Category talk:Alternative medicine

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Contents

[edit] [[Category:Alternative medicine]] is NOT a replacement

[[Category:Alternative medicine]] is NOT a replacement for the Wikiproject on Alternative Medicine infoboxes. This is because our infoboxes are customized to the respective articles and offer classification information which improves the informational content of the article.

However, Category is an acceptable alternative to the use of some of our article series boxes.

Those strongly objecting to {{CamBottom}} now have two options. They can either elect to display it on the very top of the article as a Category or on the very bottom of the page. Clicking on either will provide the explanation for why an article is in this category. {{CamTiny}} now works completely like text, because it is text. So, you can place it anywhere near the bottom of the page.

  • Template:CamTiny

It is now your choice: Categories on top or see also on the bottom of the article. [[Category:Alternative medicine]] should be put on the very bottom of the article, but it always displays on top.

-- John Gohde 20:28, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Generic Explanation

The text in this article is there to provide a generic explanation of why any one of these some 200 articles was included in this category. In addition, a few basic definitions are included. -- John Gohde 07:16, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] CAM infobox

Article Title Here
This article is part of the branches of CAM series.
CAM Article Index

I have created a template {{CAMInfobox|title=XXXX}} to replace the inline used in various articles. It is at present installed only in Apitherapy. As I am a bee article editor (among others) and not an aternative medicine editor I leave it to others (you) to replace the inlines with this template. This is a better practice since an infobox color, layout, or content change may be made in one place and will affect all articles. It is important that all articles with the inline be so converted, lest the template be updated and some articles not be changed. Best wishes, Leonard G. 15:52, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pseudoscience

I notice a bit of a disagreement building here over whether the category pseudoscience is attached. Anyone care to express the issues? Pros, Cons, etc? Alternatives? Peace. ॐ Metta Bubble puff 01:56, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

To put Alternative medicine in Category:Pseudoscience is to label it a branch of pseudoscience. This kind of generalization is untrue. Sure some Alternative medicine is pseudoscientific, some protoscientific, and some ascientific. Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and series boxes makes it very clear: Unless it is self-evident and uncontroversial that something belongs in a category, it should not be put into a category. --Dforest 11:45, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that is very clear. So is the point that since at least some CAM therapies may be supported by scientific research, therefore the pseudoscience tag is controversial? Or is there more clarification on this to be made? ॐ Metta Bubble puff 14:37, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
It should not be in pseudoscience. It's a mixed bag and the categorization is misleading. Alternative medicine has, at times, formed the instigation for research that brought it into the mainstream. And what is alternative in one place may well be mainstream in another part of the globe. I believe the snake oil salesmen should be identified at their own level, and should not even be included in the alternative medicine category. Pollinator 15:26, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Western medicine's tawdry pattern of relentless attacks upon more enlightened practitioners, dating back to the Middle Ages, only seems to be escalating in tandem with its growing political clout, which is clearly attributable largely to the drug industry's trillion dollar plus annual cash flow. If anything, the corruption of the drug industry has poisoned the well of scientific inquiry, bringing even the most prestigious medical journals into disrepute in recent decades. The proposal here is just a sad example of how startlingly pervasive the deterioration of medical politics has become. Ombudsman 16:45, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Agree per Pollinator and Dforest. --Limegreen 22:52, 19 March 2006 (UTC)
Agreed also. Not sure what proposal you're talking about Ombudsman. The current consensus is a unanimous no to having a pseudoscience category tag. I only brought it up 'cos the edit has been reversed twice by someone. ॐ Metta Bubble puff 07:39, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Coming in late to this debate, I would suggest that the tag 'Pseudoscience' is inherently WP non-PC. It is surely POV by its very nature. There are differences of opinion on what represents 'science' and therefore what represents 'pseudoscience'. In my experience, both tags could apply to some aspects of both 'alternative' and 'mainstream' medicine. Furthermore, there are practices that have developed through observation, in both categories of medicine, which have not been 'scientifically proven', according to modern criteria, and are therefore not EBM (evidence-based medicine). That does not make them invalid. I have held back from editing articles on various aspects of alternative medicine, as they seem so fraught with sabotage, ideology, bigotry and all sorts of other un-WP stuff (sometimes coming from both 'sides'). I believe that WP is the loser in all this. - Ballista 10:23, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
I agree with some of this - the tag is commonly going to be misplaced. Science is science and many other things are perfectly reasonable other things. Pseudoscience I take to be wrapping non-science in the trappings of science in order to confuse. eg Orgonite, [[[Royal Rife]] and - given the assertion of subluxations - chiropractic's fundamanetal theoretical basis are pseudoscience. chiropractic as an empirical collection of manipulations for pains in joints and muscles is not, and if it is approached scientifically will include science. Science is powerful and pseudoscience is an attempt to steal that power for fraudulent purposes or at least quackery. Midgley 09:16, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
Edzard Ernst would be a good chap to ask about that sort of thing. I might manage it. Much of his work is putting science in CAM, and taking out that which is not. Midgley 09:18, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
And what about Category:Quackery? Which is currently proposed for deletion. --Salix alba (talk) 21:25, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Remove Quackery and Pseudoscience

