How is it possible to know whether something is an initial deterioration or an aggravation of the disease? How can we distinguish between a first order and second order therapy? How do we know if something is a therapy and not a suppression? more
Western medicine is mainly structural, Chinese medicine is mainly functional. These are (in Western terms) not only somatic, psychological and psychosomatic aspects. The Chinese diagnosis includes the semiotic aspect as well. Semiotics is concerned with symbols and their influence. People with ‘a broken heart’ who suffer from emotional stress might develop a distinct form of heart symptoms (Ebert 2005). Although this might be explained by stress hormones it involves also a semiotic aspect: we all know what a broken heart is and that the heart is the centre of love and compassion. So this very knowledge alters the expression of stress or even is able to create stress. more
Randomized studies examine the effectiveness of a specific intervention in a defined setting compared to a sham intervention. This setting, though, does not coincide with the setting of the naturopathic treatment. The keyword is individualization. Even a simple massage has to be individually adapted for every patient, otherwise the massage can not be successful. What is good for one person can be harmful for another. more
How can we finally distinguish conscious from unconscious, mind from matter and spirit from nature, except as a linguistic definition of a range of experience, whose purpose is to interrupt the continuum at certain points for particular reasons that have nothing to do with the things in themselves? In the language of mythology this is to say that the myth of the goddess is not absent from the collective psyche just because it is disregarded. In fact, it is exactly where we might expect to find it –in the collective unconscious of the race. more