The Quackometer » $100 challenge

Extending the ‘Simple Challenge’

Le Canard Noir — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 22:52:00 +0000

Homeopaths claim that their pills can induce predictable and distinct sets of symptoms in healthy people. That is how they prove their powerful medicine. This is basic stuff for homeopaths and my simple test asks them to prove it because I do not believe it for a minute. If this claim is not true then everything else they say falls apart. So, far no-one has the courage to come forward.

But I want to extend my offer. I have given homeopaths almost complete freedom in how they do this test. The only real basics I ask for is that the test is verifiably blinded and they do the test publicly, that is, say what they are doing in advance. I do not need to be involved.

Homeopaths are claiming that us sceptics are behind the times and there is now research from material scientists that show that homeopathic preparations are different from normal diluted solutions. I do no believe this too. I think the experiments so far can be explained by bad experimental design: either contamination or instrumentation problems. No chemist can reliably show how homeopathic water is different from ordinary water.

So, the extended challenge: exactly the same as before; any six remedies; some third party swaps the labels around; tell us which remedy is which when the labels are not on the bottle. You can use any experimental equipment you like, any conditions you like – you just have to be blinded. Simple.

As this is analytical chemistry, I think I would one further condition over the original challenge. The remedies must be 12C, or more potent. The claims of homeopaths are that post-Avogadro dilutions are recognisable.

Let’s see it.

Any homeopathic friendly chemists want to do this? Your chance to punch this smart alec sceptic on the nose.

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The $100 Homeopathy Challenge: Update

Le Canard Noir — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 08:08:00 +0000

Well, I have had two conversations with homeopaths now about taking the challenge. Recap: its a simple challenge to see if a homeopath can determine which remedy is which out of a sample of six when they do not already know which remedy is which. If the claims of homeopaths are correct, it ought to be easy.

First up: Sarah K, who left comments on my blog to say she was up the challenge. Fantastic news. Unfortunately, quite quickly she appeared to get rather defensive and say she would not be rushed into things. And ultimately decided that she did not want to do it. A huge shame.

Some of her excuses were that remedies could take a long time to take effect and might interfere with each other. Fine. But she has the choice to decide which remedies to use. For example, I suggested Nelsons Insomnia remedy. Customers of Nelsons might expect their insomnia to be reduced in a few hours, not over several weeks, and they would expect no lingering side-effects too, which homeopaths claim do not happen. Oh well. So close.

Another homeopath appeared to contradict Sarah K in the most striking terms. Soroush Ebrahimi was up for the challenge, but unfortunately not mine – he had his own ideas. He wanted to give me a remedy and be able to seal an envelope with a prediction of what the remedy would do to me – a ‘reproving’. I think it best to allow the IM chat to speak for itself…

(for explanation, Soroush has already challenged Ben Goldacre to a similar test. This is IM, so spelling and sentence order may be erratic)

SE: Hi – did you want me for something? Welcome to my group of friends

LCN: Just wanted to know if you were prepared to take the quackometer $100 challenge. If you claim you could guess ben g’s symptoms from taking a single remedy, then this test ought to be a walk in the park and great public proof of homeopathic claims.

SE: Hi – I did explain that the quackmaster test involves to elements:

SE: 1- Is the homoeopath any good?

SE: 2- Does a potentised substance work?

LCN: yes i am happy with that – do you think you are good homeopath?

SE: So if the result is a fail you do not know whetehr the homoeopath was poor in his selection or whether potentised substance have no effect

LCN: sure. but if you succeed then you win!

SE: So my ‘reproving’ exercise is better, because it elliminates the uncertainty about the ability of the homoeopath

LCN: no it does not. it relies on both the homeopath to interpret the symptoms correctly and the subject to report them correctly – both subjective and so unlikely to yield a good result for anyone. Eitgher side could cry foul. With my test, no one can cry foul.

SE: Neither with my test – when they are in agony and asking for help, then we will know for sure!

LCN: well frankly – if you are prepared to inflict agony on someone then you are not fit to conduct such tests. and ben was quite right to refuse.

SE: Oh – so dilute potentised substance do have an effect?? Make up your mind

LCN: so, you want to induce agony in someone and then claim that homeopathy is right? I think you do not understand anything about obtaining objective evidence

LCN: you are telling me they do. i think ben was quite right to worry tha tyou might poison him. i would be. my test involves no such risks.