1 vote to the removal of both terms relating to the topic of alternative medicine. anyone have any good reasons to not? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Travisthurston (talk • contribs) 26 June 2006.

Perhaps this deserves some discussion rather than a straight yes/no vote.
Quackery has its own category, it does not need to be a subcategory of Alternative medicine for the following reason:
Quoted from the article on Quackery: Quackery is a term used to describe the unethical practice of promising health-related benefits for which there is little or no basis.
  • Most if not all types of regulated alternative medicine have a code of ethics. Each alt med-related article should therefore be evaluated as to whether it fits the description of quackery, and if not, perhaps it should not be in the Alternative medicine category?
The Pseudoscience article defines the term as Pseudoscience is a term applied to a body of alleged knowledge, methodology, belief, or practice that is portrayed as scientific but diverges substantially from the required standards for scientific work or is unsupported by sufficient scientific research.
Evidence-based medicine has categories according to the level of evidence on which information is based. Could some CAM articles be classified using this system instead?
--apers0n 05:01, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Remove both. Quackery can be a subcategory of conventional medicine as well, as with plastic surgery being overpromoted, and it's POV to subcategorize it here.

As for having this cat be part of category:Pseudoscience, consider this from WP:CG:

Questions to ask to determine whether it is appropriate to add an article to a category:
  • If the category does not already exist, is it possible to write a few paragraphs or more on the subject of the category, explaining it?
  • If you go to the article from the category, will it be obvious why the article was put in the category? Is the category subject prominently discussed in the article?
If the answer to either of these questions is no, then the category is probably inappropriate. ....
Categories appear without annotations, so be careful of NPOV when creating or filling categories. Unless it is self-evident and uncontroversial that something belongs in a category, it should not be put into a category. ....
Whatever categories you add, make sure they do not implicitly violate the neutral point of view policy. If the nature of something is in dispute (like whether or not it's fictional or scientific or whatever), you may want to avoid labelling it or mark the categorization as disputed.

Given these NPOV considerations, putting the entire Category:Alternative_medicine into category:Pseudoscience seems absurd. Even if one defines anything lacking EBM support as pseudoscience (which doesn't appear to be an agreed-upon definition, just one that some infer), not all alt-med lacks support under EBM. One can, again, by fiat simply cease to define any modality as pseudoscientific as soon as it acquires EBM-level evidence, but again, that isn't how the term alt-med is commonly understood either. Where are the verifiable references saying there is scientific consensus that all all-med is pseudoscience? Let those who wish to keep the cat supply them.

The problem is that being in a category is, at least with the present Wiki software, an either/or thing. There is no way to qualify something as falling "partly" in a category, or as having "elements" of that category. Midgley's point (in the preceding section) about chiropractic being both pseudoscientific and scientific is very well-taken. See also the example of "being partially in the kitchen" in the fuzzy logic article. I think WP:CG is pretty clear about what to do in such cases: don't apply the category.

