Would you like a surprisingly positive result?
Would you care to experience improvement?
Who wouldn't?
Even if it is all a sham?
The effect of placebos has been shown by randomised controlled trials to be very large.
Just to remind you what a PLACEBO is we provide the following definition:
"a substance or procedure… that is objectively without specific activity for the condition being treated"
In short: a simulated or otherwise medically ineffectual treatment for a disease or other medical condition intended to deceive the recipient.
But, wait! How can it be a sham and ineffective and yet bring about improvement and positive results??
Something is awry here!
Well, not exactly.....
Here is something to think about.
If you become sick the natural course the illness will ALWAYS take is one of two paths.
Path 1: You feel bad........feel worse.....and worse....a little better.....better.....you're back to normal and feel fine.
Path 2: You feel bad........feel worse....and worse....you die!
At what point do the majority of sufferers decide to try a medical intervention??
At the point where they feel "worse and worse".
So, consider the logical outcome of ANY medicine, treatment, therapy or "belief" about same...
Path 1: You feel bad......feel worse.....and worse...(insert treatment)...a little better.....better....you're back to normal and feel fine.
Compare this to doing NOTHING.
Path 1: You feel bad......feel worse.....and worse... (no treatment or sham treatment) ...a little better....better....you're back to normal and feel fine.
Are you at all surprised? Whether you do something or nothing or something which is the same as nothing.....you get better.
The only alternative is Path 2 in which you die! *
You can die after the best or the worst treatment just as you can improve after the best or worse treatment.
The point we SHOULD NOT MISS is the following counter-intuitive idea:
You will either improve anyway or die anyway--but--most likely you'll BELIEVE you improved BECAUSE OF the treatment you sought!!
Is it "belief" or "faith IN" a treatment that makes you better? NO!
It is the fact that there are only two possible outcomes anyway!
Most often we do NOT die. So....we praise whatever treatment we sought and applied.
PLACEBO thinking is not thinking which has anything to do with FAITH or BELIEF.
It actually has everything to do with attribution!
If you Pray you believe that prayer will be effective. You'll either improve (anyway) or die.
Every time you don't die you'll attribute the CAUSE of improvement to what? The natural course of illness? No. To your INTERVENTION!
cum hoc ergo propter hoc: believing that correlation implies a causal relation. Example
- Argument: More cows die in the summer months. More ice cream is consumed in summer months. Therefore, the consumption of ice cream in the summer months is killing cows.
- There are a great many phony cures, remedies, quack medications being used. NOW YOU KNOW WHY THEY......ummm...."work"!
- *If you need an operation and don't elect to allow it the natural result would be worsening and death. So, you need the operation, certainly. The operation allows the natural improvement which follows. The point of the above is to consider how UNWITTING we can be about cause and effect if we are not fully informed. A placebo is unwitting.