SE: Ben was QUITE wrong – because if you read my post, you would have realised that he would have had the substance tested for himself and my half of the remedy would have been in a safe-box only to be opened with both of us present

SE: You guys have to put your body where your mouth is

SE: Either a potentised highly dilute material has powers or it does not

LCN: i am happy to take homeopathic remedes – but not from someone who promises to have me in agony! it shows a lack of ethics in the trial that you would be prepared to do so.

LCN: i have no doubt that the homeopathy would do nothing. I just would not be prepared to take a pill forom you.

SE: So tell me do potentised highly dilute substance have any power?

SE: if not – you are just taking a sugar pill as you lot claim

LCN: i believe they do not. but can i trust you to give me a potentised highly dilute substance ?

I hope you understand my reluctance to take part. The conversation went on for a while more. Mostly, me repeating a question to ask Soroush to take my test or work out a better protocol for his own.

For the record, I would take such a test, but Soroush needs to think up a protocol to take into account the following:

S should not be allowed near any pill I would take.
We need end measures that are not subjective – if the test fails I do not want homeopaths accusing me I was misreporting symptoms.
We need a quantifiable result. At present, a success for S would not give us any idea of the significance of the result. Could it have been chance? We have no way of quantifying that.
If it is going to cost more than my proposed test, I want to know why it is a better test and worth the money.

Without these things, Soroush’s test is just a circus stunt. And, if I may say so, a very disconcerting circus stunts. Like a scary clown juggling sheep’s hearts.

It is remarkable than no one else has come forward. This is a basic test of homeopathy. Something that ought to be easy and yet nothing quite like it appears never to have been done. It would show basic evidence that homeopathy is not a delusion. And yet, homeopaths feel no shame in taking on the responsibility for sick people. A responsibility that cannot be grounded in reason or evidence and instead relies on fragile anecdotes. Homeopaths’ preference to counter criticism is to sue people rather than provide argument and evidence.

I am offering the chance for some homeopath to give me a metaphorical bloody nose, humiliate me, and prove me wrong – all for the cost of some postage and and few remedies.

So far, none of them have the courage of their convictions.

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A Simple Challenge to Homeopaths

Le Canard Noir — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 17:45:00 +0000

Homeopaths are feeling under threat at the moment and are scrambling around wondering what to do about it. I think there are a number of things they could do: most importantly, they should better manage their own business by showing that they respect the boundaries of what they can reasonably assume is good practice, e.g. stop the dangerous nonsense of believing that can do anything about dangerous conditions such as malaria and AIDS; they can be much more complementary and less alternative.

But there is something else that they can do too: start showing a desire to develop a base of data that can be relied upon, and respected, to support their methods. The focus to-date has been on clinical trials. Doubters say that trials show no evidence of efficacy. Supporters point to many positive trials. But it has been well documented that the many positive trials are most often poorly designed and reported, and are at best ambiguous in their results. There is not a compelling evidence base for homeopathy. If there was, there would be no argument.

So, let’s take a step back. What sort of evidence would be required to convince me that there might be something in it? Fundamentally, my problem with homeopathy is its total implausibility – it contradicts what we know about the behaviour of matter. How can a plain sugar pill have any significant therapeutic effect on health? So, why not test the basic plausibility of homeopathy – can homeopathy pills do more than sugar pills in predictable way? There are a number of discussions about this going on in bloggerland and I would like to pick up on these and set a challenge…

Here is a rough outline of the sort of test I would like to see done…

A trained homeopath selects six homeopathic remedies of any type and strength.
The remedies are posted to an independent third party who removes the labels and replaces them with a code letter, A, B, C…F, and posts them back.
The homeopath takes each remedy in turn and notes the ‘totality of symptoms’.
The homeopath writes down which remedy corresponds to which code letter.
The third party ‘breaks the code’ and we note how many are right.

Pretty simple stuff. If the homeopath got all six right, then the odds of that being a fluke would be 1:720. (six factorial). This is far more significant than the typical outcome of a clinical trial, where the odds of a fluke result are more like 1 in 20. It would be pretty compelling if done fairly and a good start to building some real evidence.

Now, admittedly, this is not a full trial of homeopathy. It does not test the ‘like-cures-like’ part of homeopathic ‘theory’ and so does not demonstrate that homeopathy can be used to treat illness. But it does somewhat get over the hurdle of total implausibility. What this trial is testing is similar to what is going on in homeopathic provings – the supposedly predictable effects of a remedy on a healthy individual.

