By: Shawn Alli
Posted: May 31, 2017 (on http://www.shawnalli.com/)
Nye starts off by debunking black magic and alternative healing by showing how electromagnetism works. Yes, that clearly debunks everything. He says that alternative medicine doesn't work because of double blind experiments. It's a shame that he doesn't mention the industry funding from Big Pharma, or the ideological science that bends all of those great double blind experiments (see A Broken Peer-Reviewed Process in Philosophy Reborn Part III: Science).
And Nye's silence about Big Pharma's role in creating ideological science isn't accidental. It's intentional. Why? Because most scientists and science journalists are just cheerleaders for Big Pharma. Sure, there's a little criticism here and there, but that's just for the appearance of neutrality.
Nye then shifts to the placebo effect (which scientists pretend to understand but actually don't). The placebo effect is when your beliefs cause a physical reaction in your body. What's the problem? A belief is non-physical. In terms of religious beliefs, there's no such thing as a neural network of religious neurons (see Philosophy of Mind in Philosophy Reborn Part I: Purpose).
The fact that non-physical beliefs can cause a physical change in your body doesn't work with the current physics (see Philosophy of Science in Philosophy Reborn Part I: Purpose and Extra Sensory Perception in Part III: Science).
Sadly, most physicists won't attempt to create a falsifiable theory of how the placebo effect works because most believe in physicalism (only physical matter can cause things). I argue against physicalism in the above books.
Nye then laments the horrors of unregulated dietary supplements. In reality, common sense is the best solution (see The War Against Natural Health in Philosophy Reborn Part V: Naturally Unhealthy Big Gov't, Big Ag, Big Industry). While some dietary supplements may be toxic, the most they'll usually cause is sickness. But if a pharmaceutical drug is toxic, it can cause death. That's a big difference. Yet Nye doesn't mention this. Again, that's not accidental. That's intentional.
And no, natural foods don't need double blind peer-reviewed articles to prove that they're healthy and good for you. But Nye doesn’t mention the anti-cancer, anti-autoimmune, and anti-viral effects of regular fruits and vegetables (see The Cancer Industry and Autoimmune Diseases for Everyone in Philosophy Reborn Part IV: Naturally Unhealthy Big Pharma & Big Media and Viruses & Vaccines in Part V: Unhealthy Big Gov't, Big Ag, Big Industry).
Again, that silence is not accidental. That's intentional. Why? Because Nye (like most people in the skeptic movement), are just cheerleaders for Big Pharma. Or simply put, like doctors, they're drug pushers.
The fact that Nye doesn't believe that dietary supplements or natural foods can heal you is sad and unethical. You need to understand that Nye isn't trying to help you get better. Like most cheerleader scientists, they want you to be naturally unhealthy and on pharmaceutical drugs for life.
And in that naturally unhealthy state, you'll more or less accept all the garbage ideologies that the government advocates. Again, none of this is accidental. It's intentional. While some scientists and science journalists are useful idiots, most (like Nye) are all in with climate change, Big Pharma, Big Ag, and Big Gov't (non-Trump government).
Nye says that cigarettes are more regulated than natural dietary supplements. Umm...that only takes away from the argument that regulation means safer products. He says that regulations exist to protect us. Again, clearly that doesn't apply to cigarettes. While I'm sure that Nye isn't saying that cigarettes are better for you than dietary supplements, he shoots himself in the foot trying to say otherwise.
Nye says that the natural claims that doctors don't want you know about this or this will cure you in a weekend are false claims. The latter definitely isn't true (natural health works, but only if you give it time, see Autoimmune Diseases for Everyone in Philosophy Reborn Part IV: Naturally Unhealthy Big Pharma & Big Media).
But the former is true. Many doctors don't want you to use natural health foods and supplements to cure your chronic illnesses because they'll lose business. As we all know, there's no money in cures. There's only money in keeping you in a state of being naturally unhealthy.
The fact that Nye dismisses all natural health medicine as nonsense is disingenuous and unethical. Nye is all in with Big Pharma. Western-European (WE) doctors and scientists want you to be drugged up and docile in order for you to be milked by government and industry for everything you have. How does Nye sleep at night? I wouldn't be surprised if he drugs himself to sleep like so many liberals do in the Trump era.
Nye lists characteristics of bad medicine on his quack-o-meter:
Invoking ancient wisdom
Ambiguous cultural references
Better because it's natural.
I've lived and worked in isolated Aboriginal communities in the Northwest Territories of Canada for almost 3 years. If I were an Aboriginal person practicing a traditional life, I would tell Nye to go f*ck himself. Why? Because he's belittling my (just pretending) culture.
