Recommended Reading

John Harvey · Post by **John Harvey** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 9:37 am

Hi, Liz --

I understand your unhappiness at the idea that I'm denigrating all previous glimpses of homoeopathy, and it wasn't really my intent to denigrate them at all. The glimpses that Stahl and Hippocrates had of the possibility of the truth of the law of similars were glimpses of something marvellous, and the pity of it is that nothing was done about this before the rise of pharmaceutical commercialism, which we have been up against from homoeopathy's very inception.

My intent was really to convey the equality of all such unproven, untested ideas before Hahnemann's vision. As the Organon's Introduction alone testifies, there were many such, and many were acted upon, but nobody set out to test any of them. So in that sense, every idea of how to treat illness was as "crackpot" as any other, regardless (as I said last time) of the fact that some of them were completely on the button. "Crackpot" here is shorthand for the kind of castle-in-the-air speculation that Kent described of Sulphur: capable of many storeys of construction, but having no foundation.

You may be right about the old folk medicine of Germany, but considering where Hahnemann spent the early part of his life, I'd be surprised to find that he'd overlooked it.

You are most certainly wrong, however, in conceiving that Hahnemann tied together a number of folk speculations to create homoeopathy. A single careful reading of the Organon will show you exactly its origins in Hahnemann's exasperation with the puerility of Cullen's reasoning behind the power of Peruvian bark to break up the regularity of intermittent fevers and in his singularly original conception of learning what Peruvian bark does through learning its effects on the healthy: the connection between the two that nobody before him had made and few since really appreciate.

Cheers!

John
2009/7/25 Liz Brynin >

Post by **Soroush Ebrahimi** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 9:42 am

THANKS John!
Soroush

________________________________

From: minutus@yahoogroups.com [mailto:minutus@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of John Harvey
Sent: 25 July 2009 08:38
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Minutus] Re: Recommended Reading
Hi, Liz --

I understand your unhappiness at the idea that I'm denigrating all previous glimpses of homoeopathy, and it wasn't really my intent to denigrate them at all. The glimpses that Stahl and Hippocrates had of the possibility of the truth of the law of similars were glimpses of something marvellous, and the pity of it is that nothing was done about this before the rise of pharmaceutical commercialism, which we have been up against from homoeopathy's very inception.

My intent was really to convey the equality of all such unproven, untested ideas before Hahnemann's vision. As the Organon's Introduction alone testifies, there were many such, and many were acted upon, but nobody set out to test any of them. So in that sense, every idea of how to treat illness was as "crackpot" as any other, regardless (as I said last time) of the fact that some of them were completely on the button. "Crackpot" here is shorthand for the kind of castle-in-the-air speculation that Kent described of Sulphur: capable of many storeys of construction, but having no foundation.

You may be right about the old folk medicine of Germany, but considering where Hahnemann spent the early part of his life, I'd be surprised to find that he'd overlooked it.

You are most certainly wrong, however, in conceiving that Hahnemann tied together a number of folk speculations to create homoeopathy. A single careful reading of the Organon will show you exactly its origins in Hahnemann's exasperation with the puerility of Cullen's reasoning behind the power of Peruvian bark to break up the regularity of intermittent fevers and in his singularly original conception of learning what Peruvian bark does through learning its effects on the healthy: the connection between the two that nobody before him had made and few since really appreciate.

Cheers!

John
2009/7/25 Liz Brynin >
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"Nothing is so fatal to the progress of the human mind as to suppose that our views of science are ultimate; that there are no mysteries in nature; that our triumphs are complete; and that there are no new worlds to conquer."

— Sir Humphry Davy, in "An Account of some Galvanic Combinations", Philosophical Transactions 91 (1801), pp. 397–402 (as quoted by David Knight, Humphry Davy: Science and Power, Cambridge, 1998, p. 87)

John Harvey · Post by **John Harvey** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 9:59 am

I'm not sure what for, but... 'twere nothin'.