I actually had removed category:Pseudoscience recently, citing a relevant passage WP:CG, and another editor reverted without explanation and scolded me to seek consensus (which was ironic, since he didn't attempt to discuss in any way). Most if not all comments I read above support removing it. So you know what? I'm going to be bold and do so now. However, I won't remove quackery as a sub-cat pending discussion. cheers, Jim Butler(talk) 08:16, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Category:Quackery was recently proposed for deletion [1], the result was no consensus. One interesting idea was to have category:Practices described as quackery which is more clearly defined. Possible category:Pseudoscience and Category:Quackery would work better as a see also in the main text rather than as a super/sub category. --Salix alba (talk) 08:48, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
Looks like an edit war - does this discussion not count for anything? --apers0n 09:27, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Well, Category:Quackery will remain a cat on Wikipedia if that was the consensus, but AFAIK that doesn't mean it has to remain a subcat here. As for this cat being under category:Pseudoscience, I've twice removed it, the first time with an explanatory edit summary, and the second time offering further explanation above. It was twice reverted (replaced) without explanation by Duncharris (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights). I've invited him to discuss on the talk page. cheers, Jim Butler(talk) 16:22, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
That you already have discussion going on cat talk pseudoscience and Dunc's talk page makes your insinuation that he reverted your removal of the cat "without explanation" disingenious at best, misleading certainly, and manipulative at worst. Your behavior is disruptive. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:26, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Do your homework KC. I can show you all the diffs if you like. Dunc certainly at NO POINT explained his reversion of category:pseudoscience on this page, neither in an edit summary (aren't we supposed to use those?), on this talk page, on his user talk page (where he hasn't responded to any of my posts, so it can hardly be said there is "discussion" there), or on my user talk page (where his only comment, regarding acupressure and acupuncture point, was telling me to get consensus on the talk page first). And here is the extent of his contribution on Category talk:Pseudoscience: diff; diff. Notice the resounding lack of substantive consideration of the NPOV issues raised at WP:CG.
My statement above is completely accurate. Please tell me how my behavior is disruptive while Dunc's isn't? It couldn't have anything to do with the fact that you agree with Dunc and disagree with me on matters of substance, could it? Worth considering under a cool sombrero with a nice iced drink. Cheers, Jim Butler(talk) 20:48, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

So anyway. User:Salix alba suggested that category:Pseudoscience and Category:Quackery "would work better as a see also in the main text rather than as a super/sub category." I think this is sensible. Not all of the "methods used in place of, or in addition to, mainstream medical treatment" are pseudoscientific under WP's definition. Therefore category:pseudoscience should be removed. I'll do so now, noting that WP:V says that the burden of evidence is with editors who wish it to stay. cheers, Jim Butler(talk) 07:21, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Just removed this cat from category:Quackery following suggestions and reasoning above. Jim Butler(talk) 22:09, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Categories Revisited

I find it surprising in light of the above debates that "Pseudoscience" continues to be added as a category (which seem to err to a consensus against adding it). Pseudoscience, as noted above would suggest that alternative medicine is masquerading as science, and a good many alternative therapies make no such claim. Acupuncture, as part of TCM, is an obvious example, making no pretence of being science. Other treatments have also received acceptance as efficacious by mainstream science, such as certain herbal treatments. Thus, it seems a misnomer to throw everything in alternative medicine into Pseudoscience. It would be far more accurate to throw some of these things out of Alternative Medicine and into Pseudoscience. --Limegreen 05:14, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I find it interesting that editors are insisting on putting this cat here without discussion, and despite EBM evidence to the contrary in fields such as acupuncture (similar problems with skeptical editors there making edits without discussion and supporting evidence). Let's see reliable evidence of scientific consensus that all alt-med, as defined here on WP, is pseudoscience. For contrary evidence, see e.g. this talk from Edzard Ernst. Just because vocal skeptics say alt-med is pseudoscience doesn't establish that as a reliable majority view among scientists. If there is EBM evidence and debate, that suggests scientists take these issues seriously and at least a significant minority accepts efficacy for some conditions. Using a cat means WP endorses the POV that alt-med is pseudoscientific. How about getting back to NPOV: if the categorization isn't straightforward, we simply present competing POV's in the article with sources. Jim Butler(talk) 16:32, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
P.S. Sorry for truncated edit summary in my last edit of the article[2]. The main point from the EBM reviews is that debate over efficacy isn't merely between scientists and pseudoscientists, but rather among mainstream scientists. - Jim Butler(talk) 16:58, 10 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Felonious Monk Reverts

FM, you wrote in an edit summary: "Inclusion in the category is discussed at the relevent article talk pages. This is standing convention, well- and long-settled."

