The Notion of Consensus
“Let’s be
clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus.
Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary,
requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means
that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the
real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is
reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great
precisely because they broke with the consensus.
There is no such
thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science.
If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period.”
“… Finally, I would
remind you to notice where the claim of consensus is invoked.
Consensus is invoked only in situations where the science is not
solid enough. Nobody says the consensus of scientists agrees that E =
mc². Nobody says the consensus is that the sun is 93 million miles
away. It would never occur to anyone to speak that way.””
Of around 2500
treatments so far reviewed by the journal's distinguished team of
advisors, peer reviewers, experts, information specialists and
statisticians, only 13 percent have been found definitely beneficial.
A further 23 percent are rated as likely to be beneficial; 8 percent
can be classified as a trade off between benefits and harms; 6
percent as clearly unlikely to be beneficial; 4 percent are likely to
be ineffective or harmful, and a whopping 46 percent - almost half of
all treatments reviewed - are rated as being of unknown
effectiveness. WHERE'S THE EVIDENCE? by Ralph Moss
"Allopathy : Also
known as ‘scientific medicine’, ‘orthodox medicine’ and
‘modern medicine’, is barely about 200 years old. It lays
emphasis on drugs. It offers antibiotics, synthetic vitamins,
steroids, chemotherapy, radiation, and immunization all of which are
highly dangerous. Its diagnostics methods are not foolproof and 95%
of surgeries in allopathic hospitals are unnecessary. Doctors of
modern medicine receive their continuing education from Medical
Representatives of (P)harmaceuticals, and prescribe lethal drugs
based on cuts and commission. These inadequately tested and
prescribed drugs create more diseases. Allopathy is a ‘pseudo
science’ which has done more harm to health and wellbeing of
humanity than any other 40 odd systems of healing described
below."---- A TO Z OF ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE by Dr. Leo Rebello
(A chapter from Dr. Leo Rebello's popular book AIDS and Alternative
Medicine, 4th Edition)
Scientific medicine is
one term accepted by these (allopathic) physicians. This name lays
exclusive claim to a "scientific" foundation on a body of
knowledge, derived from both research and observation, that is
chronicled in peer-reviewed journals. It has a history of controlled,
clinical studies; has a strong tradition of basic laboratory science;
and is closely affiliated with medical schools and hospital research
centers. But alternative practitioners, short on laboratory science
but long on case reports, can also point to a historic collection of
observations and data. With the NIH now enrolled as a sponsor, they
will be soon publishing the results of more rigorous clinical
studies, whatever their outcome, and may establish a stronger
scientific foundation for their work. The term scientific medicine
implies that other healing practices are not grounded in reality. It
suggests, in a not so subtle manner, that alternative practices have
no scientific or technological underpinnings, no systematization of
facts, methods, or principles. Annals of Internal Medicine
"Despite the
tendency of doctors to call modern medicine an 'inexact science', it
is more accurate to say there is practically no science in modern
medicine at all. Almost everything doctors do is based on a
conjecture, a guess, a clinical impression, a whim, a hope, a wish,
an opinion or a belief. In short, everything they do is based on
anything but solid scientific evidence. Thus, medicine is not a
science at all, but a belief system. Beliefs are held by every
religion, including the Religion of Modern Medicine." Robert
Mendelsohn MD Preface by Hans Ruesch to 1000 Doctors (and many more)
Against Vivisection
"Most patients
probably assume that when a doctor proposes to use an established
treatment to conquer a disease he will be using a treatment which has
been tested, examined and proven. But this is not the case. The
savage truth is that most medical research is organised, paid for,
commissioned or subsidised by the drug industry (and the food,
tobacco and alcohol industries). This type of research is designed,
quite simply, to find evidence showing a new product is of commercial
value. The companies which commission such research are not terribly
bothered about evidence; what they are looking for are conclusions
which will enable them to sell their product. Drug company sponsored
research is done more to get good reviews than to find out the
truth."----Dr Vernon Coleman
"Today's medical
training is based upon pronouncement and opinion rather than on
investigation and scientific experience. In medical schools students
are bombarded with information but denied the time or the opportunity
to question the ex-cathedra statements which are made from an archaic
medical culture. Time and again new treatments and new techniques are
introduced on a massive scale without there being any scientific
support for them and without doctors knowing what the long term
consequences are likely to be. Instead of experimenting and then
practising tried and trusted techniques, modern medical practitioners
use all their patients as guinea pigs and practice their black art as
a massive international experiment."----Dr Vernon Coleman
"Doctors go to
great lengths to disguise the fact that they are practising a black
art rather than a science. The medical profession has created a
'pseudoscience' of mammoth proportions and today's doctors rely on a
vast variety of instruments and tests and pieces of equipment with
which to explain and dignify their interventions. This, of course, is
nothing new. The alchemists of the middle ages and the witch doctors
of Africa realised that words and spells reeked of gods and sorcery
and so they created a secret and impenetrable structure of herbs,
songs, dance, rattling of special bones, chants and ceremonial
incantations. Today's clinicians have much more sophisticated mumbo
jumbo to offer. They have laser surgery and psychotherapy, CAT
scanners and serum manganese assessments to substantiate their claims
to be scientists. But however good the impenetrable pseudoscience may
sound or seem to be, and however well based on scientific principles
the equipments and the techniques is still little more than mumbo
jumbo. Doctors may use scientific instruments but that doesn't make
them scientists any more than a witch doctor would become a scientist
if he wore a stethoscope and danced around a microscope!"----Dr
Vernon Coleman
"Now, if doctors
were aware that medicine was not a science and that they were pulling
what is undoubtedly the largest and most successful confidence trick
ever tried the damage would be fairly minimal. But the problem is
compounded by the fact that the vast majority of doctors believe the
lie that they are taught; they believe that they are scientists,
practising an applied science."----Dr Vernon Coleman
"In the last
century the practice of medicine has become no more than an adjunct
to the pharmaceutical industry and the other aspects of the huge,
powerful and immensely profitable health care industry. Medicine is
no longer an independent profession. Doctors have become nothing more
than a link connecting the pharmaceutical industry to the
consumer."----Dr Vernon Coleman
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