Minutus

Dear Soroush,
From my memory of Haehl and repeated reading of the Organon and of Chronic Diseases, the sequence of Hahnemann's discovery of the curative value of the homoeopathic relationship between medicine and illness was as follows:
(1) Due in large part to its results as confessed by its best practitioners, Hahnemann adopted early on a healthy skepticism that any sound reasons lay behind such "systems" as orthodox medicine then used, including • seeking to understand and oppose the causes of illness in bodily humours, • seeking to cure patients through treatments that oppose a symptom of interest, • seeking to cure patients through counter-irritation, and • seeking to apply medicines upon the basis of their similarity of appearance, behaviour, or other properties to some aspect of the patient's illness (the allopathic doctrine of signatures, which Liz has pointed out may have played a part in native use of Peruvian bark in malaria).
(2) Hahnemann experienced outraged incredulity in particular at Cullen's explanation for the effectuality of Peruvian bark in breaking up the regularity of intermittent (malarial) fevers.
(3) Due in part no doubt to Hahnemann's rigorous training, in searching his mind for a way to determine how Peruvian bark acted in such fevers, he hit upon the wholly original idea of learning what abilities Peruvian bark held to alter health: its so-called pure effects. This most significant idea, which still largely escapes allopathic medicine today, is what allowed Hahnemann to separate the primary effects of any drug from its secondary effects and from the course of any natural illness in which it might be applied.
(4) Hahnemann chose as his most reliable first-hand observer of objective and subjective symptoms himself and accordingly took the drug.
(5) He expressed marked surprise at the similarities between the primary effects of the drug and the malarial fevers over which it so commonly had marked influence.
(6) Naturally this single experiment suggested a possible principle, which Hahnemann nevertheless took to testing repeatedly, by learning the primary effects of many drugs in as much detail as possible and comparing these with those natural illnesses in which they showed a markedly curative effect, both in history and in medical trial.
(7) In examining these relationships, Hahnemann drew clear distinctions between fixed diseases (which he called acute or chronic or semi-acute miasms and which we might also call infections) and symptoms (some of which to this day allopathic medicine will refer to as syndromes or diseases).
(8) As a result partly of this but largely too of his innate conscientiousness, Hahnemann drew clear distinctions between the course of individual patients' diseases and so refined the notion of similarity. From what his original experiment might have suggested -- such as a conception that Peruvian bark might cure or at least remove some of the symptoms of malaria -- he arrived at a conception of similarity so refined that the name of the disease came scarcely to matter in comparison with the characteristics of that disease unique to each individual.
(9) Hahnemann discovered what we take for granted about medicines: that they are capable of reproducing individuals' symptomatic responses as finely differentiated as individuals' responses to natural disease.
(10) Having found, and stated, that in all cases of which he was aware, the drug that cured a patient's illness was similar in primary effects to that patient's illness, and having examined this question both in broad, generic terms (malaria and Peruvian bark) and in particular, individualised terms (peculiar patient symptoms and characteristic primary drug symptoms), Hahnemann found that the more homoeopathic a drug was to the patient's particular illness, the more direct and rapid was the cure it could produce.
Naturally Hahnemann discovered much more than this, but that is another story: not the story of his discovery that similars cure similars and not the story of his direction that in order to cure, one should prescribe as similarly as possible, which together are the story of the discovery of the generality of the medical homoeopathic result and of the invention of the homoeopathic medical principle that followed from that discovery.
Cheers --

John

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"The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled."

— Plutarch

Dear John
Thank you for your answer.
Now you have agreed that the symptoms caused by the Peruvian bark in the healthy were similar to the Malaria experienced by the sick.
However, previously you had said that it was not homeopathic to the case. Would you kindly care to explain?
Best wishes
Soroush

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From: minutus@yahoogroups.com [mailto:minutus@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of John Harvey
Sent: 19 August 2009 10:56
To: minutus@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Minutus] Role of Peruvian bark
Dear Soroush,
From my memory of Haehl and repeated reading of the Organon and of Chronic Diseases, the sequence of Hahnemann's discovery of the curative value of the homoeopathic relationship between medicine and illness was as follows:
(1) Due in large part to its results as confessed by its best practitioners, Hahnemann adopted early on a healthy skepticism that any sound reasons lay behind such "systems" as orthodox medicine then used, including • seeking to understand and oppose the causes of illness in bodily humours, • seeking to cure patients through treatments that oppose a symptom of interest, • seeking to cure patients through counter-irritation, and • seeking to apply medicines upon the basis of their similarity of appearance, behaviour, or other properties to some aspect of the patient's illness (the allopathic doctrine of signatures, which Liz has pointed out may have played a part in native use of Peruvian bark in malaria).
(2) Hahnemann experienced outraged incredulity in particular at Cullen's explanation for the effectuality of Peruvian bark in breaking up the regularity of intermittent (malarial) fevers.
(3) Due in part no doubt to Hahnemann's rigorous training, in searching his mind for a way to determine how Peruvian bark acted in such fevers, he hit upon the wholly original idea of learning what abilities Peruvian bark held to alter health: its so-called pure effects. This most significant idea, which still largely escapes allopathic medicine today, is what allowed Hahnemann to separate the primary effects of any drug from its secondary effects and from the course of any natural illness in which it might be applied.
(4) Hahnemann chose as his most reliable first-hand observer of objective and subjective symptoms himself and accordingly took the drug.
(5) He expressed marked surprise at the similarities between the primary effects of the drug and the malarial fevers over which it so commonly had marked influence.
(6) Naturally this single experiment suggested a possible principle, which Hahnemann nevertheless took to testing repeatedly, by learning the primary effects of many drugs in as much detail as possible and comparing these with those natural illnesses in which they showed a markedly curative effect, both in history and in medical trial.
(7) In examining these relationships, Hahnemann drew clear distinctions between fixed diseases (which he called acute or chronic or semi-acute miasms and which we might also call infections) and symptoms (some of which to this day allopathic medicine will refer to as syndromes or diseases).
(8) As a result partly of this but largely too of his innate conscientiousness, Hahnemann drew clear distinctions between the course of individual patients' diseases and so refined the notion of similarity. From what his original experiment might have suggested -- such as a conception that Peruvian bark might cure or at least remove some of the symptoms of malaria -- he arrived at a conception of similarity so refined that the name of the disease came scarcely to matter in comparison with the characteristics of that disease unique to each individual.
(9) Hahnemann discovered what we take for granted about medicines: that they are capable of reproducing individuals' symptomatic responses as finely differentiated as individuals' responses to natural disease.
(10) Having found, and stated, that in all cases of which he was aware, the drug that cured a patient's illness was similar in primary effects to that patient's illness, and having examined this question both in broad, generic terms (malaria and Peruvian bark) and in particular, individualised terms (peculiar patient symptoms and characteristic primary drug symptoms), Hahnemann found that the more homoeopathic a drug was to the patient's particular illness, the more direct and rapid was the cure it could produce.
Naturally Hahnemann discovered much more than this, but that is another story: not the story of his discovery that similars cure similars and not the story of his direction that in order to cure, one should prescribe as similarly as possible, which together are the story of the discovery of the generality of the medical homoeopathic result and of the invention of the homoeopathic medical principle that followed from that discovery.
Cheers --