What do you mean by "discussed at the relevant article talk pages"? Chiropractic is not in category:pseudoscience, which apparently refects consensus at that talk page. There was no consensus on the Acupuncture talk page for the cat either; one editor yesterday added it, mistakenly calling it a "reversion of vandalism". If some or most alt-med topics should be in cat:pseudoscience, put them there. But not all things labelled pseudoscientific are equally pseudoscientific, and in some cases the cat is inappropriate. No editor so far has demonstrated that consensus exists among scientists that acupuncture or chiropractic are pseudosciences. But they're still alt-med, which means you don't have justification to categorize all of alt-med as pseudoscience. Simple logic. See comments citing Ernst above.

Read the rest of this talk page. There is no consensus for adding category:pseudoscience, and quite a bit of editorial opinion against doing so. I don't accept your argument from authority that there is "standing convention" that trumps (a) what scientists say about alt-med and (b) consensus on this talk page. If that policy exists you need to cite it.

You mentioned NPOV on Category Talk:Pseudoscience. What NPOV says about describing majority views "as such" does not mean you get to categorize something as pseudoscience just because Randi or Carroll said so. You need to address the NPOV issues raised in WP:CG. You are mistaken when you say your position is non-negotiable: it is the principle of NPOV itself that is non-negotiable, not every sentence on the NPOV page. NPOV also has to be balanced with of the equally non-negotiable WP:V. Using cats can be POV, and if you want to do so here, you need to meet WP:V and support your contention that majority views exist. You haven't met that burden for chiropractic or acupuncture, where EBM reviews show that there is debate among mainstream scientists about efficacy. (No reason to repeat myself, so please see my comments at Talk:Acupuncture#Category:Pseudoscience.)