Would a trial like this convince me? Well, no single scientific experiment should convince anyone of anything. (There is always the possibility of experimental error or fraud in any experiment.) But a test like this would certainly get my attention. Rarely do experiments start with a ‘big bang’ and all encompassing approach. Most often, preliminary tests are done, ‘proof of concept’ runs and so on. If this worked , then it could easily be replicated by other homeopaths. Larger versions done and properly written up for a journal. More stringent statistical tests could be set. Then, I think all sceptics would have to admit that the principle of homeopathic potentized remedies has merit.

This test is not totally fool proof. I could think of a few ways of cheating; some more devious than others. Do we think the odds of a homeopath cheating be more or less than 720:1? Nonetheless, I think it is a simple and good start that could be done with almost no money and would get the ball rolling. More rigorous tests along the same lines could take place afterwards. Conversley, should the test fail, then homeopaths would have a lot of explaining to do.

The great thing about this test is that it could be done with very little money. The actual costs would be a few pounds for some remedies and postage, and some volunteers’ time. I doubt it would cost for than £50-60 (About $100). No need for the millions that ‘Big Pharma’ has. And, unlike a clinical trial, there are very few ethical issues – at least, no greater ethical issues than a homeopathic proving. This test is well within the means of a small group of homeopaths who wanted to show the world that they were not deluded. Homeopaths want to be taken seriously. Here is a good start. It’s the $100 Challenge – that is all it would cost.

What is surprising to me is that I can find no instance of a test like this being done before. I would have thought that this was pretty fundamental – can homeopaths determine the effects of a remedy under blinded conditions? One would have thought that this would have been a staple experiment done at homeopathy school. If any homeopaths can enlighten me as to why this has never been done, then please tell me.

So – the challenge: do any homeopaths want to give this a go? All I would ask is that you do this in the true spirit of enquiry and are open and honest about this. What I mean is that if you want to try this challenge, please follow a few simple guidelines:

Tell the world in advance that you are going to do this. Post your intention on a blog or web site, tell the world what you are going to do, be open to suggestions about how to simplify and make it a fair test. The more detail you publish, the more trust you will have. Remember, sceptics have a problem with trust of homeopaths.
State in advance what you think would be a successful result and any caveats you may have. Think of ways in which the trial may go wrong in advance, and make efforts to minimise those risks. None of us want excuses afterwards if it does not go well.
Find a genuine independent third party – someone with no stake in the outcome. Publish who they are and ensure they are happy to field questions from people after the trial. (People will want to know that protocol was followed).
Publish your results on the web before the code is broken to reveal how well you have done.

Feel free to jig around with the form of the trial. Add extra homeopaths or remedies if you like. Pick whatever remedies you think will maximise your chances of success. As long as the central rule of running the trial totally blinded (only the third party knows the code) then most variants ought to be fair. But publish what you intend to do so that others can judge the fairness of the test. Be open to comments and suggestions about how to make it a fair test. The most important thing you can do, if you want to impress the sceptics, is to convince people the test was properly blinded – that is, there was no way that the testers could know or guess which remedy they were taking.

I think such a trial could be conducted in a week or two. The hardest part may be finding a third party. For the record, I am willing to act as that party. The sceptics will trust me – but the problem is that I suspect the homeopaths may think I will cheat and expose the remedies to moth balls or some other spoiler. I would suggest you could use a local newspaper editor, a GP (you do work with them and trust them, don’t you?), a priest or local politician. Basically, someone with no interest in the result and a reputation to loose if they cheated.

I see no reason why a trial like this could not be done. Instead of lots of homeopathic whining about how the sceptics are picking on them, this trial would be a big step forward in proving your case. I can see many homeopaths taking the line, “Why should I do this? I see proof in my practice every day”. If that voice is you, then rest assured the critics of homeopathy will not go away, because there is every reason to believe you are been fooled by the placebo effect, regression to the mean, and wishful thinking. They will see you as dangerously deluded.

If it is not done, then I can only conclude that homeopaths are frightened of the results.

What is to stop you? Let’s go…

Update here

Extending the ‘Simple Challenge’ Homeopaths claim that their pills can induce predictable and distinct sets of symptoms in healthy people. That is how they prove their powerful medicine. This is basic stuff for homeopaths...
The $100 Homeopathy Challenge: Update Well, I have had two conversations with homeopaths now about taking the challenge. Recap: its a simple challenge to see if a homeopath can determine which remedy is which out...
George Vithoulkas Makes a Fool of Himself This is a minor one but it is worth a brief post: George Vithoulkas is considered to be one of the top intellectuals in the homeopathic world. Revered for...