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Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

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Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#201

Post by GlenTheMachine »

fooblat wrote: post #197
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #191

I'm fascinated that, as far as I can tell, there's a lot of disagreement here about whether this is "mumbo jumbo" or not, when nobody is addressing the major aspect that differentiates reiki from other non-traditional medicines -- which is that it is based on touch . We're social animals. I've never had reiki but I have spent some time in hospitals. You know what you NEVER get in a hospital? Someone touching you in a…

Only it is not based on touch. The "Reiki Master" quoted in the article says it works just as well at a distance. He also claims that it works on animals and plants and that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

So I'm pretty skeptical of the distance aspect and the plant aspect. I'm actually not skeptical of the "animals" claim.

Cats cuddle with you. They enjoy being petted. So do dogs. And so do humans! I have a dog whose primary pleasure in life is snuggling up to you on the couch and getting petted. This is not surprising; dogs, like humans, are social animals. And this is a symbiotic relationship. It's pretty well known that therapy dogs significantly reduce stress, including physical markers of stress such as blood pressure and cortisol levels.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#202

Post by kerkeslager »

fooblat wrote: post #197
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #191

I'm fascinated that, as far as I can tell, there's a lot of disagreement here about whether this is "mumbo jumbo" or not, when nobody is addressing the major aspect that differentiates reiki from other non-traditional medicines -- which is that it is based on touch . We're social animals. I've never had reiki but I have spent some time in hospitals. You know what you NEVER get in a hospital? Someone touching you in a…

Only it is not based on touch. The "Reiki Master" quoted in the article says it works just as well at a distance. He also claims that it works on animals and plants and that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

This is why science asks more specific questions than "Does Reiki work?" We shouldn't let a self-proclaimed Reiki Master determine what we look at.

I'd also add that we don't have to let them determine our terminology, either. If the touch parts of Reiki work, then there's no reason we should add an air of validity to all of Reiki by saying "Reiki works" instead of "touch therapy works" or something similar.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#203

Post by fooblat »

GlenTheMachine wrote: post #201
fooblat wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only it is not based on touch. The "Reiki Master" quoted in the article says it works just as well at a distance. He also claims that it works on animals and plants and that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

So I'm pretty skeptical of the distance aspect and the plant aspect. I'm actually not skeptical of the "animals" claim. Cats cuddle with you. They enjoy being petted. So do dogs. And so do humans! I have a dog whose primary pleasure in life is snuggling up to you on the couch and getting petted. This is not surprising; dogs, like humans, are social animals. And this is a symbiotic relationship. It's pretty well known…

I love animals and I agree that Dog Therapy is effective for the reasons you state. I fail to see what any of that has to to with Reiki and it's claims of tapping into the "Universal Source" and manipulation of "Healing Energy".

Hugs are also beneficial and cause documented positive chemical changes in our bodies. No imaginary mystical forces or increased "vibrations" needed.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#204

Post by naravara »

GlenTheMachine wrote: post #201
fooblat wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only it is not based on touch. The "Reiki Master" quoted in the article says it works just as well at a distance. He also claims that it works on animals and plants and that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

So I'm pretty skeptical of the distance aspect and the plant aspect. I'm actually not skeptical of the "animals" claim. Cats cuddle with you. They enjoy being petted. So do dogs. And so do humans! I have a dog whose primary pleasure in life is snuggling up to you on the couch and getting petted. This is not surprising; dogs, like humans, are social animals. And this is a symbiotic relationship. It's pretty well known…

There's probably a whole body of unexplored potential in therapeutic systems that rely on varying types of placebo or psychosomatic effects. Modern medicine has a very strong naturalistic underpinning to it, which biases it towards pharmacological types of interventions and tends to write off anything else as fake quackery or superstition.

Granted, most of it IS fake quackery and superstition, and whatever the thing is the pharmacological intervention is probably going to be more effective in a more predictable and repeatable way than most traditional practices. But there's clearly some measure of relief people get from a lot of the traditional systems that we could learn from, even if it means we do a little dance and chant while we administer the ibuprofen.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#205

Post by fenwick67 »

fooblat wrote: post #197
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #191

I'm fascinated that, as far as I can tell, there's a lot of disagreement here about whether this is "mumbo jumbo" or not, when nobody is addressing the major aspect that differentiates reiki from other non-traditional medicines -- which is that it is based on touch . We're social animals. I've never had reiki but I have spent some time in hospitals. You know what you NEVER get in a hospital? Someone touching you in a…

Only it is not based on touch. The "Reiki Master" quoted in the article says it works just as well at a distance. He also claims that it works on animals and plants and that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

> He also claims [...] that many cats can perform Reiki on their owners.