Next up, Joanna Hausmann (a member of Nye's team) looks into new age sound healing. Oddly enough, there's an Edgar Cayce quotation. That's impressive. I didn't know that skeptics are intelligent enough to read Cayce (The Sleeping Prophet). Oh wait, they probably just read one page and then dismiss everything. Well done.
In the investigation, Hausmann goes to a new age shop for sound healing where a healer yells at her stomach to remove bad energy. Yes, it's very easy to pick on the lowest of the lowest for new age cures. Why don't you try picking on a diet rich in natural whole foods that prevents and cures cancer (see The Cancer Industry in Philosophy Reborn Part IV: Naturally Unhealthy Big Pharma & Big Media).
And yes, many new age healers are charging massive amounts of money for garbage cures. Again, common sense is the best medicine to avoid new age people who are lost in their ideologies. Or, if you’re really lost, you can turn to radical dualism (see Philosophy of Mind in Philosophy Reborn Part I: Purpose and Autoimmune Diseases for Everyone in Part IV: Naturally Unhealthy Big Pharma & Big Media).
Nye convenes his panel: Donald Schultz (a filmmaker), Cara Santa Maria (notable skeptic and science journalist), and Chris Beedie (a professor of applied sports and exercise).
Schultz says that ultrasound can break up kidney stones. But the rest of the panel shuts him down by pretending that ultrasound doesn't really count as sound. Clearly, objective science has already left the building.
Professor Beedie makes an excellent point that I raise in Extra Sensory Perception in Philosophy Reborn Part III: Science. He says that people who get the placebo pill experience the negative side effects of the actual drug. That's incredible. This is the power of the non-physical mind. Sadly, Beedie interprets this as a nocebo effect (a negative effect from a placebo effect). Maria shuts him down and rails on homeopathy.
Oddly enough, Beedie tries again to argue that Schultz's point about ultrasound healing is correct. But Nye shuts him down quickly with sarcasm and the blues. Beedie is actually trying to have an intelligent conversation about objective science, and Maria and Nye are shutting him down. Fascinating.
Schultz then argues for alternative/complimentary medicine having positive effects and cites research about using mushrooms and music to affect depression in a positive manner. Well done Schultz. But again, Maria and Nye shut him down.
Beedie tells Nye positive stories of athletes using the placebo effect to get better results. And they do get better results. Nye doesn't like this. He wants to hear that the placebo effect is having more negative effects and not helping people. I must admit, this is a very entertaining panel.
The panel then talks about auras and dismisses it as nonsense. To be fair, there's no credible research that shows that people have auras around them. People can believe what they want, but there's no objective science today that shows that auras exist.
Schultz is correct in saying that when you're on LSD or other drugs, you can see and feel a person's aura/presence. Personally, I've never tried LSD as of this writing. But I'd like to experience it at least once in my life with a loving person.
Both Maria and Nye shut him down by laughing it off. Nye tries to ridicule crystal therapy but Schultz still fights for it. Again, Nye and Maria shut him down by laughing it off. Clearly, Schultz has done various natural drugs and had incredible ESP experiences. I commend him for his bravery for being a part of this panel.
Prashanth Venkat (a member of Nye's team) takes center stage and ridicules new age cures. Thank god, the first visible minority of the show. He claims that sound healing has nothing to do with Buddhism or Hinduism. Umm...what? Google "sound healing Buddhism" or Hinduism and you'll see that sound is a small but significant part of both religions/ways of life.
Oddly enough, no one mentions binaural beat therapy for meditation. I use binaural beats for the simple reason that they're pleasant and calming.
Venkat goes on to ridicule yoga. I've never done yoga in my life. But many people swear by it and find it both spiritually enlightening and physically beneficial. To be fair, self-help gurus tend to hinder people instead of empowering them. Former Yoga guru Bikram Choudhury's fall from grace is well deserved. [1] But for Venkat to dismiss yoga as nonsense is disingenuous. Venkat is just talking out of his ass while attempting to do stand-up comedy.
Nye says that a lot of the effective medicine you buy starts off as natural medicine. Umm...not really. Synthetic pharmaceutical drugs have never been natural by any means. Saying that it's based on a natural compound doesn't make it natural.
Nye and musician Steve Aoki create an experiment to simulate stomach acid. It's a shame that Aoki does practically nothing. It almost feels like he's a token visible minority on the show just to checkmark the box.
The problem with the experiment is chemistry vs. biology. Your stomach is more than just chemistry. It's biology due to your gut bacteria. It's not just chemical compounds in a sterile environment.
This experiment is not analogous to your stomach biology. This is the same mistake that Nye makes in his first water sea level rise experiment and claiming that it's analoguos to sea level rise. Incompetence at its best.
References:
[1] Godwin, Richard. 'He said he could do what he wanted': the scandal that rocked Bikram yoga. Guardian. February 18, 2017.