John
2009/7/25 >
________________________________
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"Nothing is so fatal to the progress of the human mind as to suppose that our views of science are ultimate; that there are no mysteries in nature; that our triumphs are complete; and that there are no new worlds to conquer."

— Sir Humphry Davy, in "An Account of some Galvanic Combinations", Philosophical Transactions 91 (1801), pp. 397–402 (as quoted by David Knight, Humphry Davy: Science and Power, Cambridge, 1998, p. 87)

Post by **Soroush Ebrahimi** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 10:41 am

It was an excellent answer!

________________________________

From: minutus@yahoogroups.com [mailto:minutus@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of John Harvey
Sent: 25 July 2009 09:00
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Minutus] Re: Recommended Reading

I'm not sure what for, but... 'twere nothin'.

John
2009/7/25 >
________________________________
--
------------------------------------------------------------------

"Nothing is so fatal to the progress of the human mind as to suppose that our views of science are ultimate; that there are no mysteries in nature; that our triumphs are complete; and that there are no new worlds to conquer."

— Sir Humphry Davy, in "An Account of some Galvanic Combinations", Philosophical Transactions 91 (1801), pp. 397–402 (as quoted by David Knight, Humphry Davy: Science and Power, Cambridge, 1998, p. 87)

Liz Brynin · Post by **Liz Brynin** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 10:42 am

Hi John
Ok - I feel better about what you wrote now. Just don't want past efforts denigrated - they did their best, long before books etc.
Re: folk medicine in Germany - of course Hahnemann knew about it. And Paracelsus explored it too - and Hahnemann had read everything that Paracelsus had left. Paracelsus also talked about the Doctrine of Signatures (which Hahnemann didn't think much of) and this was also used by folk herbalists. Personally, I find this a fascinating idea - when I lived in South America,(before homeopathy, unfortunately) I noticed that the Indians also had similar beliefs e.g. beetroot is good for the blood because it's red like the blood. Then I came across it when I started to study homeopathy.
Anyway. let's leave it at that. As I said, Hahnemann's genius lay in seeing how these ideas could be made to work by putting them together and developing them - and thank God he did so.
But I am always in awe of ancient traditions of herbalism, because I wonder how they came to know which herbs to use. It's a fascinating subject - and early man must have experiemented in very risky ways! Or is there a inbuilt instinct in us (we are, after all, like other animals) to guide us towards choosing what we need in sickness from what is available around us? It's certainly true that the body often knows what is good for it - maybe that can also be extrapolated to plants around us. But we've probably lost that gift now - along with all sorts of other things!
Liz

John Harvey · Post by **John Harvey** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 4:51 pm

Hi, Liz --

I'm sure Hahnemann came to know about the German folk medicine very well. But homoeopathy did not have its origins in that or in any other of the ideas that he came across -- except, perhaps, indirectly, in causing him to take a practical step in reaction to their bootlessness. The doctrine of signatures was part of what he was reacting against, by the way -- it was one of the bases of allopathy of the time, and he was as contemptuous of it as of anything else, as it was purely speculative.

It is fascinating, isn't it, how things come to be learnt. I've often thought about acupuncture in that regard (not symptomatic acupuncture, but holistic, five-element, acupuncture). Two things I'd note about what can appear to be completely instinctive in non-human animals, though: first, many species have much keener senses of smell than we do, which may help in detecting toxic plants; second, many species of non-human animal have clearly cultural knowledge, passed down from generation to generation, including knowledge of food plants' habits and even of how to detoxify them in preparation for their consumption.

Cheers!

John
2009/7/25 Liz Brynin >

cbwillis9 · Post by **cbwillis9** » Sat Jul 25, 2009 10:13 pm

John Harvey wrote:
German folk cures were more culturally endemic than formally
systematic.

I come from these family traditions, which continued among the
Pennsylvania Dutch/Deutsch.

I agree that German folk cures were likely one influence on the
development of Hahnemann's thinking.

Carol W.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/willis_protocols