Just this interesting piece on the placebo effect. Once again, be aware of the power of the mind.
The placebo paradox - Placebo healings can't be eliminated by the progress of medicine. In fact medical progress can only strengthen them
Away from the internet for a few days now, but will be back soon.
4 comments:
read "the future of the body" by michael murphy
The placebo effect has little to do with the power of the mind, and more to do with the ineffectiveness of medications.
If researchers are seeing a "stronger placebo effect" it's because they're morons and/or can't reconcile the evidence that the drugs they are researching are ineffective.
Peter Lipson at science based medicine covered this topic
Hi there. Quick preface: What follows is unsolicited advice. Sorry in advance.
I read your blog a lot when I first started getting interested in training and nutrition last year and your enthusiasm was infectious. Now I'm hooked on this stuff. For that, thank you. You are awesome.
Also largely thanks to you, I got caught up in the Paleo/low-carb/CrossFit/MovNat thing because it all makes an intuitive kind of sense. But I've moved away from them all after reading the overwhelming amount of research, experience and just plain logical thought that Alan Aragon and Lyle McDonald constantly pump out. You seem to be way over in the Paleo/LC/superslow/MovNat camp, but also like an extremely curious and open-minded guy, so I figured I'd point you in their direction. They completely changed the way I look at exercise and nutrition.
Anyways, happy training and happy eating!
Luke
Luke:
I'd say do what works for you really.
If you're into BB/muscle gains/PWO nutrition/etc. then yeah Lyle and Alan are very good resources for that.
I don't really see things as conflicting -- as long as you're working towards your goals and doing what works for your body.
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As for this article, I think that fact that there's a more disproportional amount of relatively "unhealthy" people makes the body more susceptible to increasing its health via placebo effect.
Yeah, it's not that hard to see with all of the chronic diseases such as heart/diabetes/etc., low self esteem from being obese, or whatever have you that your body can overcome some of the seriousness of these things by itself.
The simple fact is the more unhealthy you are, the more room there is for improvements, especially with chronic conditions. Whether it's placebo or medicine or just plain eating healthy/sleeping well/working/etc. (and I think most of us choose the latter), you'll see effects from each.
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