What is it with Mormons and quack medicine?

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by JohnnyLingo

So let's see... the title of this thread is "What is it with Mormons and quack medicine?" and have two examples of anecdotal evidence to back that up.

Nice generalization. What makes you think Mormons are more likely to engage in holistic junk than other groups?

Apparently you were too lazy to read down to the last paragraph of my original post.

Trust me. I have dozens of anecdotal stories. This is the tip of the iceberg. Like I said, I was just wondering if others have seen the same types of things.

[Archaea]

The problem with herbs is the lack of controlled studies. Herbal salespeople make a bunch of unverifiable claims.

And from what I know, often the herbs are too dilute to produce the properties which many proponents make.

Conversely, before we had the titration and concentration techniques, herbs were our first medicines, so to opine that no herbs are of benefit would be false.

Usually, if there's high profit without verification, one should worry. In those cases, what I've usually found is benign substances that work no benefits, and merely loosen cash from the pockets of the possessor.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by The_Tick

Until the church puts their logo on the medicine, then I wouldn't care what the GA says.

You should go to the bishop then. If she wants to go to the bishop with the whole "GA" line, then he can talk with the Stake President.

I was serving in the mission field when a GA showed up at church one Sunday and released everyone that was in the PEC meeting. It was like sitting through a weekly Amway convention.

Bishop down to Sunday School President were all released.

Made for a great day at church.

She doesn't have any GA backing on the homeopath issue. And she always claims to have more support than she actually does anyway. My wife hates to go to the bishop with issues like this. Looks too much like tattling. But she may need to do it in this case.

[The_Tick]

Originally Posted by homeboy

She doesn't have any GA backing on the homeopath issue. And she always claims to have more support than she actually does anyway. My wife hates to go to the bishop with issues like this. Looks too much like tattling. But she may need to do it in this case.

I think you should go with her.

I like the "asking for a release" part. (Granted I am the YM President in my ward) But if I was told that "god doesn't speak to the Secretary", the YM President would be eating his own chiclets.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by homeboy

She doesn't have any GA backing on the homeopath issue. And she always claims to have more support than she actually does anyway. My wife hates to go to the bishop with issues like this. Looks too much like tattling. But she may need to do it in this case.

Church is not a place where goods and services should be promoted. If she persists in bucking authority to promote these goods and services, then the unpleasant due falls upon the lines of authority, ultimately, the bishop. You or your wife may have no choice.

[creekster]

At the risk of supplying Seattleute/catblue with unneeded support for his periodic cirticisms of our group's reasoning skills, let me say that I think the correlation is not between mormons and quack remedies but between any group that relies on non-empirical (or non-scientific method) thought processes to guide a significant part of their lives and quack remedies. The reason people use those remedies is becaseu they are willing to accept the claims on faith without using their reasoning skills to analyze whether it could be true. People that are used to relying on faith and feelings in one part of their life (religion) find it is a very small and easy step to rely on feeling and faith in another part of their life, especially when they are confronted with a charismatic presence that sells it to them.

This issue is frequently the basis for Catblue's posts; rational and critical thinking grounded in the scientific method tells us that quack medical remedies can't be effective. So why don't we apply the same approach to religion? CatBlue thinks you should and that you will then be led to a non-faith based world view. (This is oppsoed to RobinFinderson's approach, btw, who seems to have had a sort of mystical gestalt that led him to his own special place in the spirityual realm of the cosmos, which I gather is located in the Nevada desert). There is no empirical answer to Catblue's argument, btw, becasue religious belief comes from faith and, occasionally, the need to suspend critical thinking in order to receive communion with the spirit. From a rational point of view, however, the difference between a testimnoy and snake oil is a matter of degree and direction. From my pioint of view, however, my spiritual experiences are transcendant and provide me with sustenance that is not otherwise avaialble. They do not, nor do I believe they ever would, require me to harm my children or myself by ignoring vlaid and uselful medical treatment.

Hopefully this made snese and you can get past the typos. The irony is that I HATE misspelled words, but I can't type worth *&^%$ and I already waste too much time typing this stuff without wasting more to edit it.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by Archaea

The problem with herbs is the lack of controlled studies. Herbal salespeople make a bunch of unverifiable claims.

And from what I know, often the herbs are too dilute to produce the properties which many proponents make.

Conversely, before we had the titration and concentration techniques, herbs were our first medicines, so to opine that no herbs are of benefit would be false.

Usually, if there's high profit without verification, one should worry. In those cases, what I've usually found is benign substances that work no benefits, and merely loosen cash from the pockets of the possessor.

Here is my "sniff test" when someone approaches me about some of this stuff. I ask the following:

1) has the medicine been subjected to double-blind clinical trial? If it truly works like you claim, it should perform wonderfully in such a trial.

2) does the physician doing the diagnosis also make any money selling the "medicine" resulting from the diagnosis? If so, it is a blatant conflict of interest and is unethical.

[Archaea]

Even our "double blind" studies are subject to manipulation. I'm not a sophisticated physician, but I've seen how our drug companies will put forth this "independent" study from a physician or group of physicians, only to have that physician(s) promote the drug after the "study".

[bluegoose]

Very well stated creekster. I hardly even noticed the typos, I was so enthralled by the content.

Having lived in several different regions of the US and Canada, my personal observation is that there is a much greater prevalence of individuals in our mormon subculture who subscribe to these homeopathic remedies than in other subcultures, aside from possibly Seventh Day Adventists. But then again, when comparing the LDS with SDA, there are several similarities that should be noted regarding laws pertaining to health.

I assume the reason for this observation is exactly as stated above - strict laws regarding health and a reliance on principles of faith in order to accept certain religious ideas.

btw, if I hadn't grown to "trust" what homeboy has to say, I would say that this story regarding the RS pres was made up. Incredible. How did your wife respond to the RS pres when she was told she "doesn't speak to Jesus; she's only the seceratry"? I can't imagine someone even thinking something like that, let alone stating it out loud directly to someone.

[tooblue]

Here is the key statement to your dilema ...

Church is not a place where goods and services should be promoted. If she persists in bucking authority to promote these goods and services, then the unpleasant due falls upon the lines of authority, ultimately, the bishop. You or your wife may have no choice.

Firstly the hand book of instruction is very clear on this subject ... the promotion of goods and or services is not to be promoted by church leaders or within the construct of Ward leadership ... refering to the hand book will always quell all disputation.

Secondly, whenever I am presented with a scenario wherein a leader other than the Stake President states that he/she has spoken to a GA and recieved support for their particular agenda or brand of the gospel I in turn very bluntly state that such instruction was not given to me therefore it is not relevant to me or my respective stewardship. Furthermore if such instruction was delivered at say conference then I demand proof of such council ... LDS.org exists for many reasons.