On 03/06/2013 01:35 PM, curtisdeltablues wrote: > The key is being able to answer the question: " Is there a test even in > principle, that could show that the theory is false?". It often involves > making the claim more precise. But even your second example: The brain waves > of students practicing TM show increased coherence, might be unfalsifiable > depending on how you define "coherence". And remember coherence is a > mathematical model being applied to the raw data. It is very easy to massage > the numbers to show some type of "coherence". For it to be falsifiable it > must be possible for someone to go through the test and for them to say "our > theory is not valid, coherence does not increase." > > But that isn't how the movement uses science for marketing. Movement > scientists would just continue to manipulate the data using different > formulas until something they could call coherence could be found. In TM > research, it is never a possible outcome that TM ever does anything bad to a > person, or that positive benefits are not "proven". If the experiment > doesn't show what they already believe, the frame around the experiment is > shifted until it shows something positive. > > Framing a test in a way that is falsifiable requires a detachment from the > outcome. You have to really care enough about the truth to plug up all the > loopholes that compromise falsifiability. We have many cognitive biases > toward winging it when it comes to our beliefs. Few people really want to go > through the hard work it would take to really test something. > > So yes you need precision in formulating the hypothesis, but that is not > enough. You have to understand how each variable affects the test. Our big > pharma testing system has the exact same problems movement research has. > They are always ready to turn capillary dilators into boner pills. They are > not setting up the research with big bucks to find out that the pill does > more harm than good. > > Lots of New Age "medical" practices operate this way. The results are so > vague that there is no way for you to conclude that it just didn't work. > Every result has an explanation, but the system itself is never tested > rigorously.
Of course the problem there is that alternative medical practices simply don't have the money to do such testing. And some of those cures are so simple including ones that are even "kitchen cabinet" just using herbs you may have there. No money in that for big pharma so instead they try to destroy alternative medicine so they can sell you expensive cures. Unrestrained capitalism is a crime against humanity. That said, fortunately over the years some of the simple cures do get tested. I recall that in the 1970s a dentist in Florida had some program to use just baking soda for dental care. Of course he was lambasted as a "quack". Now go to your supermarket and take a look at toothpaste that includes or advertises baking soda used. Ayurveda suggests turmeric or even triphala as a mouth wash to prevent gingivitis. I have use Crest's Total Health which I noticed is as astringent as those two herbs and would bet that astringency is at the basis of the cure.
