In the spirit of friendly banter :
Mr_Grue wrote:It's that it does harm that's the problem
Does it? I thought it was sugar?
Mr_Grue wrote: there's the view that Boots oughtn't be selling stuff that does no better than placebo simply on the basis that some people want to buy it.
But should it not be selling things that may make some people feel better via the placebo effect? It may not work for you, but if it helps other people, why not? I do not feel this is particulalry unethical.
Mr_Grue wrote: By failing to speak out against taking pills containing nothing for the treatment of the doldrums or head colds, you create the groundwork for the more deluded to go off to Africa to try and cure AIDS with pills containing nothing.
No, I don't think so. You create a situation where someone suffering from a headcold will get cured from it in seven days with sugar pills, and someone taking aspirin and vitamin C in 1 week.
As for the AIDS argument you put forward, I find it a little far fetched. I'm not saying it has not /cannot happen, but it is no different in my view to all the unfortunate stories we've heard about counterfeit drugs on that continent.
Mr_Grue wrote: To say that homeopathy is harmless ignores the cases where people have chosen (or have had chosen for them) homeopathy over conventional treatment for life-threatening but preventable illnesses. it's not harmless; people die.
I don't know anyone, or of anyone, in a critical condition who has ever chosen exclusively alternative over mainstream medicine. Again, not saying it cannot / has not happened, just that it has never come to my attention. I presume this has been studied?
Sure it would be harmful to take sugar pills instead of chemo. I'm just not sure that it happens that often, or often enough to outlaw the potential benefits of a placebo. You can't stop people ignoring doctor's recommendations, at the end of the day everyone is free to choose to live /die whichever way they please.
Mr_Grue wrote: The skepticism movement is about encouraging people to question what they are told, and to provide a firm counter to those who mistakenly think that their beliefs allow them to behave badly.
Fair enough, we have a brain at birth and may as well make use of it, but questioning everything for questioning's sake, without a formal education in a specific domain may occasionaly make people sound like dumbasses.