WP works by consensus, and there isn't consensus here. Attempts from editors to argue from authority, avoiding discussion and dismissing arguments they dislike as wikilawyering, don't do much to advance either science or WP. Let's try and work toward consensus as WP:DR says, with civil and substantive discussion on the merits. Thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 19:13, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Medicine is a scientific endeavor. Science requires empirical proofs. Medicine without empirical proofs is not scientific. Hence, pseudoscience. Its not a POV thing; its an accuracy thing. I see a chiropractor myself, and have received much benefit from doing so. Doesn't mean there are claims made repeatedly for Chiropractic care which are without any scientific evidence. FM was absolutely correct to revert; accuracy is our goal here. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:22, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
It's not that simple. Scientists and doctors argue over how to interpret evidence all the time, and disagree over what suffices for empirical proofs. One sees this in peer-reviewed literature all the time, e.g. EBM reviews. If there is a credible significant minority view, WP should not categorically take sides and endorse the majority view by using the cat.
Overpromotion exists with conventional medical treatments as well, but they don't get catgeorized as pseudoscience. It is rhetorically attractive to define alternative medicine by fiat as "that which is without evidence", as Dawkins does. But that doesn't reflect popular, dictionary-level use of the term, and isn't the same as the definition we use on the cat page: "encompasses methods used in place of, or in addition to, mainstream medical treatments." Alternative medicine, in its current version[3], makes a false distinction between alternative and complementary. The two terms are used interchangeably in common usage, and WP should reflect that and not adopt idiosyncratic terms.
Therefore, it's possible to be both alt-med yet not pseudoscientific enough to justify using the cat tag. - Jim Butler(talk) 19:46, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Interesting, this, "...If there is a credible significant minority view...", how, absent the use of science would one determine credibility? •Jim62sch• 23:00, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
One wouldn't. That's my point. The EBM reviews and debates that I'm referring to are written by scientists, in peer-reviewed literature, for scientifically literate audiences. In the case of acu's efficacy for some conditions, there is debate and no apparent consensus for or against. (Reviews supporting efficacy: headache[4], nausea[5][6][7], back pain[8][9] and dental pain[10]. Against: headache[11] and nausea[12].) No consensus, IOW. Now note Jimbo Wales' comments on NPOV and science here: "If a view is the majority view of a broad consensus of scientists, then we say so. If a view is a minority view of some scientists, scientists who are respected by the mainstream that differs with them on this particular matter, then we say so." I'm simply saying that it's better to describe scientists' views about acu's efficacy accordingly. To categorize it as pseudoscience is to take sides in a debate that the scientific community itself hasn't resolved. Jim Butler(talk) 04:03, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Simple solution, though: create "category:complementary medicine", and move acu and chiro there along with other techniques with scientific support. -Jim Butler(talk) 19:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC) struck, see below. -Jim Butler(talk) 05:18, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
The issue isn't "interpretation of evidence", it's use of the scientific method. Granted, there's a lot more art than science in contemporary medicine too, but in general it has a scientific basis... Guettarda 19:55, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, Guettarda - I was trying to keep it simple enough to be clear, I may have made my statement too simplified. KillerChihuahua?!? 20:10, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Editing earlier comments for brevity -- KC's instincts to simplify for the sake of communication are actually good ones I need to follow.
Sure, acu's theory is not scientific. But nonscientific isn't the same as pseudoscientific. Acu's theory isn't presented as scientific; it's used pragmatically for the results it gets. Testing those results is completely compatible with scientific method, and there is legimitate scientific debate over its efficacy for some things, cf. EBM section in acupuncture. Sure it's promoted as treating some things without EBM-gold-standard proof, but come on, this is true for sinus surgery, back surgery, psych meds etc. -- we don't call those pseudoscientifc (maybe we should). Anyway, Ernst is right: no double-standards.
Even under EBM it isn't considered heresy to apply treatments that are less than proven: other things being equal, it's acceptable to "try it if it might help and can't hurt", and rely on clinical experience as well as meta-analyses.[13] Given all this, I think that categorically classifying it as pseudoscience is too strongly POV. Why not just present the various arguments in the article, per NPOV? -Jim Butler(talk) 21:09, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
One problem with the thesis: Acu is presented as science as is alternative medicine as a whole. One merely needs to Google "science of acupuncture" or "science of alternative medicine" and behold thousands of hits, a number of them by practitioners. Hence, as the way the hypotheses of both are stated as fact rather than as tentative propositions they are non-falsifiable, thus, they are pseudoscience. •Jim62sch• 21:43, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Jim, that's a good argument. It does apply where acu is falsely represented as being scientific. There are also cases where acu is correctly presented as compatible with science, as when scientists do RCT's on it. There are also cases where acu's TCM theory is correctly portrayed as nonscientific (i.e., as a different paradigm than science). NPOV accomodates all these views, allowing them to be presented in articles. WP:CG suggests caution in using cats to endorse one side of an argument, and I agree. What should the threshold be? I don't know. Maybe consensus among scientists that the topic is pseudoscientific? No editor has shown that exists in the case of acu or chiro. Not sure what the majority scientific views are here. If we don't know we shouldn't assume. Omitting the cat still allows the arguments to be made without WP endorsing any one. Thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 23:22, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Killer Chihuahua Medicine is a scientific endeavor. Science requires empirical proofs. Medicine without empirical proofs is not scientific. Hence, pseudoscience.
It might seem semantics, but "pseudoscience" does not mean "not scientific", but "pretending to be science", so the initial syllogism is correct, but your final conclusion that that makes it pseudoscience is false. Intelligent Design is pseudoscience. It pretends to be science when it is not. In contrast, while some practioners might pass some alternative medicines off as science, that doesn't make it pseudoscience. Also, just because some scientific evidence accrues supporting a particular treatment, that doesn't just magically shift it into conventional medicine. That process usually takes decades. --Limegreen 00:21, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Alternative medicine, not alternative rock band. Take the first sentence, add the others - Says it is a science (medicine) but it isn't. KillerChihuahua?!? 05:47, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Nonetheless, KC, it's fallacious to attempt to redefine alt-med as "that which lacks proof". That's Dawkins' definition, not the one on the cat page which more closely reflects popular understanding and usage of the term. Calling all alt-med pseudoscience suggests to the reader that everything in the cat lacks evidence, and that simply isn't true. (Again, note the lack of consensus on either the chiro or acu talk pages for such a classification.) - Jim Butler(talk) 05:58, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
KC: Alternative medicine, not alternative rock band. Take the first sentence, add the others
Probably better 'alternative health paradigm'. How about a little bit less weak semantics and a bit more evidence. I'm a scientist. I like evidence. I like logic. I liked alternative rock in the early 90s. I even prefer conventional scientific medicine. --Limegreen 11:44, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Rather than creating "category:complementary medicine", Template:Alternative medical systems has recently been designed as part of an ongoing attempt to group the various comp. and alternative medical practices according to the NCCAM classifications and is intended to include chiropractic and acupuncture, the thing is that some of them are in more than one classification... Category:Alternative medical systems is however also a subcat of Category:Alternative medicine see the (now inactive but still relevant project) Wikipedia:Wikiproject:Alternative Medicine/Classification Systems. --apers0n 05:20, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Agree, no need for a new cat. Thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 05:56, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reverts on 14 July 2006 and "See Also" section