Our cat incessantly "kneads" people (moves her feet up and down on us) and I am now thrilled at the idea of charging people for Cat Reiki

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#206

Post by GlenTheMachine »

fooblat wrote: post #203
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'm pretty skeptical of the distance aspect and the plant aspect. I'm actually not skeptical of the "animals" claim. Cats cuddle with you. They enjoy being petted. So do dogs. And so do humans! I have a dog whose primary pleasure in life is snuggling up to you on the couch and getting petted. This is not surprising; dogs, like humans, are social animals. And this is a symbiotic relationship. It's pretty well known…

I love animals and I agree that Dog Therapy is effective for the reasons you state. I fail to see what any of that has to to with Reiki and it's claims of tapping into the "Universal Source" and manipulation of "Healing Energy". Hugs are also beneficial and cause documented positive chemical changes in our bodies. No imaginary mystical forces or increased "vibrations" needed.

I agree. I don't buy the explanations reiki practitioners give of why it works; we don't need to resort to "healing energy". I just think that the act of gently touching someone who is in pain has significant positive effects, and that in hospital settings this is incredibly rare.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#207

Post by dcx »

fooblat wrote: post #200
dcx wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An interesting point TFA makes is that it doesn't have to beat placebo: the placebo effect itself provides therapeutic benefit! > Ted Kaptchuk, a Harvard Medical School professor and one of the lead researchers, theorizes that the placebo effect is, in the words of the Times article, “a biological response to an act of caring; that somehow the encounter itself calls forth healing and that the more intense and focused…

Ted Kaptchuck is not a credible source. He is an altmed activist who plays games with the definition of placebo to push his agenda. His studies are universally flawed[0] and manipulated. 0. https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/ted-kaptchuk-versus-placebo...

That's not what your link actually says:

> He’s the Director of the Program in Placebo Studies, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and a professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School. His work on placebo effects has been a frequent topic right here on this very blog and has been a mixed bag. On the one hand, Kaptchuk sometimes does interesting work, but on the other hand he can’t seem to help himself when it comes to overselling it.

And frankly I think the idea stands on its own regardless of who it's coming from. We know that there are placebo effects that convey therapeutic benefits [1], and aren't currently sure exactly where these come from. But why not make use of them anyway? TFA points out that we did that with aspirin for decades, and are doing that with antidepressants right now (which [1] points out may be mostly industrialised placebo as well). This seems like good practical thinking.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placebo#Effects

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#208

Post by naravara »

fooblat wrote: post #203
GlenTheMachine wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'm pretty skeptical of the distance aspect and the plant aspect. I'm actually not skeptical of the "animals" claim. Cats cuddle with you. They enjoy being petted. So do dogs. And so do humans! I have a dog whose primary pleasure in life is snuggling up to you on the couch and getting petted. This is not surprising; dogs, like humans, are social animals. And this is a symbiotic relationship. It's pretty well known…

I love animals and I agree that Dog Therapy is effective for the reasons you state. I fail to see what any of that has to to with Reiki and it's claims of tapping into the "Universal Source" and manipulation of "Healing Energy". Hugs are also beneficial and cause documented positive chemical changes in our bodies. No imaginary mystical forces or increased "vibrations" needed.

>Hugs are also beneficial and cause documented positive chemical changes in our bodies. No imaginary mystical forces or increased "vibrations" needed.

It's just a different theoretical framework for describing an observed phenomenon. Even if it's not technically correct, it can still be a good enough cognitive heuristic to help people intuit what's happening or how to influence it.

Think about it kind of like Newtonian mechanics, which are also not quite right but make predictions that are generally close enough for most of what we do in everyday life and much easier for people to work with intuitively.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#209

Post by tonyarkles »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #183
conjectures wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's extraordinary in the sense that there is no known mechanism for it to work. E.g. soap kills viruses by dissolving them, some painkillers work by blocking transmission of signals along nerves, radiotherapy kills cells in the blast zone. Other than through establishing a psychological effect around 'someone cares', there's simply no known way of positive thoughts in one person's head being transmitted down through…

Well... That sounds testable. Use 10 people who have chronic pain who report pain relief with hands-on reiki. As for the test: Hands-off reiki vs hands-off no reiki (person who isn't trained in reiki present) vs nothing We should see significant reporting of gains with the hands-off reiki, and should see no gains with #2 or #3... Just because we can't see this assumed energy doesn't mean we can't measure it somehow.

There’s the rub though: what you’re proposing isn’t measuring “subtle energy” at all. It’s measuring whether or not there’s some phenomenon (possibly psychological) that brings pain relief. Your proposed test is only measuring the effect (which is a valuable test!), but not providing any insight into the mechanism of action.

Re: Reiki can’t possibly work, so why does it?

#210

Post by jmcmichael »

driverdan wrote: post #181
hosh wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, the attitude one holds is important. People can sense that at some level. Subtle energy is real though. Reiki is one of the modalities that does not require being in person. There’s a bunch of weirder, more obscure modalities that can work with chronic pain, trauma, and the like.

> Subtle energy is real though. Do you actually understand what the word "energy" means? What form of energy is it? Can you demonstrate with a controlled scientific test this energy?

It's qualitative energy, not quantitative energy. The same energy one feels when one experiences love, feels lifted up by a favorite song, or feels exuberance when one's team wins the superbowl.
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