingests some non-dilute thing, then waits... and waits... and waits... his attention turned inward upon bodily sensations, feeling states, and mental imagery. After comparing notes with other homeopaths, the substance is deemed a means to cause certain effects or symptoms, and so can be used in dilute form to stop those symptoms.

In short, a "proving" is subjectivity run amok with no awareness of its quirks and frequent misfires.

Same thing with naturopathy. Vis medicatrix naturae is an *inner* guide regarding "wellness" verses "dis-ease." The inner guide determines what is "natural" or "healthy." Facts, not so much.

Watch people on YouTube consulting the Force to correct their "polarity" or to decide which supplements to take. Lulz will ensue.

Once the public see naturopathy for what it is, maybe the US can get back to investing in reality-based medicine.

Would you like to know the 313 secrets of Tarvu?

I gotta say, these Tarvu videos are slick. High production values.

I wonder who's paying for the whole Tarvu thing. But I don't want the genius behind it outed if he or she might become one of Scientology's "fair game" targets.

Update: Oh, LOL, I shoulda Googled. Tarvu was created by Robert Popper and Peter Serafinowicz --the guys behind the British TV show, "Look Around You."