KC, you argued that once scientific evidence is extant it is no longer "alternative" so alt med is accurately placed here. I refuted that above, but it's easy to miss so I'll repeat. You're attempting to redefine alt-med by fiat to an evidence-based definition, but that is not the same as popular or WP definition. Alt-med is defined as a function of whether it's used within mainstream medicine, not on extant evidence. From the cat page: Alt-med encompasses methods used in place of, or in addition to, mainstream medical treatments. Scientists have found evidence for both acu and chiro (see respective articles), and there is no consensus in favor of calling those pseudosciences (see respective talk pages). Evidence can accrue in favor of something, but the switch of that something to "mainstream" usage usually takes a little while longer.

Thank you for mentioning 3RR. I am aware of exactly what the policy says, and that it's a maximum limit, not an entitlement. I undid my revert because I had a total of three that day, and didn't even want to be close. It just seemed like a good-faith thing to do.

It's better to discuss on this page than edit-war. Unfortunately there isn't much middle ground between the category being there or not. As I said, I think that NPOV (see WP:CG) suggests that in borderline cases, we should err on the side of not using a category. Someone User:Salix_alba already placed a "see also" on the page, which could be a nice compromise approach. It wasn't showing up due to formatting; I fixed that. My edit summary was truncated and should have read: "...and reformat so "See also" is visible". thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 20:54, 14 July 2006 (UTC) (revised 02:17, 15 July 2006 (UTC))

Just noticed another rv without discussion from User:Duncharris, who like some other contributers here is also an admin. Admins should remind one another to adhere to Wikiquette; the end does not justify the means. Refusal to discuss is no way to pursue consensus. In the meantime, I've added Template:Disputed-category. Thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 22:44, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
KC, I just noticed that you removed the disputed tag with this edit summary: One malcontent who does not understand the definition of pseudoscience does not a dispute make.[14].
I strongly object to your edit for two reasons: (1) You make a gratuitious personal attack (see WP:NPA and Help:Edit summary), and (2) The purpose of the tag is to show that concensus doesn't exist and to attract discussion to the talk page. I am not the only editor who objects to the use of cat:pseudoscience on this and other alt-med articles. Consensus doesn't exist, and you and other editors are now avoiding discussion and quashing attempts to reach consensus (see para below). Removing a disputed tag under such conditions is grossly inappropriate. Please restore it.
Your edit summaries for your previous edit was also misleading. You wrote Rv, once scientific evidence is extant it is no longer "alternative" so alt med is accurately placed here. Please discuss on talk.[15] Your first sentence was simply repetition of your previous edit summary[16] that I did address on talk above. Telling me to discuss again, and still not discussing, is disingenuous. Let's stay cool and work this out. Thanks, Jim Butler(talk) 23:35, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

No, a personal attack is "you are an idiot". You are a malcontent; you are not contented with Alt Med being in pseudoscience, and are unwilling to discuss the possibility that you may be mistaken. You argue rather than cite and reason. Blunt I may be, but personal attacks that was not. KillerChihuahua?!? 23:51, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, KC, it is a personal attack, and I do understand what pseudoscience is. I'm perfectly willing to discuss the possibility that I may be mistaken. It seems that Dunc, and now you, are unwilling to discuss that with me. That is poor Wikiquette and does not serve WP well. Also, I use citation and reasoning in my "arguments" as much as anyone else.
You still haven't addressed my objections to your removing the disputed tag. Nor have you addressed my rebuttal of your attempt to define alt-med by fiat as "medicine lacking evidence (irrespective of who uses it)" as opposed to WP's "medicine used outside the mainstream (irrespective of whether there is evidence for it). Nor have you answered my other arguments above, i.e. that scientists indeed find evidence for acu and chiro, so using the tag to cover all alt-med is wrong. No editor has addressed my citation of WP:CG, or my refutation of FM's claim that WP:NPOV trumps it. No editor has addressed the issue of burden of proof arising from WP:V: that those who wish a cat to stay should cite adequate evidence. Jim Butler(talk) 00:32, 15 July 2006 (UTC)


I'm beginning to think that you KillerChihuahua are the malcontent. Reasons why the Pusdosceince tag is awkward.
  1. Its a pejorative term.
  2. For a large category covering a large number of various practices its a very broad brush to apply.
  3. Not all sub fields claim to be a science.
  4. Some sub fields have reached general acceptance in the medical practice. There are 370,000 research papers on the subject.
  5. Medicine as a whole is debatably science. The primary goal of medicine is healing, if people get better, then its a success, whether or not there is a scientific explanation.
  6. Science is about proving, not healing.
Take for example Herbalism many of our medicines today are derived from herbal products. There's plenty of scientific research on these products. Or maybe Category:Traditional medicine which have always used a different mode of enquiry into developing the fields, never claiming to be scientific, instead they have other rich traditions to draw upon. Or the Alexander Technique which is basically about good posture, or Shiatsu a form of massage. Do ALL of these claim to be science, and do ALL of these fail to be science. So what is it which unnerves you about the combined wisdom of centuries of paractice?--Salix alba (talk) 00:38, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Category:Alternative medicine is not pseudoscience in general.
However if an Alternative medicine practice itself claims to be sciencetific (as in science.health.alternative medicine) but it is not yet scientific, not entirely scientific, or not at all true science and biased (ie to gain money) it should also get one of it's matching categories: Category:Protoscience (proto-, not yet), Category:Pseudoscience (pseudo, not entirely), Category:Junk science (junk, not at all, but biased) ... !
If an Alternative medicine practice itself claims to be, or is, spiritual or psychological it should also get Category:Spirituality ... --Ollj 17:33, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

quote "Pseudoscience is not a POV label, its a perfectly useful word and should be used when appropriate. If other people find it offensive, we can't help that. As encyclopedists we don't pander to people's feelings. We describe things accurately." --Ollj 17:33, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A western term

I think there is some merit to the reverted sentence Alternative medicine is a Western terms that.... It is only on Europe and North America where the term is frequently used, so it could be argued that it is a case to WP:BIAS. Adding the fact its a Western term, could clarify the situation. Further, the term is diminishing in popularity with Complementary medicine becoming more prominent. --Salix alba (talk) 17:35, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This happens to be the English edition of Wikipedia. Yeah, the category should have been called CAM. But, we all know why that did not happen. Now, why don't we all move onto the task of this category: correctly classifying complementary and alternative medicine related articles? -- John Gohde (talk) 14:45, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps, but that should be discussed at talk:Alternative medicine, not here. And it was overly cited, looking like a POV list of articles you should read. — Dunc|☺ 17:39, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The edit was NOT intended as POV. If it appeared that way, then I apologise but the point of Wikipedia is to collaborate to get to the right formula, not just to delete things we don't like. Could you therefore please be more helpful and rephrase or edit it rather than just delete it? I don't want the piece to be POV, but you cannot deny that what in the West (1 billion people) is called "alternative medicine" is considered quite normal in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Arabia (>4 billion people). This is not my opinion, this is just numerical fact. Nowhere is it written that Wikipedia enshrines the Western world-view above all others. I would really appreciate people's help in making this piece NPOV, rather than just resorting to heavy-handed deletions. Please excuse my vehemence but this is not a minor point. Regards Punanimal 15:14, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
Hopefully all the traditional medicine practicies should be listed in Category:Traditional medicine, which is a more neutral term. There may well be a case for just listing articles in that category rather than here, see WP:SUBCAT, In straightforward cases an article should not be in both a category and its subcategory, however there are numerious exceptions to the rule. I'd say we should try to kepp the description here brief, explained what the category is, rather than have an extended article which is Alternative medicine. --Salix alba (talk) 12:51, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
Good point. The trouble is that "alternative medicine" and "traditional medicine" are inherently POV terms. In the West, "alternative medicine" subsumes both non-European medical systems AND New Age practices; "traditional medicine" means Western medicine. In the Orient, though "traditional medicine" includes Ayurveda, Chinese medicine and other practices. However, it would be a mistake to suppress these terms. What is needed is for a GLOBAL perspective to be worked into all articles on these topics. This, of course, will provoke backlash from the conservative Western medical professional who believe that Western medicine is the "only" way to treat patients, as per my London doctor who just smiled indulgently when I told her that I had been to see a dietician and that I practice yoga. Ohhhh, how people lack perspective. Regards ... Punanimal 20:22, 2 Sep 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pseudoscience (again)

