Natural Health, Natural Medicine: Andrew Weil and Peddling Nonsense

Purveyors of so-called 'natural' medicines and 'natural' health treatments almost invariably say and do things which are unjustified in the light of scientific evidence. This is not to say that such medicines and treatments always have no value at all, it's just that much more is claimed about and for them than should be.

In the January / February 2006 Skeptical Inquirer, Harriet Hall reviews Andrew Weil’s best-selling book Natural Health, Natural Medicine:

Weil wants you to avoid conventional doctors except for cases of trauma, bacterial infection, and emergencies. He wants to keep the body healthy by natural means, allowing it to heal itself. He wants you to avoid drugs, but by golly, he wants you to try every herb, diet supplement, home remedy, and placebo he can think of.

Some of his advice is based on good science (exercise and smoking cessation), but much of it is not supported by credible evidence (breathing exercises, fasting, and even homeopathy, which has been the laughingstock of science for two centuries).

Over and over, he asks the patient to experiment: try Ayurveda, try homeopathy, try an herb, try a diet modification. See if you can “make them work” for you. The problem with this approach is that many conditions are self-limited and others have variable courses. When your symptoms happen to subside, you will falsely attribute success to whatever remedy you happened to be trying at the time.

Hall references comments made by Arnold Relman, M.D. and editor emeritus of The New England Journal of Medicine:

According to Weil, many of his basic insights about the causes of disease and the nature of healing come from what he calls “stoned thinking,” that is, thoughts experienced while under the influence of psychedelic agents or during other states of “altered consciousness” induced by trances, ritual magic, hypnosis, meditation, and the like. He cites some of the characteristics of “stoned thinking” that give it advantages over “straight” thinking; these include a greater reliance on “intuition” and an “acceptance of the ambivalent nature of things,” by which he means a tolerance for “the coexistence of opposites that appear to be mutually antagonistic.”

In Weil’s view, intellect, logic, and inductive reasoning from observed fact are the limited instruments of “straight” thinking, and should be subservient to guidance by the intuitive insights that are gained during states of altered consciousness and “stoned” thinking. ... In Weil’s mind, intuition, no matter how bizarre and unsubstantiated, rules the day. But if intuition rules, how would we find the truth when one person’s intuition conflicts with another’s? Weil does not appear to consider that a problem, either. For, as “stoned thinking” reveals, there is not one truth, but many truths. Reality itself is basically “ambivalent.”

Would you fly in an airplane which had been engineered by people relying on “stoned thinking”? Would you support the construction of a nuclear power generator which had been designed by people treating intellect and logic as unnecessarily limited forms of thinking? I certainly wouldn’t, but I wonder if Weil would? If so, he’s insane — dangerously insane, as he holds principles which put him and those around him in danger. If not, then he’s a hypocrite.

Unfortunately, Weil can’t help but contradict himself:

“My intuitions about disease are: first, that its physical manifestations are mostly caused by nonmaterial factors, in particular by unnatural restraints placed on the unconscious mind; and second, that the limits to what human consciousness can cause in the physical body are far beyond where most of us imagine them.” Or, again: “Since leaving the world of allopathic practice, I have witnessed a number of impressive nonallopathic cures of ... dramatic illnesses, including cancer and life-threatening infections.” And later: “To the straight mind nonallopathic healing sounds very mystical. Faith healing is held in contempt by most rational people, despite the abundant evidence of cures.”

If there is “abundant evidence” that his strategies can cure illnesses, then his arguments can be supported by intellect, logic, and evidence. The reliance upon verifiable, testable evidence is what separates scientific medicine from the nonsense Weil keeps talking about. Weil wants to have it both ways: he wants to denigrate scientific medicine in order to prop up his claims, but in the end he also wants to assert the existence of scientific support for his claims.

Hall notes Weil’s penchant for contradiction as well:

Weil advises against suppressing hay fever symptoms with antihistamines or steroids, because “Suppressive treatment can perpetuate disease by frustrating it.” What does he recommend instead? Natural remedies that he says will . . . suppress symptoms!

We shouldn’t expect consistent, rational thinking and arguments from a person who explicitly and unapologetically dismisses logic in favor of “solutions” arrived at while under the influence of drugs. Of course, we also shouldn’t expect to get reliable, trustworthy advice on pretty much any subject from such a person, either.

The kinds of ideas and thinking recommended by Andrew Weil would be rejected without a second thought if offered in most areas of life, so they shouldn’t be given a second thought when it comes to health, either.

 

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