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Biofield healing (aka energy healing) has shown tremendous results in case studies, placebo-controlled studies, cell culture studies, and other peer-reviewed research over the past few decades. It’s recognized by the NIH and approved for use in hospitals.
And yet, biofield healing is only used by 1% of the population, and research funding is almost non-existent. Why?
It’s not failings in current research. Yes, most studies are single-blind not double-blind, and like all research you can find flaws in some studies. But you know what? If a drug were producing these results, there would be a pile of money to fund top-quality double-blind trials.
So what’s the difference between drugs and biofield healing?
The short answer is: Physics.
See, the sciences aren’t isolated. Medicine is based on biology, and we can explain how drugs function in terms of cells and hormones and neurotransmitters. And biology is based on chemistry, which describes the details of those interactions. And ultimately, all of that is based on physics. Science isn’t just a collection of facts. It’s a tower, with physics at the bottom, and chemistry, biology, and medicine built on one another, going up.
To research a new drug, we only need a new top floor. All of the foundation already exists — the physics, chemistry, and biology.
But when we research biofield healing, we’re starting from zero. There’s no biology that corresponds to the biofield, and no chemistry, and no physics. We need the whole building, not just the top floor.
That’s why current research isn’t convincing: It’s starting with the medicine, and skipping the physics.
But scientists add to physics all the time. Two hundred years ago, relativity, quantum, string, and many other findings didn’t exist. So why can’t we just run some good medical studies and let the physicists update physics, while we get on with healing people?
The short answer is: Medicine and physics have different rules. Except that isn’t satisfying at all. Why do they have different rules, and why does that matter?
In any research, there’s a chance that the results are coincidence. Some portion of your volunteers will get better all on their own, and if we get more of those destined-to-be-healthy people in the treatment group than the control group, the treatment group will have better results with or without the drug. Think of it like flipping a coin — heads means healthy, tails means sick, and if you flip 10 times, sometimes you’ll wind up with 7 or 8 heads just from random chance.
If instead of 10 flips, we do 100 or 1000, it’s must less likely we’ll wind up far from 50% heads. So that’s what we do: We test the drug on many people, and ensure there’s only a 5% chance the results were just luck. Maybe 1% chance if we’re really serious. Those are good papers in medicine.
But in physics? Between 0.01% and 0.0001% chance the results are luck. That’s 10,000x as careful as top-notch medical research. And physics can do that, because atoms are much easier to work with than humans, and there are no ethics committees.
The point is: Accepting the biofield requires new physics. So we need a way to produce physics-level results, that only have a one-in-a-million chance of being luck.
How do we do that? Short answer is to develop new biofield techniques producing obvious, unmistakable results. The long answer is its own post, or more likely its own book.
But the first step toward a solution is understanding why the problem exists. So that’s why: Because we don’t just need new medicine. We need new physics.
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Mike,
I don’t think the answer is physics. Although you pose a good argument. The difference between drugs and biofield healing is profit. They can’t make money off of energy healing. It isn’t a pill.
Why would they want to fund research for a treatment modality that allows us to heal ourselves? It would have to be a compassionate investor who isn’t tied to the drug companies.
Energy healing is holistic. It’s awakening our natural healing mechanisms. It’s healing from the inside out. They can’t make money if we’re healing ourselves from the inside out.
Drugs treat the symptoms instead of the whole body. Drugs have side effects. People become dependent on drugs because they aren’t truly being healed. Nature should be our pharmacy. Our minds are our best medicine. We are the cure. The problem exists because we choose fear over love, and war over peace.
Why are you so concerned with proving the efficacy of energy healing? Those who believe, already believe. And those who don’t, never will. It’s like trying to convince my uncles to like Obama, not gonna happen. People can be narrow minded, myself included. I don’t have all the answers, but at least I’m offering my opinion.
Energy, like love, cannot be controlled, and that’s why it’s sacred.
Heal the people you can heal, and don’t worry about the rest.
Best,
Julie
Yeah, it can be frustrating to talk to people who dismiss something important to us, whether that’s healing or politics. I get that. That’s part of why I’m focusing on research to change minds en masse, rather than on convincing dismissive skeptics one at a time.
Here’s why I care: The world isn’t divided into good people who believe in healing and bad people who don’t. There are billions of good people who do meaningful work, volunteer in their communities, love their families and their neighbors, but who dismiss biofield healing because, well, everyone else does. I know a lot of people like that. And I believe that healing can help them, so I think the world would be a better place if healing was more accepted and used more often.
There are also selfish reasons. Better research means better healings, for me and you and everyone else. By understanding how biofield energy interacts with atoms, cells, organs, and diseases, we’ll gain insights into how healing works and how to heal everyone better. The way to get better healing for ourselves is to get more people invested in developing better healing techniques.
In terms of funding, as credibility increases and we start seeing more concrete results from healing, I expect we’ll see more funding for research. Possibly from the NIH, possibly from philanthropists, possibly from venture capitalists and other investors, possibly from companies devoted to getting the best healing techniques to market. But the first step is to increase credibility.
Physics are difficult, but my guess is that magick is in some way related to Causal Entropic Forces. Is an interesting subject of investigation. Is basically magick, the system “knows” how to behave in certain direction, also in a way that seems intelligent. Here’s the link if you are interested:
http://www.alexwg.org/publications/PhysRevLett_110-168702.pdf
That’s an interesting idea. I hadn’t heard of it. Thanks.
I will say, I think it’s ultimately physicists who will figure out the physics. I just want to generate enough evidence to get them to take that project on.
I look at magick as “anti-entropic” force.
Then again, I don’t limit myself to efficient cause.
Aether physics maybe.
Oh sorry, not allowed to use that term. “Process physics.”
Interesting terms. I’ll probably let physicists name it, but it’s always good to have suggestions.