I have added the Category:Pseudoscience tag back, after having modified the category page to emphasize that the members of the category are not (necessarily) being called pseudoscience by their inclusion, but rather that there is a notable association. I don't think that much is disputed, since it is after all mentioned in the intro of this category page. Since some people might still take the inclusion to imply that Wikipedia is endorsing the view that Alternative medicine is pseudoscience, I suggest that anyone who feels this way not only reply here but also bring it up on the talk page for Category:Pseudoscience so that the importance of clarity on this issue is itself made clear. --Sapphic 02:34, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Per Wikipedia:Categorization#Some_general_guidelines point #8, it is not self-evident that alternative medicine belongs in this category. -- Levine2112 discuss 18:56, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
If an article on X is in category Y, that does not imply that X is Y (or a Y). Category:Pseudoscience includes articles on noted skeptics such as Michael Shermer, various logical fallacies that tend to show up in pseudoscientific theories, and many other articles that are not actually examples of pseudoscience. If it would help to explicitly spell this out in the category page for alternative medicine, then I would be happy to help with that. Of all the fields accused of being pseudoscientific, I'm probably most sympathetic to alternative medicine, so in fact I'd be inclined to argue that many of the members of this category are not pseudoscience — but that doesn't mean I'm willing to turn a blind eye to the fact that they (and indeed the entire field of alternative medicine) are considered to be pseudoscience by a notable portion of the scientific community, which is all that's really required for category inclusion. --Sapphic 20:18, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
Michael Shermer is notable for being a debunker of pseudoscience and pseudoscientific theories. Thus he is notable (the reason why he has a Wikipedia article) for being directly tied tot he topic of Pseudoscience. Thus, it is completely uncontroverisal to put Michael Shermer in this category. Alternative Medicine is not explicitly notable for being a pseudoscience or for being associated with pseudoscience; but rather it is only controverisally related to pseudoscience. Thus, putting Alternative Medicine in the category of Pseudoscience is a violation of point #8 of Wikipedia:Categorization#Some_general_guidelines. I don't think that annotation on the category page solves the issue as the label "pseudoscience" is pejorative and often misused subjectively. I would say that a possible solution it to put forms, theories, practitioners and instruments of alternative medicine that are uncontroversially notable for their association to pseudoscience (meaning that there is no major controversary surrounding this association) into the category of Pseudoscience. It may be helpful to remember that categories do not form a tree. -- Levine2112 discuss 21:23, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quackery, Pseudoscience, or Powerful Medicine?

I do not really care, if some editor happens to be a skeptic. Complementary and alternative medicine: Exists, and has a history. Therefore as long as articles covers topics that do in fact exist in alternative medicine, they have every right to be in a world class encyclopedia like WikiPedia; just as long as they are written from the perspective of an encyclopedia article. The whole idea of skepticism has absolutely no place in an encyclopedia, IMHO. Further, skepticism is a priori proof of advocacy, IMHO.

And, that fact goes quadruple for the classification system called categories. The only valid questions that can be raised on this category are:

  1. Is a specific article a part of complementary and alternative medicine?
  2. Has the article been correctly sub-classified?

Article clean up and development is a totally separate issue from the task of this talk page; and just as obviously belongs on the respective talk pages of the articles belonging to this category.

Whether or not some group of skeptics wants to waste their time creating and maintaining a totally redundant category called quackery, pseudoscience, or whatever; is their prerogative just as long as their activities don't impede the correct classifications and subclassifications of the category:alternative medicine.

The primary activity on this talk page has been and will continue to be by definition the:

  1. Determination whether or not a specific article is correctly a part of complementary and alternative medicine.
  2. And, whether or not the article been correctly sub-classified.

Have a good day. -- John Gohde (talk) 13:42, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Not category:pseudoscience again

The criteria for using category:pseudoscience are given at WP:PSCI: "obvious pseudoscience" (i.e. obscure tiny-minority things like Time Cube, or "generally considered pseudoscience by the scientific community" (i.e., well-known topics that have attracted commentary by scientific bodies, like astrology). While some alt-med's qualify as such, not all do, and I don't know of any reliable source that says the entire field of alt-med, or CAM, is generally considered pseudoscience by the scientific community. Please also see WP:RS#Claims_of_consensus, which clarifies that "claims of consensus must be sourced". I welcome efforts to locate and include such a source, but till then, WP's NPOV policy is clear that the category doesn't belong here. --Jim Butler (t) 18:32, 8 May 2008 (UTC)