John

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------------------------------------------------------------------

"The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled."

— Plutarch

Hi, Soroush --

I do hope that we can return to the subject of your interpretation of Hahnemann's meaning in § 26 and how you arrived at it; and I fear that this is merely another endless sidetrack. But if you'd be kind enough to tell me exactly what you'd like me to explain (perhaps an entire paragraph or a time and date), I'll do my best.

Thanks --

John
2009/8/19 >
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Dear Soroush,
Now you have asked me to do three things in this track. Originally, you asked me to answer the question "Was the practise of the native Peruvians to use of the bark as a cure for symptoms of Malaria homeopatic in nature?", stating that an answer to this question was crucial to your ability to explain yourself.
In spite of your history of distracting attention from a topic never to return to it, I answered it.
Next, you asked me to explain your contention that I had said that Peruvian bark "was not homeopathic to the case".
Rather than refuse to do so on the basis that your distractions from the topic are unhelpful, I have asked merely that you clarify what you think I said.
Your reference now to a message of 12:58 a.m. on 11 August suggests that you mean a message I sent at 11:58 p.m. GMT on 10 August (few will know what your time zone is; so GMT is a useful reference for message times). In that message, I see no claim resembling the claim you say I made. I see instead the outline of the argument I understand you to be making: an outline of which you have confirmed the first half and diverted attention from the second half. That outline is eight short paragraphs in length, rather than the three pages you criticise it for.
And now, rather than correctly quote what you would have me explain, you ask me additionally to do something quite different and even more distracting from the requirement that you make your case for your claims: to explain what I understand by Hahnemann's statement in § 26.
As I have said earlier, I don't believe it is helpful to hold a contest of beliefs, any more than it is helpful simply to repeat them. What is helpful in sharing points of view is to offer support for one's contentions: reasoning.
Neither of your mutually contradictory contentions concerning § 26 has yet received any such support.
I remain willing to help tease out what your reasoning actually is, if you have any. But if you remain unwilling to state your contentions unambiguously or unwilling to state what reasoning should lead us to share them, then your claims remain simply further examples of castles built upon doctrine and belief rather than claims with a substantial foundation.
I remain willing also to answer your second question in this thread, concerning the claim you believe I made -- whatever that is. You need merely quote it.
The third separate discussion -- the one you now ask to commence "So as to ease the question of whether ONLY homeopathy can cure", the discussion of what I understand by a certain statement -- should perhaps be reserved for a few days' time, when you have clarified what you are saying and why you say it.
If this third distraction is not to distract you permanently from the original topic -- your contentions* and your reasons for them -- then it will keep.
I am perfectly willing to state what I understand Hahnemann to be saying in § 26 and to give reasons for it, and have already done so. But I have no wish to interrupt you in the process of your valiant attempt to explain your doubtless lucid reasoning in making the contentions that you originally made* concerning § 26, whatever it is that those contentions actually meant, and regardless of your ability to recollect what you actually meant by them. If you're willing to meet the challenge of supporting either of your mutually contradictory contentions, then please go ahead and meet it.
You will have no chance of winning anybody's understanding of your reasons unless you are willing to state them.
Thanks!
John
* These being your (mutually contradictory) contentions concerning Hahnemann's intent in § 26:
(1) Hn says that every REAL cure is due to Homeopathy!
(2) Hn... states here that if any can manage to cure, it must have acted in a homeopathic way.
Dear John
Please re-read your posts eg - 11 August - I rcvd it at 00:58 where in place of answering simply you write 3 pages trying to analyse what the qn means!
So as to ease the question of whether ONLY homeopathy can cure (as per Hn's definition of cure) please explain what you understand by this statement from Aph 26
"This depends on the following homœopathic law of nature which was sometimes, indeed, vaguely surmised but not hitherto fully recognized, and to which is due every real cure that has ever taken place:"
Best wishes

Soroush
2009/8/19 John Harvey >
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