Posts by Steve Reeves
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But, Creon:
The "kiwi identity", after all, is in a precarious state: our icons must be protected from potential attack
surely the Afghan biscuit is an Australian invention (just like....no, let's not go there...)...
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Just watched the programme---very good!
And putting down the comfort pad really did help a lot!
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Emma, it is Stephen Fry---what a record, what a man!
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Maybe Bill Ralston wanted a TV7 programme?? And did not get one (yet??)?
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Tom, I think you mean "ni!".
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Emma's point about side effects is a good one. I am, however, quite surprised to read (in Wikipedia, so it must be true):
Placebos are inactive or ineffective treatments or formulations; however a patient may experience either a positive or negative clinical effect while taking one. When a placebo is administered to mimic a previously administered drug, it may also incur the same side effects as the prior authentic drug.
The article goes on to say:
Most of these effects are thought to be psychological in nature or due to other unrelated factors. Not all placebos are equally effective. A placebo that involves ingestion, injection, or incision is often more powerful than a non-invasive technique. Placebos administered by authority figures such as general practitioners and other experts may also be more powerful than when this psychological authority effect is absent.
They are, however, not inert, sham, or inactive in any other manner of speaking; and they may well, in and of themselves, generate considerable change within any given subject, at any given time, under any given circumstances.So, you're not being "tricked" or being made to look "stupid" if a placebo works for you---we're just made that way, which is fascinating, I think.
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Dan S said:
Er, Steve, respectfully: Fuck off. I wasn't given a sugar pill and I have never taken part in any trial and I know it worked (and works) for me.
With all due respect, I did say that I do not doubt it works (for you and everyone else who has said so).
What the research says is that, because the drug turns out to be no better than a placebo (for all but the most extreme cases), the fact the pill works for someone does not tell them whether it contains the drug or is a placebo. That's all.
Of course, you would expect that, unless part of an experiment, you know you are being given a pill containing the drug. So, assuming you were not part of an experiment, if you take the pill and it has an effect then that's evidence the drug does work for you. But that still leaves the fact, on the evidence of this research, that a placebo would work just as well.
So, you can see why the drug companies are upset: the research shows that if doctors had prescribed placebos (which are cheap and needed no development) instead of the drug, in all but the extreme cases, the effects would have been the same. So, a doctor might now (leaving a few small ethical issues aside :-) ) prescribe you a placebo (which you believe actually contains the drug) and the drug companies would lose a lot of money! And you would feel the same benefits.
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Lots of people here, who say or imply "the drug had a great effect on me, so the research must be wrong", are missing an important point: how do you know you were not being given a sugar pill?
Note that the research says (for all but perhaps the severest cases) a placebo was as effective as the drug. And, by definition, a placebo is something you're given and you believe it to be the actual drug.
So the fact that what you were being prescribed worked for you (which I do not doubt) doesn't show that the research is wrong.
Having said that, the coverage leaves much (clarity) to be desired!
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Time for the Turing Test perhaps?
You mean, see whether a person conversing with Key via a keyboard will decide (be fooled into thinking?) he's human based on the answers he gives?
Heh, indeed.
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I'm in the UK currently, and noticed this on BT and wi-fi in Teh Grauniad a while ago: