Talk:Homeopathy/Archive 46

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The Lede is very long, Violates multiple WP:guidelines, Doesn't well define homeopathy in first sentence, Lacks good "Why" explanations that are in article body, Reads like a committee product

The consensus and still open matters in this section were summarized in a new talk page section, otherwise this section is -

Resolved

The Lede is unnecessarily long.HkFnsNGA (talk) 02:20, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Combining

1. the comments of each editor who responded above,
2. WP:Lede on "first sentence" ("If its subject is amenable to definition, then the first sentence should give a concise definition: where possible"),
3. WP:Lede on "first paragraph" (“Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”),
4. WP:Use plain English (don't need "Ipse dixit", "axiom", "placebo effect", "serial dilution", "solution", etc. - "solution" is not even the correct usage, since there is no "solute" for the "cells" and tissues of the crushed plants and the un-dissolvable metals used in homeopathy),
5. WP:MOS ("concise" - all of the content can be covered with 2/3 of the words, and e.g., a practitioner consulting trade books for diagnosis is unremarkable), and
6. WP:MOS (“avoid jargon” - e.g. "repertories").

The existing lede violates all of thes quoted WP:guideline. Here is a lede proposal that corrects these, and specifically deals with each specific reasons to oppose made by each editor who commented on my first two proposals.

“Homeopathy (also spelled homoeopathy^[1] or homœopathy) is a form of alternative medicine, whereby it is claimed that if a substance causes a symptom of the illness, then highly diluting a mixture of the substance creates a remedy for the illness. Homeopathic "remedies" are, with rare exceptions, considered safe^[2] though homeopathy has been criticized for putting patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine such as vaccinations,^[3] anti-malarial drugs,^[4] and antibiotics.^[5] Homeopathy is practiced around the world, with great variations in its regulation and coverage by health care systems. However, homeopathy's effectiveness (beyond that of a sham treatment) is unsupported by the collective weight of modern medical and scientific research, and its principles are inconsistent with established laws of science.
Homeopathy was proposed in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Hahnemann declared that a substance that creates the symptoms of an illness can be used to treat the illness, which he called “the law of similars”. He declared that the more the substance is diluted, the more effective it becomes, which he called “potentization”. The substance is crushed and mixed into a liquid (water or alchohol) then shaken by forceful striking, and the resulting mixture is repeatedly diluted then shaken by forceful striking. The resulting preparation is called a “remedy”.
Hahnemann’s declarations were made without using the scientific method, and before the molecular theory in chemistry. Under levels of dilution recommended by Hahnemann, no molecule of the original substance would likely remain in the “remedy”. Modern homeopathy claims that no molecule is needed because it claims that water has a “memory”, which is inconsistent with the laws of physics and chemistry. Inefficacy in clinical trials, and inconsistencies with established laws of science, have led to members of the scientific community calling homeopathy a pseudoscience, quackery,^[6]^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10] and a "cruel deception".^[11]”

Here is the existing lead, with 50% more words, and Wp:guidlines, as in items 2 - 6 above,

"Homeopathy (also spelled homoeopathy^[12] or homœopathy) is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners use highly^[13]^[14] diluted preparations. Homeopathy was first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796, based on an ipse dixit^[15] axiom^[16] formulated by Hahnemann, which he called the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given in diluted form to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion, after each dilution under the assumption that this increases the effect. Homeopaths call this process potentization. Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains.^[17] Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending remedies.^[18] Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, and a remedy is selected based on the totality of symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are, with rare exceptions, considered safe^[2] though homeopathy has been criticized for putting patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine such as vaccinations,^[3] anti-malarial drugs,^[4] and antibiotics.^[5]
Homeopathy's efficacy beyond the placebo effect is unsupported by the collective weight of scientific and clinical evidence.^[13]^[14]^[19]^[20]^[21] While some individual studies have positive results, systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy conclusively.^[22]^[23]^[24]^[25]^[26] Furthermore, higher quality trials tend to report results that are less positive,^[24]^[27] and most positive studies have not been replicated or show methodological problems that prevent them from being considered unambiguous evidence of homeopathy's efficacy.^[13]^[20]^[28]^[29] A 2010 inquiry into the evidence base for homeopathy conducted by the United Kingdom's House of Commons Science and Technology Committee concluded that homeopathy is no more effective than placebo.^[14]
Depending on the dilution, homeopathic remedies may not contain any pharmacologically active molecules,^[30] and for such remedies to have pharmacological effect would violate fundamental principles of science.^[21]^[31] Modern homeopaths have proposed that water has a memory that allows homeopathic preparations to work without any of the original substance; however, there are no verified observations nor scientifically plausible physical mechanisms for such a phenomenon.^[31]^[32] The lack of convincing scientific evidence supporting homeopathy's efficacy^[33] and its use of remedies lacking active ingredients have caused homeopathy to be described as pseudoscience, quackery,^[6]^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10] and a "cruel deception".^[11]
The regulation and prevalence of homeopathy is highly variable from country to country. There are no specific legal regulations concerning its use in some countries, while in others, licenses or degrees in conventional medicine from accredited universities are required. In several countries, homeopathy is covered by the national insurance coverage to different extents, while in some it is fully integrated into the national health care system. In many countries, the laws that govern the regulation and testing of conventional drugs do not apply to homeopathic remedies.^[34]"

These specifics laden paragraphs can be moved to be the leads in the corresponding article sections.HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:16, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm a sucker for brevity - so this has my support. Shot info (talk) 09:36, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I really hate to repeat myself over and over again. The reason why there are “corresponding article sections” is that the sentences you propose to move there are their summaries. It's a long article, therefore it has a “long” lede (which is still within guidelines - it's four paragraphs). While your proposal is worded more carefully than the ones before, it still tries to leave out details of the homeopathic practice and focusses on what science has to say about homeopathy. While the scientific part is important, this article is about homeopathy as a whole, so describing remedy selection isn't being “overly specific”. The current lede is carefully worded and referenced, while yours has both style problems (e.g.: “whereby it is claimed”, “which he called” in two consecutive sentences) and contains vague/incorrect wording like “The substance is crushed and mixed into a liquid” - with no reference. It still uses “non-plain” English (dilution, sham treatment), indicating that it's just not possible to go without it. You substituted ipse dixit with “declation” - a word totally unknown to me and probably no more understandable than the former - if it was, you wouldn't need to link to ipse dixit.
btw: the current lede isn't violating any guidelines. --Six words (talk) 09:48, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

"declation" was a typo for "declaration". "Sham treatment" is from the definition of placebo in its Wiki article. I linked it becaue it seemed like an editor wanted a link to a definition of "ipse dixit".69.199.196.246 (talk) 05:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have to Oppose again. The new suggestion is indeed better than previous ones, but it still changes the balance so that the lead focuses on debunking homeopathy rather than presenting a balanced summary of the article. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:57, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

PS: Although the current lead is quite long, I do actually think it has the balance just about right. Any rewriting for clarification must, I think, retain the current balance - which has taken a lot of time and discussion to arrive at. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:00, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and we definitely shouldn't be replacing neutral words like "placebo" with emotive phrases like "sham treatment". -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:03, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

"Sham treatment" is a neutral expression and appears in the definition of "placebo" at the Wiki article. ".69.199.196.246 (talk) 05:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The lead is supposed to be long because it's a long article, but the lead isn't "too" long. It does its job nicely and I see no need for major changes. -- Brangifer (talk) 20:02, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It is too long if you know an uneducated photograper who could not afford medical care for her 4 year old, googled "homeopathy", and tried to "remedy" things based on what she was able to read at Wiki (she read the first few sentences). Maybe Wiki "guidlines" could be stretched with a three sentence intro added at the outset of this article. All of the editors who have commented appear to share my view that molecules exist, and that there is no "extra force" in physics, but we seem to be debating style, at the expense of what really matters.HkFnsNGA (talk) 06:56, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I still don't buy your argument. The WP:LEAD guideline cannot be overridden. That doesnt' mean that small tweaks can't be made, but the lead is supposed to summarize and mention all significant content. If something is worth creating a section or subsection in the article, it should be mentioned in the lead. No one who first reads the lead and then reads the rest of the article should be surprised by anything they find. The lead should prepare them for what's coming. If you can find a way to say some things in a shorter and better way, go for it, but don't play with it too much or you'll do violence to all the efforts that led to its creation and present state. -- Brangifer (talk) 08:16, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The lead is the length it is because it has to summarise a long article. The proposed "three sentence intro" would introduce redundancy, and would actually make the lead longer. Brunton (talk) 11:27, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

While I don't wish to denigrate your photographer friend in the slightest, her failure or inability to read beyond three sentences is not the fault of the Wikipedia article. And though the case may be sad, warning people off homeopathy is not the purpose of this article's lead. And I have to say, this really does support the suggestion that you have an agenda/COI here - I don't mean to offend you, but I really think you should just leave this to people who have no such personal issues and can write from a neutral POV. Best regards -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:34, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I think the lede is too long.

There is a lot to summarise, but I think the lede could perhaps do it more concisely - don't be afraid of cutting out some detail as long as it makes the main points clear. For instance, we have a whole paragraph on the regulation & prevalence of homeopathy even though that's already covered in a separate article - why not pare it down to one sentence?

Does the lede even need whole sentence on the House of Commons enquiry? That's just one enquiry out of many, and is already covered under the umbrella of "Homeopathy's efficacy beyond the placebo effect is unsupported by...". Similarly, the "No verified observations..." is merely repeating something that was summarised in the preceding sentence. We've got the word "dilution" or "diluted" six times in the lede - is that really the sharpest summary we can write? bobrayner (talk) 11:49, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd support a shortening that retains a balanced overall summary of the article, but I would not support a shortening that changes the balance and tone into that of an anti-homeopathy warning. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:56, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Well put, Boing. As much as I think homeopathy is bunkum, it would be a serious NPOV violation to edit the lead so it served as a warning. The content in the lead is determined by the content of the article, regardless of what message people might read into the finished product. It must sum up the whole thing. The length argument is rather spurious since we have many articles with leads that are even longer. The length and complexity of this article necessitates a relatively long lead.

Conciseness is a good thing. If anything is to be shortened, it should be done through conciseness, not deletion. -- Brangifer (talk) 16:57, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

[edit conflict] I agree that the sentence about the HoC inquiry report doesn't really belong in the lead, for the reasons Bobrayner gives above, but I think the "no verified observations..." statement, or something like it, is needed in the context of the first part of the same sentence raising "water memory" - it is referring to that and not the subject matter of the preceding sentence. Brunton (talk) 17:02, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Comments from an uninvolved editor, so do what you will with them. Homeopathic remedies just redirects to the main article. It seems to me, "Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains." and "Depending on the dilution, homeopathic remedies may not contain any pharmacologically active molecules." say similar things and could be combined. The lede does not explain well the basics of what is diluted (many animal, plant, mineral, and synthetic substances?), or how these remedies are used. Is it mainly oral? In my opinion the basic description of homeopathy should be given more weight verses the detailed descriptions of the terminology and criticism of the science. Ward20 (talk) 20:52, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Here is a very short proposed lede:

"Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on three main principles, that a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"), that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"), and that the solute used for the dilution has a "memory". The first two principles were declared in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. The declaration that solutes like water and alcohol have a “memory” was made by 20th century homeopathists, responding to the fact that repeated dilution as recommended by Hahnemann would likely leave no molecules of the original substance. The principles upon which homeopathy is based are not consistent with well established principles of science. Homeopathic remedies are no more effective than a placebo. Its regulation varies widely around the world, but it is generally not considered harmful at high dilution levels.

It preserves the balance of the current lede since each paragraph is concisely replaced with a single sentence or less, without essential content loss. It addresses the bullet points 2-6 at the outset of this talk page section.69.199.196.246 (talk) 07:11, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Nice definition but not a LEAD per our guidelines. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:05, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I was trying to respond to these - WP:Lede "If its subject is amenable to definition, then the first sentence should give a concise definition where possible", and “Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”, also to WP:Use plain English 69.199.196.246 (talk) 06:33, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

That's the right way to start. I used to have a diagram I used to help me create a lead. I boiled each section down into a few sentences. A long and complicated section might require 2-3 sentences, while smaller and simpler ones might be covered in one sentence. A long article would still end up using 3-5 paragraphs, but nothing essential failed to be mentioned very briefly. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:39, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I like the bold compression, that's really good. However, the current lede has a lot of how scientific studies show no basis for homeopathy, and this is revisited repeatedly in the body of the article. If we could expand the "Homeopathic remedies are no more effective" sentence a bit (though not to the extent of the current lede!), I'd be very happy. bobrayner (talk) 10:14, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Attempting some minor tweaks to 69.199.196.246's fine proposal:

"Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on three main principles: That a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"); that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"), and that the solute used for the dilution has a "memory". The first two principles were declared in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. The declaration that solutes like water and alcohol have a “memory” was made by 20th century homeopaths, responding to the fact that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance. The principles are not consistent with well-established science, and systematic reviews of clinical trials show that homeopathic remedies are no more effective than placebo. Regulation of homeopathy varies widely around the world, but it is generally not considered harmful at high dilution levels.

Any comments / complaints?

I wanted to wikilink "law of similars", and was surprised to find that we don't have a separate article for it. Hmm.
Also, I think it would be worth keeping a few citations - in most articles, people prefer to keep citations in the body, but it's impossible to write a lede for homeopathy that doesn't contain claims which will be contested by some editors... if we're writing an evidence-based article on an alt-med practice, then references are worth their weight in gold. What do you reckon?
The scientific conflict with homeopathy occurs on two distinct fronts - one is that the principles appear incompatible with mainstream physics, chemistry, &c; the other front involves actual clinical tests of whether or not the remedies are more effective than placebo. We might or might not need much detail of either in the lede, but I think that it's very important to at least mention both of these fronts. bobrayner (talk) 13:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

1. How about Sympathetic magic? That article mentions "the Law of Similarity", and see, for example, Sir James Frazer: The Golden Bough chapter 3. There are also occasional references to magic in the homoeopathic literature, and I notice that the Magical thinking article has a Wikilink from "Homeopathic magic" to the Homeopathy article.

2. The citations are in the lead specifically because virtually every statement in it was challenged. They are all used to support the same statements in the body of the article, as far as I'm aware (if they aren't they should be).

3. I agree that both need to be mentioned, but I also think that the lead should give at least some indication as to why this is so. Brunton (talk) 16:23, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Concise and very well worded by Bobrayner. Bobrayner's "two front" analysis quickly sums up about half of the article with one sentence. Yes, still needs citations added on "two front" findings. I agree with Brunton that a mention of "why" would by helpful (because continued dilution would make any effect impossible, since it eventually leaves no molecules, per established chemistry; and water does not have special powers like a "memory", per established physics), but keep it very brief, and word it better than what I just wrote. Leave word "magic" out (accurate and concise though it is). HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:37, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

As much as I'd personally agree with the point about magic, homeopathy is already controversial; wikilinking to magic could be a little too provocative. Citations should be straightforward - recycle the good ones from the current lede. I'm happy to add more detail on either of the two "fronts" as long as we end up with a lede shorter than the current one, and which satisfies other editor's concerns about tone - anybody want to try writing an extra sentence or two? bobrayner (talk) 18:12, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry to be such a pain, but I still have a few “complaints”:

“a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness” isn't correct as Hahnemann said (ipse dixit, bla bla bla) that some substances need to be potentised to develop “healing powers”.
The memory thing isn't a homeopathic principle, so if we claim that in our lede I fear that loads of homeopaths/their customers will come and try to change that (and insert some other “facts” while they're at it).
Even homeopaths agree that water memory is a theory, so we can't call it a declaration.
The lede should mention how a homeopathic remedy is chosen - the sentence we have right now seems very good to me.

I still like the current lede better, but with some extra lines and refs (if there's one article that needs to have references in the lede it's homeopathy, otherwise there's warring even over the most innocent sentences) we could trim the lede down a bit. --Six words (talk) 21:26, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

The water memory is not a theory, its an idea with no basis on evidence (and is in fact against the evidence since the water structure would only last nanoseconds), a (scientific) theory makes and is consistent with its falsifiable claims. Most homeopaths do propose this as the mechanism too as indicated. IRWolfie- (talk) 00:24, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

You're preaching to the choir here. We can call it a “proposed mechanism” if you dislike theory, but it's not a homeopathic principle, and calling it one wouldn't be correct. --Six words (talk) 13:58, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd hesitate to call it even a "proposed mechanism", since there isn't really anything in the way of mechanism proposed here ("water remembers stuff" is not a mechanism). It's more of an ad hoc rationalisation of the implications of Avogadro's constant. Brunton (talk) 15:17, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Water memory is a widely held homeopathic conjecture first proposed by Jacques Benveniste. -- Brangifer (talk) 21:44, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

But it isn't a mechanism, any more than "aspirin works because it has acetylsalicylic acid in it" is a mechanism. "Conjecture" is probably OK, though. Brunton (talk) 22:36, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

To be honest, I'm completely indifferent on that point. Conjecture, mechanism, flight-of-fancy, whatever you prefer :-)

However, Six Words raised a couple of other points. On the first one, I think "some substances need to be potentised to develop “healing powers”" is already covered by the "can be used to make" wording - but if y'all prefer, we could expand/modify that slightly. Any suggestions for wording?

As for how a remedy is selected, I'm not 100% convinced we need that in a condensed lede but I'd be happy to go with the existing sentence as long as we remove/rephrase the "totality of symptoms" since that sounds rather mealy-mouthed. Homeopaths make decisions based on the symptoms that they are aware of, just as a real doctor might; I don't want to imply that either (a) homeopaths have special powers to see symptoms hidden to other practitioners, or (b) allopaths consistently disregard some significant symptoms. bobrayner (talk) 22:51, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Are we nearly there yet?

It appears that we're converging on a lede which would be acceptable to the people who've commented so far. However, it occurs to me that we'll probably never get a lede which everybody is completely happy with, so at some point we'll have to go ahead and replace the lede anyway, whilst accepting that there are a few loose ends which might need to be tied up later. It's all very well having an "almost perfect" proposal sitting here, but in the meantime, article-space readers get something which I think is much more flawed.
Shall we thrash out one last draft, and put it into article-space? If anybody feels that I'm trying to bulldoze opposition on a particular phrase in the new lede, I'll step back away from that phrase. My main priority is to get these improvements to where readers will see them, rather than to "win" on some specific wording. bobrayner (talk) 23:03, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

I think the last suggested lede by bobrayner is fine as it stands. It is easy to read, and as fully informative as it is likely to ever get.

Agree with last suggested lead by bobraynor.HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I have not followed this discussion because changing the lead of this article has always been extremely contentious and generally induced huge battles between the two main pseudoscience factions. I did not want to even think about what might be the consequences of replacing the lead by a rewritten one that is arguably better and not obviously unbalanced. I guess that a number of other editors stayed out of the discussion for similar reasons.

Is the proposal to replace the entire current lead by the one paragraph above in Brunton's 16:23, 4 January 2011 post? I don't think we are there yet:

It's way too short. Apart from being an introduction and providing a quick orientation, the lead is also supposed to function as a summary of the article, briefly addressing all the major points discussed in the article. The proposed lead is about the same length as the original lead of pigeon photographer, which had to be doubled in size to pass GA. Personally I did not feel that that was strictly necessary for an article about such an obscure topic, but for a topic with the prominence of homeopathy it is necessary that the lead gives sufficient information.
I doubt that it is correct to describe water memory as a third principle of homeopathy, giving it the same prominence as the law of similars and potentisation. Homeopaths are very conservative, and ultimately they believe in Hahnemann's writings. I don't think they would be unhappy if someone could prove homeopathy to be effective, explain this effectivity scientifically, and at the same time disprove water memory. In the corresponding situation where the law of similars or potentisation is the only thing disproved and the rest proved they would not be happy. The claim is also unsourced and not present in the article, as far as I can tell.

Otherwise the proposed text makes a good job of condensing the current lead to a single paragraph and after fixing problem 2 I could support it as a new first paragraph. That leaves 1. There should be at least another paragraph giving additional information about homeopathic practice, relation to other forms of alternative medicine, etc. The only problem with that is that this will reduce the proportion of text devoted to debunking homeopathy which makes the expansion likely to be rejected on those grounds. (This is not a WP:FRINGE or WP:NPOV problem, this is a psychological or sociological problem on the side of religious pseudoscience debunkers who do not believe in using reason for fighting pseudoscience.) Hans Adler 10:11, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

The following takes bobrayner's last suggestion, and adjusts it per Hans's remarks -

"Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on two main principles: that a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"); and that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"). The principles were declared without scientific basis in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Basic chemistry showed that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance, leaving only water or alcohol in the “remedy”. Some homeopaths declared that water has a “memory” in response to this fact from chemistry, but water does not have a memory according to well established principles of physics. The principles of homeopathy are not consistent with well-established science, and systematic reviews of clinical trials show that homeopathic remedies are no more effective than a placebo. The Regulation snd prevalence of homeopathy varies widely around the world. Homeopathic "remedies" are not considered harmful at high dilution levels, when it is only water or alcohol, although homeopathy may put patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine

69.199.196.246 (talk) 19:37, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

User:Hans Adler, water memory is referenced in the Medical analysis section.HkFnsNGA (talk) 19:32, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

??? Of course it is. As a modern attempt to explain the (unproved) efficacy of homeopathy beyond placebo. Not as a founding principle of homeopathy that is of an importance comparable to the law of similars and potentisation. Hans Adler 22:07, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

My bad, Hans. I misunderstood you to say there was no source about water memory, but you objected to the fact that there is no source that water memory is a "basic principle" in all homeopathy, which it is not, as you correctly pointed out. The new proposed first lede paragraph corrects this, per your correct comments.HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:28, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

UserHansAdler, the modification I made above, just after your remarks, modified UserBobrayner's suggested lede and reduced the number of central principles to two, and put water memory as a declaration of just "some" homeopaths. Does it satisfactorily respond to your all of your points? Are you also suggesting using it only as thet opening paragraph, but keeping the rest of the lead to follow? If so, I agree with that, for Wikipolitics reasons, if not for others.69.199.196.246 (talk) 22:16, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I thought this was about shortening the lede, not expanding it and adding extra redundancies. What is the point of adding another paragraph? --Six words (talk) 22:26, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. I withdraw my above remark, and think the single paragraph is short, easy to quickly read, and comprehensive, all at the same time.HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:31, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

No, we aren't getting any closer at all because, although it's a nice definition (good work Bob), it isn't a LEAD per our guidelines. A Wikipedia lead isn't the same as an introduction or summary elsewhere. The shorter it gets, the more it deviates from standard practice here. The original lead is quite good and not too long for such a long and complicated article. There is no policy argument, style justification, or need to shorten it. Until that is addressed, all efforts to condense it are a waste of time. Sorry, but I've been watching this and these facts seem to be ignored in the hope they will go away if editors are silent. No, they won't simply because our style guidelines still exist and justify the current lead. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:21, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I think it is much closer to correcting the problems with the current lede specified in bullet numbers 1 -6 at the top of this section. It has all of the non-overly specific content of the current lead, with less than half the words. Please take another look and compare the two, and consider the problems with the current lead specified in #1-6 at this section's beginning. If the first paragraph were to be replaced with the modified Bobrayner paragraph above, the lead would still be the same length, but the WP:Lead, WP:MOS, and WP:UsePlainEnglish violations detailed in #1-6 would be addressed. Bobraynor's paragraph is a great imporovement and does not violate any of these guidelines.HkFnsNGA (talk) 02:52, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I guess I missed something. I thought his paragraph was supposed to replace the entire current lead, but that's not what you're saying. Now I'm puzzled. I do agree the current first paragraph is pretty long. I noticed that the first 33 references which are used in the lead aren't all duplicated in the body. They should be. We must not lose any refs in this process. -- Brangifer (talk) 05:20, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

My bad. I included the 6 listed problems with the current lede, in this section objecting to the length of the lede. I should have separated the issues. You are definitely right that nothing should be lost in any changes.HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:45, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

This is not what I expexted to find, but the current lead has important information that is not in the article body at all. For example, I searched for the word "vaccination", and found it only in the lead. This means that a wholesale replacement of the lengthy lead can not be done without much work. This also means that the current lead deviates even more from wiki policies than in the six bullet pointed problems at the beginning of this section.HkFnsNGA (talk) 07:38, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm not at all surprised. Before the lead is changed, this needs to be fixed. Whatever is in the lead that's not in the body should be included in the body, and possibly not even be left in the lead. Just from looking at the refs list, one can see that in the first 33 refs a number are only included in the lead. That's a sign that something's wrong. Once these issues are fixed, THEN we can look at revising the lead and possibly shortening it. It might work then, and it might not even be necessary because this process may have resulted in a shorter lead. -- Brangifer (talk) 15:08, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

The current lead is the result of an extremely long, contentious process ("lead-doctoring"). As far as I can tell the dispute was mostly about the proportion of "debunking" material in the lead. Here are some non-obvious constraints for the lead which the proposed new lead does not satisfy:

Roughly one third must be denoted to debunking.
Every paragraph must contain at least one debunking sentence.
The word "quackery" must appear in the lead.
The word "pseudoscience" must appear in the lead.

These constraints make no sense. They are almost impossible to reconcile with WP:LEAD, are far more than is required by WP:NPOV and WP:FRINGE, and actually come close to breaking WP:NPOV themselves. But in my experience, if it ever looks as if one of these constraints might be violated, all hell breaks loose. You can expect numerous anti-pseudoscience warriors swarming in here and then staying here for a few weeks. (There is no need to assume off-site canvassing: This article has more than 700 page watchers. Most of them ignore it until they see on their watchlist that something goes "wrong".)

If you really want to rewrite the lead drastically, you have my moral support, but I don't expect you to have any success. This would probably require going to Arbcom, in which case I may or may not take part in the case, depending on how much time work leaves me.

This is a very unfortunate situation because anti-pseudoscience excesses such as the one we have here tend to cause a backlash by Arbcom and others, which then makes it harder to deal with actual pseudoscience-related problems. (I am not saying there is no pseudoscience here. I am saying without the extremism we would have no trouble dealing with it.) An example of such a backlash, (caused by less provocation than we have here) is the recent Arbcom case on global warming. Hans Adler 12:47, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

That's pretty accurate and the current attempt to shorten the lead has created one that pretty much only tells the skeptic's version. It looks like the lead in an article written on some skeptic website, and that's not what we're supposed to do here. -- Brangifer (talk) 15:08, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I like the proposal, but there are still some minor inaccuracies:

"The principles were declared without scientific basis in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann." This is not true. When Hahnemann declared these principles, medicine was still a protoscience and they were revolutionary but not any worse than most things experts at the time believed. This changed shortly afterwards, and the problem was that Hahnemann stuck to his principles even when they were obviously no longer tenable. (By the way, testing was confounded by the fact that Hahnemann was one of the earliest advocates of hygiene and proper food for patients. That alone made homeopathic hospitals more successful than others.)
"Basic chemistry showed that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance, leaving only water or alcohol in the “remedy”." True, but misleading. When Hahnemann declared his principles, the existence of molecules was a not very plausible hypothesis due to ancient Greek philosophers. He died before Loschmidt's experiments proved the existence of atoms and molecules beyond doubt and determined the Avogadro constant. That is the point from which one could compute with confidence that homeopathic remedies theoretically consist only of solvent. (In practice it depends on the method. If the same container is used repeatedly for shaking, as the "potency" increases, then the end result will contain some of the original substance, although obviously not very much. Hans Adler 13:05, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Good points. -- Brangifer (talk) 15:08, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that point 1 is "not true", simply that the lack of scientific basis is irrelevant in a discussion of the origins of homoeopathy because, as Hans points out, no medicine had any real scientific basis at that time. The second point is a fair enough point to make (it has been known since the later 19th century, after all), but does not belong in a paragraph that deals with Hahnemann's original propositions. This sort of issue is the reason that the lead needs to be structured as several paragraphs. Brunton (talk) 19:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

By the way, I'm doing my bit to shorten the lead by removing the sentence about the House of Commons Evidence Check. I really don't see that it belongs in a paragraph of the lead which otherwise deals with the evidence from reviews and meta-analyses in the scientific literature, and it is (as has already been pointed out) overly specific for the lead (it is used as a source for other statements in the lead, which is perfectly appropriate). Brunton (talk) 19:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Summary of this talk page section

This summarizes all of the above talk page èsection. I number the various points made so that they can be referred to or aÇddressed in isolation from the others. If tried to use direct quotes, but if I missed a point of some editor, please add it to the 19 bullet points below, and number it.-

1. "The lead should not focus on debunking homeopathy, rather on presenting a balanced summary of the article." All editors seem do agree that they would “support a shortening that retains a balanced overall summary of the article, but would not support a shortening that changes the balance and tone into that of an anti-homeopathy warning.”
2. "Conciseness is a good thing. If anything is to be shortened, it should be done through conciseness, not deletion."
3. "The current lead is the result of an extremely long, contentious process ("lead-doctoring"). Consensus has been developed limiting how the lead should look."

4. "Roughly one third must be denoted to debunking."
5. "Every paragraph must contain at least one debunking sentence." (What is a "debunking sentence"? I assume that means facts homeopaths don’t want anyone to know?)
6. "The word quackery must appear in the lead."
7. "The word pseudoscience must appear in the lead." (“Junk science” might be more in line with WP:UsePlainEnglish.)
8. "These constraints make no sense. They are almost impossible to reconcile with WP:LEAD, , are far more than is required by WP:NPOV and WP:FRINGE, and actually come close to breaking WP:NPOV themselves."
9. If the above is egregiously violated, "expect numerous anti-pseudoscience warriors swarming in here and then staying here for a few weeks".

10. The current lead violates WP:MOS because it has sources not in the article body.
11. The current lead violates WP:MOS because it has content not in the article body.
12. All editors agree no sources should be in the lead without being transferred to the body, if it is not already there.
13. All editors agree no content should be in the lead without first being transferred to the body, if it is not already there.
14. The current lead violates WP:MOSLead - define in first sentence if possible, since WP:Lede on "first sentence" ("If its subject is amenable to definition, then the first sentence should give a concise definition: where possible"). BobRaynor’s lead (below) defines homeopathy in the first sentence, so it is amenable to definition.
15. The current lead violates WP:UsePlainEnglish, with Latin expressions, e.g., “ipse dixit” vs. “declared without an observational or scientific basis”, "axiom", "serial dilution", "solution", etc. - "solution" is not even the correct usage, since there is no "solute" for the "cells" and tissues of the crushed plants and the un-dissolvable metals used in homeopathy.
16. The current lead violates WP:MOS “concise”, since BobRaynor’s suggested lead (below) has almost all the info with half the words.
17. The current lead violates WP:MOS “avoid jargon”, e.g., trade books are called “repertories”.
18. The current lead violates WP:MOS avoid specifics, e.g., British HoC findings, avoid vaccinations, Homeopathists read books (repertories), etc.
19. "The lead should give at least some indication as to why this is so", e.g., regarding timing of development of concept of molecule, hygiene and terrible state of western medicine explains why it seemed to work (relative to western medicine at the time), as is done in the article body.

The following (referred to as “BobRaynor’s proposed lead”, although his was later modified to satisfy objections by other editors) has been proposed either

a. To replace the current lead,
b. To replace the first paragraph, (to correct WP:Lede on "first paragraph" – “Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”), or
c. To be added before the first paragraph until the above problems are fixed. (This would make 5 paragraphs, violating the WP:MOS 4 paragraph guideline.)

”Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on two main principles: that a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"); and that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"). The principles were declared without scientific basis in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Basic chemistry showed that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance, leaving only water or alcohol in the “remedy”. Some homeopaths declared that water has a “memory” in response to this fact from chemistry, but water does not have a memory according to well established principles of physics. The principles of homeopathy are not consistent with well-established science, and systematic reviews of clinical trials show that homeopathic remedies are no more effective than a placebo. The Regulation snd prevalence of homeopathy varies widely around the world. Homeopathic "remedies" are not considered harmful at high dilution levels, when it is only water or alcohol, although homeopathy may put patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine.”

There seems to be general agreement that this paragraph (referred to as BobRaynor’s, although modified by others) is a good definition and very well worded, and specifically better satisfies - WP:Lede on "first paragraph" – “Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”, so would be consistent with b. or c., above, but
There are still some minor inaccuracies with the above proposal.

"The principles were declared without scientific basis in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann." This is not true. When Hahnemann declared these principles, medicine was still a protoscience and they were revolutionary but not any worse than most things experts at the time believed. This changed shortly afterwards, and the problem was that Hahnemann stuck to his principles even when they were obviously no longer tenable. (By the way, testing was confounded by the fact that Hahnemann was one of the earliest advocates of hygiene and proper food for patients. That alone made homeopathic hospitals more successful than others.)
"Basic chemistry showed that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance, leaving only water or alcohol in the “remedy”." True, but misleading. When Hahnemann declared his principles, the existence of molecules was a not very plausible hypothesis due to ancient Greek philosophers. He died before Loschmidt's experiments proved the existence of atoms and molecules beyond doubt and determined the Avogadro constant. That is the point from which one could compute with confidence that homeopathic remedies theoretically consist only of solvent. (In practice it depends on the method. If the same container is used repeatedly for shaking, as the "potency" increases, then the end result will contain some of the original substance, although obviously not very much.

BobRaynor said, “we'll probably never get a lede which everybody is completely happy with, so at some point we'll have to go ahead and replace the lede anyway, whilst accepting that there are a few loose ends which might need to be tied up later. It's all very well having an "almost perfect" proposal sitting here, but in the meantime, article-space readers get something which I think is much more flawed.”

I suggest that simply adding BobRaynor’s proposal to the beginning, ”accepting that there are a few loose ends which might need to be tied up later”, without deleting anything at all. This would mean a five paragraph lead, which could be ironed out and “tied up later”, so that “in the meantime, article-space readers get something which [BobRaynor] thinks is much [less] flawed”. Perhaps adding a sentence or two about homeopathy being proposed before the concept of a molecule, cell, germ, hygiene in western medicine, and the scientific method was used in western medicine, which was worse at the time of Hahnemann’s declarations. At that time, homeopathy (nothing), with its hygiene, was much better than non-science based traditional western “medicine” (something).

HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:14, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Here is another proposal incorporating all of the suggestions of Editors above, resolving all of their objections, and resolving all of the WP:MOS problems. It does not try to come up with a “one third debunking” rule, but only tries to best summarize the article and define the subject in the first sentence, and outline the article in the first paragraph. Coincidentally, it has only slightly less than a third (about 25%) devoted to “debunking”. The current lead is 50% longer, and reads like a committee product, and is less well stated than BobRaynor’s. It is entirely based on what is in the article, and only slightly modifies BobRaynor's suggestions, based on comments by HansAdler, Brangifer, and Brunton

”Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on two main principles: that a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"); and that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"). The principles were declared in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. This was before the scientific method was well developed in western European medicine, and before the concept of a molecule was accepted in basic chemistry. Hahnemann was one of the earliest advocates of hygiene and proper food for patients. The state of traditional western medicine at the time lacked hygiene, so that alone made homeopathic hospitals more successful than others in Europe. Shortly after Hahnemann’s proposal, the concept of a molecule in basic chemistry showed that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance, leaving only water or alcohol in the “remedy”. This implied that there could not be any pharmaceutical effect of Hahnemann’s remedies. Some homeopaths in the 20th century declared that water has a “memory” in response to this fact from chemistry. Water does not have a memory according to well established principles of physics. The principles of homeopathy are not consistent with well-established science, and systematic reviews of clinical trials show that homeopathic remedies are no more effective than a placebo. Homeopathy is considered “quackery” and a “pseudoscience” by most established scientific bodies. Homeopathic "remedies" are not considered harmful at high dilution levels, when it is only water or alcohol, although homeopathy may put patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine. The Regulation and prevalence of homeopathy varies widely around the world. ”

A. BobRaynor’s eloquent, concise, and simple wording is much clearer than the “committee product” current lead.
B. Most importantly, it resolves ALL of the WP:MOS violations listed above. It corresponds almost exactly to the organization of the article. It uses only plain English. It satisfies the WP:MOS guidelines to include a definition in the first sentence, and provide a comprehensive overview of the article in the first paragraph, which is not very long at all.
C. It incorporates SixWords’ objection to the style problems of my own pre-BobRaynor proposal, and SixWords’ objection that water memory is not a basic principal for all homeopaths, and to shorten the lead, which is 50% longer, and to exactly correspond to the article body organizational structure.
D. It incorporates Hans Adler’s minor adjustment points (as modified by Brunton) to BobRaynor’s original, which Brangifer found to be good points.
E. It preserves the balance Boing suggested, since a word count of the number of “debunking” words is only slightly under a third.
F. If it is simply added at the beginning, this leaves five paragraphs, but the later ones can gradually be incorporated into the article body, where they should already be anyway, as pointed out by Brangifer.
G. It leaves a good comprehensive first paragraph so that, in BobRaynor’s words, “in the meantime, article-space readers get something which is much [less] flawed”.
H. PS – I accidentally deleted a comment by Brunton in an edit conflict, and I don’t know how to correct my mistake. HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

No problem, here it is again:

I don't agree that the consensus has ever been that the words pseudoscience and quackery "must" appear in the lead. The consensus has consistently been that they are appropriate there (which is not the same thing).

I think the structure of the current lead adequately summarizes the most important points of the article. If there are problems with overly technical language, they should be addressed within something like the current structure. The first paragraph, for example, is a reasonably good, and reasonably neutral, description of what homoeopathy is, and how it is used, as per "Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific". Possibly the final sentence does not quite fit with this; if so I would not be opposed to its being moved to the end of the second paragraph, following the discussion of the scientific evidence for efficacy.

Basically, I don't think it is so broken that it can't be fixed without a complete rewrite. Brunton (talk) 21:43, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Brunton, I think your own comment above, “I also think that the lead should give at least some indication as to why this is so” , is the most important of all of the comments on this talk page. BobRaynor’s lead, as modified per Hans Adler, whose points were called good by Brangifer, and then corrected by yourself (especially as per hygiene and the history of “molecule”) are essential to understanding the “why”s of homeopathy and its critics.

Also, BobRaynor’s opening sentence is the best defining first sentence I have read about homeopathy, anywhere.

Take a look again at the most recently modified BobRaynor lead. It really gets right to the “what” and “how”, and especially very well deals with the “why” that you pointed out was really missing from the current rambling lead.

It also exactly summarizes the article in the most simple, plain, well written English (it in no way reads like a committee product, even though it essentially is).HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:06, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Another point: The current lead contains content and sources not used in the body. They must be moved or (more properly) copied to the body. The reason I say "copied" is that they were likely considered important enough that they must appear in the lead, but someone forgot to make sure they also appeared in the body. Nothing must be lost.

Why this sentence? "However, the homeopathic ideas of the importance of hygiene and proper diet in health are well established principles in western medicine." Is there evidence that this was a unique idea at the time, attributable only to Hahnemann as its originator? I really doubt it. I'd like to see some sources on that. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:03, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Brangifer, I included your two points about “The current lead contains (1) content and (2) sources not used in the body” as bullet points 10 and 11 above -

10. The current lead violates WP:MOS because it has sources not in the article body.”
11. The current lead violates WP:MOS because it has content not in the article body.”

I included your two points “They must be moved or (more properly) copied to the body”, and “nothing must be lost”, as bullet points 12 and 13 above -

12. All editors agree no sources should be in the lead without being transferred to the body, if it is not already there.
13. All editors agree no content should be in the lead without first being transferred to the body, if it is not already there.

I just reworded 12 and 13 to be more in line with your current point.

I think the bullet points I gleamed from the talk page comments of other editors is pretty complete, as I checked it twice.

I got the unsourced sentence you refer to (“"However, the homeopathic ideas of the importance of hygiene…”) from a comment by User:Hans, assuming that it was sourced and in the article body, but I cannot find it there, so I deleted it from the above proposed lead.

BobRaynor’s idea seems to be to put in the suggested new lead at the top, then work out the bugs (“tie up loose ends”), to benefit readers until bugs are worked out. I suggest that the current lead lines be directly copied into the body as part of the working out the bugs stage. The body part they are inserted into can then be later rewritten for style.HkFnsNGA (talk) 08:25, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I am going to be copying blocks of text from the lede into the relevant body sections, in order to begin to correct #10 - #13 that were pointed out by User:Brangifer. This will cause duplication and style problems in the article sections, which will need to be worked on in each relevant section, line by line. If someone is actively working on a better approach to correct #10-#13, please feel free to revert the edits I am about to do.HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:31, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Brangifer, homeopathy was an episode in the history of medicine which refused to die when its time was over. We previously cited an excellent book on the history of various forms of alternative medicine, but it has since disappeared from the references and I have trouble remembering it. It's the only detailed account of the history of homeopathy that I know which is from an outside POV. It stresses hygiene, and to a lesser extent diet, as key factors for the success of homeopathy at the time. You must take in mind that there was a lot of opposition to Ignaz Semmelweis' (1818–1865) contention that it might be a good idea for surgeons to wash their hands before they start work. Samuel Hahnemann (1755–1843) practised hygiene much earlier and apparently advocated it in a two-volume book (Friend of Health) that appeared in the 1790s. Hans Adler 09:37, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Per Brunton's comment, I now agree with him that the best way to fix the above numbered problems with the current lead is to examine the current lead line by line, rather than doing it as a complete rewrite (given what has been said in the the extensive archives of this talk page).HkFnsNGA (talk) 00:41, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

I will archive this talk page section on problems with the lead, summarizing the consensus matters and the open matters in a new section on the talk page, otherwise this section is -
Resolved

The First Paragraph can be shortened according to WP:MOS, and using the same standards used at Wiki for Medicine, Biology, and Chemistry articles

Resolved

1. “Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, and a “remedy” is selected based on the totality of symptoms” is overly specific and does not belong in the lede. It does nothing to define homeopathy, and would be like putting “Medical reference books known as ‘Medical text books’ are then consulted, and a remedy is selected based on the totality of symptoms” in the lead of the article on Medicine. While some might be surprised that believers in homeopathy can actually read, it is too unremarkable to be in the lead, and the specific name of homeopathic reference books violates WP:MOS “avoid specifics” and “avoid jargon”. The sentence should be removed from the lead and left for the body.
2. “Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending remedies” does not belong in the lead. It does nothing to describe homeopathy as a medical practice, since examining a patients physical and psychological state is common to almost any medical practice, and is not notable, and overly specific, in violation of WP:MOS. “Apart from the symptoms, medical doctors use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending remedies” would never be allowed in the lead in an article on medicine.
3. “…shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion” is both overly specific (succussion), and it is irrelevant how homeopaths suspend the substances they use in “remedies”. This would be like describing that biologists shake a suspension of germ cells, or chemists use a centrifuge to isolate isotopes in the lead of a biology or chemistry article. It is implicit in use of the expression “serial dilution” that there is some manner of mixing the solute in the solution. This is overly specific, violating WP:MOS, and homeopathy should not have different criteria for the lead from biology or chemistry.
Making the above changes would greatly shorten the first paragraph, and be in line with WP:MOS. I will do so unless there is good reason to have these specifics, and to have different standards for the lead in a homeopathy article from Medicine, Biology, or Chemistry articles.HkFnsNGA (talk) 11:34, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Please stop implying that the lede violates WP guidelines - it doesn't as guidelines always give some leeway and aren't set in stone. The lede is supposed to give you an overview of the subject, and remedy selection is an important part of homeopathy.
Same goes for a patient's medical history. As far as I know a medical doctor doesn't care too much about the subject of your dreams if you visit them for a cough - in homeopathy it does or at least can matter, so I'd say that's something that should be mentioned in an article about homeopathy, and since we don't have separate articles for homeopathic diagnosis and homeopathic treatment (we do for medical diagnosis and therapy), we have to cover those subjects in the main article.
Again, very unique to homeopathy, and has to be explained if we want to give a complete overview.

As for a reason to not make your changes: you have to get consensus first or your changes probably will be very short-lived. Right now I seem to be the only one disagreeing with you about a lot of your suggestions, but you're discussing with less than 1% of the editors who have this page on their watchlist [1], so without other editors actively endorsing your proposed changes, I don't think there's a new consensus. --Six words (talk) 17:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Stating that a modern European medical practitioner consults their trade manuals in making a diagnosis in no way tells us anything about that practice, be it homeopathy, medicine, or any other practice. It is superfluous.HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:44, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

The lead does not go into the subject of dreams, it just says "physical and psychological state", which is unremarkable and in no way defines homeopathy from almost any other medical practice. Maybe the "dream-cough" thing should go in, since that IS pretty crazy, and DOES help define homeopathy. As in the above section, the lead is bad, and your explanation is good, and your explanation would be better than the current lead. Medical Doctors do usually check for hypochondria, but not in any way like that. Since I do not know any WP:RS on this, would you mind adding your "dream-cough" example to the lead, and I will happily drop my objection.HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:44, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Why is it relevant how you shake something? Chemists and Biologists used to shake things by forceful striking, too.HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:44, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

All these things are important according to homeopathic theory, so they have to be mentioned. You don't have to ask me why the how is important - I don't know, but it matters to homeopaths. Again, we're not creating an article based on our own opinions, we're just summarising what the sources say. Since the article (including the lede) isn't that specific, there's no need a reliable source for my “dream-cough” example, a homeopathy homepage will do I guess: online consultation of a homeopath regarding ‘frequent cough’. --Six words (talk) 18:26, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I actually have heard homeopaths stress how important these things are (not repertories, though, in any way special to homeopathy), but I never understodd why they thought it was. Maybe some other editors can help here. There seem to be some really knowledgeable "reality-based" homeopathy-expertised editors around here.HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Some parts of the second lead paragraph contain no information, some are POV, and some are nonsense.

Resolved

1. The clause, “systematic reviews of published trials fail to conclusively demonstrate efficacy” is POV. This is highly irregular wording for a statement of a failure to demonstrate efficacy. It should instead read, “systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”, which is NPOV. (It would be correct to say "fail to conclusively demonstrate inefficacy".)
2. Given that “systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”, and a publishing standard of p-value .05, .05 of trials are ``expected`` to show significance, and .95 of trials are ``expected`` to show none. So “some individual studies have positive results others have negative results” says nothing additional whatsoever about homeopathy. It is utter nonsense to a person who knows what a p value is, and how experiments with probabilistic results vary. The sentence should simply be, “Systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy.”
3. That said, then “Furthermore, higher quality trials tend to report results that are less positive” is ``nonsense``, given that “Systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. Given that systematic reviews showed nothing more than 0 efficacy, less positive than 0 would be negative which is nonsense, given that homeopathic remedies are nothing with water or alcohol. (Unless the sentence is meant to say that there is a negaitive efficacy shown, i.e., that homeopathy is worse than nothing, which is not supported in the article body.) So the sentence “Furthermore, higher quality trials tend to report results that are less positive” should be removed. I will do so unless someone points out a flaw in my reasoning.
4. “…most positive studies have not been replicated” is a logical consequence of “Systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. Logical consequences say nothing about homeopathy beyond “Systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. Furthermore, the fact that some “show methodological problems that prevent them from being considered unambiguous evidence of homeopathy's efficacy” is irrelevant given that “Systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. Therefore, the entire clause “most positive studies have not been replicated or show methodological problems that prevent them from being considered unambiguous evidence of homeopathy's efficacy” is redundant, and should be removed.
5. “Homeopathic remedies are, with rare exceptions, considered safe.” should be explained, and appear AFTER the zero molecules sentence in the lead. It should be replaced with “Homeopathic remedies are, with rare exceptions, considered safe BECAUSE at high dilutions they contain zero molecules”.
6. “…homeopathy has been criticized for putting patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine such as vaccinations anti-malarial drugs, and antibiotics” should be broken off as its own sentence, and moved to the criticism paragraph.HkFnsNGA (talk) 15:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
I will make these changes, unless there is reason given not to do so.

1 - Agree with removal of "conclusively".

2 - Partially agree - the point about some trials being positive is important because homoeopaths often cherry-pick these positive trials and use them to imply demonstrated efficacy.Brunton (talk) 11:19, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

But why make homeopathy special, by lecturing on the meaning of p-value in the lead, just because some homeopathist does not know what it means? By this reasoning, EVERY statistical test based article on Wiki would have to mention positive results in the lead, unless the homeopathy article has its own wiki:guidleines that differ from all of the rest. Positive results, and publication bias, are a part of every statistics based conclusion with multiple studies.HkFnsNGA (talk) 16:11, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

3 - This is an important finding because it suggests that the positive results that can be pointed to are likely to be the result of bias.Brunton (talk) 11:19, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

They are likely to be the result of the meaning of "publishable", i.e., significance of p=.05 or smaller. Unless there is a meta-analysis that shows statistical significance, mention of the existence of positive results does not belong in the lead following the results of an meta-analysis failing to show significance. What a p-value is can be explained in the article body, but does not belong in the lead.HkFnsNGA (talk) 16:11, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

4 - Replication (or the lack of it) is an important issue, espacially in the context of cherry-picking of individual positive results.Brunton (talk) 11:19, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

But this does not address that general lack of replication is a logical consequence of a meta-analysis failing to show effect, so is redundant given that statement about a meta-analysis.HkFnsNGA (talk) 16:11, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

5 - Would support the addition of "because they are highly dilute" or similar, but I think this sentence belongs where it currently is. I would suggest avoiding harping on the "zero molecules" aspect too much; this is something of a strawman because many remedies are at potencies below 12C/24X. Brunton (talk) 11:19, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Re 5 - If not for zero molecules, then why consider it safe?, and who is considering it safe? 16:11, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

In th UK at least, the MHRA, which for over 20 years had a registration scheme for homoeopathic products which included a condition that they had to be sufficiently dilute to guarantee safety (they have since introduced a second scheme). OTC remedies of below 12C (eg 6C or even 6X) seem to be commonplace in the UK, and there are probably few substances that would be dangerous at these dilutions. Brunton (talk) 16:30, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

For reasons you could start reading the many, many archives this page has, or you could at least read the references those sentences have. It simply isn't true that systematic reviews showed no efficacy, yet all that did also pointed out that the effects were small and can't be considered unequivocal proof because the positive outcome may be because of publication bias and small study sizes. That most positive studies haven't been replicated definitely isn't “a logical consequence” of the fact that systematic reviews don't conclusively show efficacy beyond placebo, it's the other way round. If postitive studies could be replicated independently and without methodological problems, these studies would in fact prove that homeopathy/homeopathic remedies are effective for something. I don't think these changes would improve NPOV. --Six words (talk) 11:26, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't think I got it backwards. If systematic reviews (I assume that means some kind of meta-analysis) do not show an effect, then one would expect positive results only about .05 of the time, so positive result studies would be very unlikely to be reproduced. That is a logical coinsequence. Right? HkFnsNGA (talk) 15:48, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, as I said: there are systematic reviews that show homeopathy≠placebo. Homeopaths also stress that “more studies are positive than negative” (and even though they're overstating the actual percentage, it's >5%), which is why it is important to say that the better studies are less positive than the small ones. You think it's unlikely that positive studies will be reproduced and so do I, but we're not here to write what we think but to summarise what reliable sources say. --Six words (talk) 16:32, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

If there are systematic reviews that show homeopathy≠placebo, then you are right, positive studies are possibly likely, and my point is moot. You just gave a very clear explanation, which is not so clear in the current wording of the lead. (By the way, where did you get the "≠" symbol from? I am not a very experienced user of Wiki editing devices.)HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:22, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

~~Could the editor who started this section sign please?~~

~~Done, sorry.~~HkFnsNGA (talk) 15:29, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

3 seems to be a misunderstanding. A "systematic review" is not the same thing as a "trial". As far as I know the fact that higher quality homeopathy trials are less likely to have a positive outcome is why the more recent systematic reviews, which take study quality into account, have a negative outcome.
Be careful about 5. Some homeopathic preparations are only weakly diluted (e.g. D4 = 1 in 10000) and some use seriously poisonous stuff. I think it's important not to mislead the reader into thinking that a preparation called "belladonna" or "arsenic" is automatically safe just because it's homeopathic. Especially for allergic people some preparations may not be a priori safe. If we explain why homeopathy is generally safe, but not where the "rare exceptions" come from, the warning will be ignored. Hans Adler 13:53, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I "at high dilutions" to 5, and "may not be safe at low dilutions". Broke long sentence into two. Since both parts of sentence contained criticism, I moved them both to criticism section.HkFnsNGA (talk) 16:27, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I am not sure we have a source for "may not be safe at low dilutions", and it's not the only problem. In some parts of the world the standards for preparing homeopathic remedies are such that the same container is used for each step. As a result, nominally very large "potencies" can easily contain moderate amounts of the original substance, especially when there is an error in the process. Hans Adler 16:39, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Hans, there are multiple WP:RS in the section on "Active Ingredients" regarding the Zicam Cold Remedy here[2]. (It is almost certain that no one would drink from a container repeatedly used to dilute Polonium-210, or even used once, for that matter.)HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:08, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Third Paragraph has redundancy with Second paragraph

Resolved

“There is a lack of convincing scientific evidence to support homeopathy's efficacy” is redundant, given that it has already been stated that at high dilutions, homeopathic remedies have no molecules, and in the second paragraph, that “systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. This sentence can be eliminated.HkFnsNGA (talk) 11:48, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I think that section of the lead may have become a little garbled - the sentence you propose removing used be part of a longer sentence (see for example this version of the page from last April, and note the current lack of a full stop at the end of the section you propose removing) that said: "The lack of convincing scientific evidence supporting homeopathy's efficacy and its use of remedies lacking active ingredients have caused homeopathy to be described as pseudoscience, quackery, and a "cruel deception"." In this context it is not redundant - it is explaining why it is regarded as pseudoscience etc. I have changed it back. Brunton (talk) 16:39, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, a short explanation of why is always best if it can be in the lead, so best to change it back. The "garbled" problem is a result of a committee structure voting on each sentence, one by one, rather than a comprehensive whole proposal. Older US Congressional Committee reports, and old Soviet reports, all had this problem. They seemed to be readable to the committee members who read it over and over, but to a newcomer looked like a garbled "committee report". What is typically done now, to avoid this, is to agree on the total content, which seems to have been done now, but then have one single person (BobRaynor is my choice) rewrite the whole thing, for stylistic consistency. That's why BobRaynor's proposed lead, still in discussion above, reads so well, but still has all of the main info. Take a look above again. (Maybe this current lead will gradually stylistically evlove into a lead that is identical to what BobRaynor wrote, anyway.)HkFnsNGA (talk) 16:50, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

HkFsnNGA, please shift down a gear or two. The problem isn't that there are many users editing (that's what Wikipedia is all about). This sentence got “garbled” only yesterday [3] and I think I wouldn't have missed this if I hadn't been so busy just reading the amount of text you produce, let alone reply to it. There's no deadline we have to meet, so let's try to do one thing at a time, not all at once. btw: the editor's name is bobrayner. --Six words (talk) 18:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I have shifted down a gear or three, after Brunton's massive deletion of my massive multiple, edit summed, one at a time initial edits in the article. I started out with the massive edits I made on the article page, and now am only doing minor bits and pieces spread over days on the article page, and so far, no one has seen fit to revert any of them since my first day. If no one responds to my talk page points for a very many days, don't worry, I will not make any major article page changes without consensus. HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:03, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

You've been posting to this talk page at least 20 times today - I can't speak for others, but for me it's really hard to read that all, let alone answer. --Six words (talk) 20:19, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Six words, take your time to respond, days, weeks,...no hurry, its all ok. Most of my posts were meaningfully and extensively responded to with well reasoned responses (including by you), with positive and negative well reasoned responses. Many of my posts were responding specifically to those responding to me. But if any of my posts seem inane, or overly verbose (wasted words), I am a mathematician who worships at the Temple of Elegance, so please point that out, too. I am currently in disfavor of that goddess, but you can "buy diarrhea of the mouth mugs, tshirts and magnets"[4] for me here[5], if you want, and STFU merchandise can bo obtained here[6]. But take your time.HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:20, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

HkFnsNGA, going back to your first comment:

“There is a lack of convincing scientific evidence to support homeopathy's efficacy” is redundant, given that it has already been stated that at high dilutions, homeopathic remedies have no molecules, and in the second paragraph, that “systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy”. This sentence can be eliminated.

Actually those don't mean the same thing to many laypeople, and especially to believers in homeopathy who couldn't care less if there are or aren't any molecules, after all, they're being bombarded with homeopathic marketing that tells them it works anyway. Well, the scientific evidence says that products without molecules still don't work, so their "memory" just isn't working. They have Alzheimers.

If I understand you correctly, there are two statements about "efficacy" saying the same thing and one about "no molecules". The "molecules" and one of the "efficacy" need to remain. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:26, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I am now a "laypeople". (Mathematicians are like fashion models; they are over the hill by the age of 26, so I am retired. And mathematicians being disconnected from reality, unlike physicists, can not do any "thing", so a retired mathematician is a person who can do less than not anything; sort of like the "less positive" than a "zero" effect results of systematics reviews as discussed above. Actually Six words explained "a less positive than zero nonnegative" much better than the current lead.) I am all for helping laypeople (like me), since I believe Wiki is a layperson's encyclopedia, like it or not, and is secretly used in the closets of non-laypersons. That is why I am all for the modified bobraynor's lead, which I hope is still under discussion above. So I agree we should not delete anything that mights help laypeople.

My current reasonable expectation is that the current lead may gradually evolve into modified-bobraynor's; which is sort of like waiting for natural selection to work its course, when genetic engineering is available. Laypeople (like me) like to follow links from other articles, in the middle of a sentence, scan a lead's first paragraph, and get a full picture, then get back to the sentence we are in the middle of. That is what is called "reading a single sentence" in this 21st (after whatshisname, A.D.) century.HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:26, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Why some tests of homeopathy “must” indicate homeopathy is effective when it is not

Resolved

Here is a very dumbed-down, fast-as-possible, explanation of the technical statistics terms needed to understand what is going on with “Why some tests of homeopathy must indicate homeopathy is effective when it really is not.” It is written POV to go in the “criticism” section. The purpose is for the reader with no basic statistics training to be able to understand the article, and for math-phobics not to get scared away by announcing they are about to learn a little math or statistics.

“Why some tests of homeopathy “must” indicate homeopathy is effective when it really is not

Publishing standards, p-value - Even if something is not effective, the way publishing works means that you must still expect about 1 in 20 tests to show that it is effective. The standard to publish a “positive effect” is as follows - If something is assumed to be false, and then the outcome of the experiment has only about a 1 in 20 chance of happening, then you can publish that it is effective. This means that about 1 in 20 tests will show homeopathy works, even if it is in fact false.^[35]^[36]^[37]^[38]^[39]^[40]

Publication bias - If a believer in something conducts a test of homeopathy and the test says that something is wrong, they might not publish that there will be no effect, because that would mean they are wrong in their belief. But they would be expected to publish when there is a positive effect, because this means their belief is not wrong. So many of the “disproving” tests of that something may not get published. Even though something is false, since we already expect about 1 in 20 tests to erroneously show it is true, we get even more than about 1 in 20 publications showing that homeopathy is not false. This is called publication bias.^[41]^[42]^[43]^[44]^[45]
A meta-analysis combines the results of several studies.

HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:31, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Moved to the section on the scientific explanation of effect. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:11, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Can we replace "must" with "will" or other words without destroying the intent?

"Why some tests of homeopathy will ~~“must”~~ indicate homeopathy is effective when it really is not."

or...

"Why 1 in 20 tests will indicate homeopathy is effective when it's not."

The last removes duplicate mention of "homeopathy" and uses "it's", which is normal speech. The other sounds very stilted, at least to my American ear...

.

Same thing in the next sentence. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:04, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

No problem with wording changes, which are already made. I still think this deserves its own section up front of the body section on science, maybe with a warning at its section top like - "Readers can skip this section who already understand the concepts p-value, publishing bias, file drawer effect, meta-analysis, and systematic review".HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:31, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone help me with how to do a search of all old homeopathy article versions, I can't find my dehydrated water source, deleted by another editor from homeopathic pill section

Resolved

I came to this article because my photographer friend bought some homeopathic pills, and they were not in the article as remedies, so I put the pills in the remedies section. I also put a source that the pills started off as lactose, which was not in the article, but someone deleted my "dehydrated water".
I forgot to add water to the homeopathic placebo WP:Use plain english definition, as can be seen here[7].
I added dehydrated water to the homeopathic pill section here[], but without RS. I hope the "dehydrated water" does not have a measurable negative effect on any editors, and get deleted again. After all, there is no rule that there cannot be a molecule of INFORMATIVE humor. Even the Christian Bible has humor in it, according to a pastor of a giant Korean church in LA, or at least he told me there was when I asked. I asked him to find it and I would be back the next Sunday, but he could not, and asked me to come back, three times, but he still couldn't find the humor in his Bible. (The third Sunday was Christmas, and they had me be their Santa Claus because I am “white”. I am actually part Native American, and other of my ancestors are from North East Africa, but when I told them this after the Christmas festivities, I explained that Santa was Native American, too, since the north polar cap is "in" North America? Homeopathic pills, which have the active ingredient of water with the water removed, is much like a polar cap with the ice removed. When the ice melts from nonexistant global warming, where will Santa live, on a homeopathic pill with memory?) If dehydrated water is removed from this article, which will make a positive LESS than nothing, that will be consistent with the “less positive” results shown in systematic reviews, referred to in the lead, but not yet changed to intelligablity. The current lead says that it is nonnegative "less positive" than zero effect. If this “nothing” (dehydrated water) is “removed”, there will be as much Humor in the homeopathy article as in the Christian Bible, or as much as in a human body being treated with western medicine in the time of Hahnemann. Another editor deleted the dehydrated water I put in the homeopathic pill section. I don’t know how to search old versions of articles. Can anyone help me with how to do a search of all old article versions so I can find my deleted dehydrated water source? Seriously. – Huck Finn’s Nigger, aka HkFnsNGA (If deleting my dehydrated water was not bad enough, now they are trying to delete me! here[8]) HkFnsNGA (talk) 06:36, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Summarizing the above, I have shown that –

I put the sugar pills in homeopathy remedies.
I put the sugar in homeopathy pills.
In the Lead, I put the water back in the homeopathic placebo, so it works.
In the Lead, “higher quality trials tend to report results that are less positive”, “Homeopathic ‘remedies’ are safe at high dilutions recommended by Hahnemann” so they are non-negative, there are zero molecules, therefore, we have less positive than zero non-negative.
Similarly, if deleting my "dehydrated water" was not intentended to be negative, deleting “dehydrated water” leaves less than zero that is non-negative.
Deleting “dehydrated water” leaves as much Humor in the article, as in a bled out body after 1796 traditional western medicine, which is less effective than Hahneman’s hygienic hospitals.
If global warming causes the north polar ice cap to melt, then Santa’s home will be nothing more than “a memory in the water”, proving there CAN be a “memory” in the water, unless you don’t believe in global warming.
Due to the deletion by another editor, I no longer have a dehydrated water source, unless someone here helps me find it.
Someone is now trying to delete me (I wonder why?). HkFnsNGA (talk) 08:48, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Hum, I can't help because I haven't been following the latest edits to the article. However, since you seem to be having problems with searching edits, I will explain you how to "search" for your edits. You can't make a direct search, you need to look at the history and check edit by edit. While you are looking at the article, you can click on "View History" at the top right, and you will see a list of the last 100 edits, clicking in "500" will show the last 500 edits. this is the page that you will, with the last 500 edits to the article. Just open that link, search for your name, and see if you can identify your edit from reading the edit summaries. Once you find the correct edit you can click on "prev" to see the changes that were made in that specific edit. If you open an edit that is near the correct edit, then, you can navigate the edits via "next edit" and "previous edit". Otherwise, hit "back" to return to the history page and try another of your edits. You can also find the edit where your addition was removed, and learn why it was removed. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:41, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

It will be very time consuming to do a page by page check because I made very many edits. Someone once told me how to do an automated search of all pages in the history, but it was years ago and I forgot how.HkFnsNGA (talk) 11:01, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Now that you mention it.... I look at the History page again, and it has a little link called "Revision history search". I had never noticed before that the link was there :-( I tried to use the tool a bit, but I have no idea of how to fill the fields. --Enric Naval (talk) 12:46, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for looking. I tried it but nothing happens for anything I put in it to search for.HkFnsNGA (talk) 14:08, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

I may have missed something, but the only references I can find in past versions of the "homeopathic pills" section are the two that are currently used, neither of which mentions "dehydrated water". Brunton (talk) 14:19, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

IIRC the source you cited didn't even use this wording (“dehydrated water”), so what do you want it for? Humorous descriptions of what homeopathy is can be found on many sceptical blogs, but Wikipedia isn't a blog, and being humorous wasn't a ‘Good Article’ criterion last time I checked. Currently this article has GA status and I'd like it to stay that way. --Six words (talk) 15:06, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

OK, I lost the RS. I still want to know how to search the history of articles. The "Revision history search" doesn't do anything when I insert expressions into it to search for.HkFnsNGA (talk) 02:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Found itHkFnsNGA (talk) 06:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Regulation and prevalence

Not sure why these two are together. The regulation of something is not really related to the prevalence of something thus should be split into two sections. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:15, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Split 'em. They may have been lumped together only because they occur together in the fourth lead paragraph.HkFnsNGA (talk)

Why was the small WP:Use plain English edit reverted?

Resolved

Why was this small WP:Use plain English edit [9] reverted?

This was the WP:Use plain English lead material before the revert -
These and other principles of homeopathy were first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796. He declared the principles, without basing them on any observations (ipse dixit [4] axioms[5]). He formulated the law of similars, that preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.
This is how it reads after the revert –
Homeopathy was first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796, based on an ipse dixit[4] axiom,[5] which he formulated as the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.
The first material clearly follows WP:Use plain English, while the second over-lengthy sentence does not. (The grammatical use of “ipse dixit” is also incorrect in the second reverted sentence.)
The plain English edit should not be reverted. Why was the first edit reverted?HkFnsNGA (talk) 19:17, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Brunton already explained that it was incorrect as Hahnemann didn't propose both principles from the start. You're not going to convince other editors by stating your opinion over and over again. I told you several times that I disagree with your interpretation of Wiki guidelines, and “Use plain English” isn't even one - it's an essay. As I explained above, you were reverted because someone disagreed with the change, i.e. thought it wasn't better than the previous wording. --Six words (talk) 19:28, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Six words, if both principles were not proposed in 1796 (Some RS say they were), then add the other date. This is no reason to use "ipse dixit" (in a grammatically incorrect way), to use obscure expressions, or to have one long and layperson-unfriendly" sentence that could easily be three easy to read sentences.

Would you agree to simply add the second date you claim exists?
You seem quite the contrarian, as most people prefer plain English when easily possible. Why do you not want to use plain English when possible, so laypeople can read about homeopathy without getting scared off by the second sentence?
Why have one very long sentence, with numerous clauses, instead of three simple and easily read sentences?
In my eleven years of doing Phil of Math and Sci/Data Analysis at Stanford, I have only seen "ipse dixit" used in a very few obscure places, mostly in antiquated writings (but where it was used in a grammatically correct way). Why use it when it is not necessary?— Preceding unsigned comment added by HkFnsNGA (talk • contribs)

Well, which sources say they were? Somewhere in the organon Hahnemann states that he “discovered” the law of infinitesimals later - IIRC no specific date/year was given. I don't think your changes improved the lede (as I already said), and the sentences of the current lede aren't much longer than what was reverted. Using wikilinks, there's a lot of things that needn't be explained in the homeopathy article - if you don't know what ipse dixit means, follow the link - et voilà, Wikipedia explains it. --Six words (talk) 20:11, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)well, partly because it might not quite be true (I'm not sure if Hahnemann proposed much beyond the "law of similars" in his 1796 essay), partly because it isn't such an improvement as you suggest (wikilinking "ipse dixit" and "axiom" - as they are in the actual article - is a perfectly adequate way of explaining what they mean, for example), and partly because it was just one of a great slew of edits which (IMO) indisputably left the paragraph much worse as far as readability and NPOV are concerned (see comments under the heading "First paragraph of the lead" above). I would probably agree with replacing "formulated as" if something better can be agreed on. Brunton (talk) 19:40, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Brunton, I have perused all 46 archive talk pages, and you have always seemed quite reasonable and accomodating. Your explanation that you did the large revert as a convenience, not because you disagreed with each one, is quite acceptable. Would you agree to defining non-plain English as above, and breaking this ponderous sentence into three shorter ones, as I did, and adding a minor date qualification? Incidentally, my multiple small edits were primarily based on your own talk page remarks, which I ultimately fully agreed with, that small "explain why" clauses are important, and that the current lead should be modified in small parts, rather than doing a complete single rewrite.)HkFnsNGA (talk) 19:58, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Suggested change -

Principles of homeopathy began to be proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796. He declared the principles, without basing them on any observations (ipse dixit [4] axioms[5]). Based on the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.

Or better -

Principles of homeopathy began to be proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796. He declared the principles, without basing them on any observations. Based on the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.

HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:03, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't think either of these suggestions is grammatically correct - you can say Hahnemann started developing (or proposing) something, but you can't say that something ‘started to be proposed’. Also, Hahnemann did base his principles on subjective observations, so it's not factually correct to say they weren't based on observations - they just weren't objective observations. --Six words (talk) 20:15, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Six words, you really are a contrarian, and are not arguing in good faith. Hahnemann did NOT base his "law of similars" declaration on observations, homeopathic principles DID begin to be proposed in 1796, the layperson unfriendly expression "ipse dixit axiom" does NOT have to be used in the second sentence of this long article, and a lengthy four claused sentence SHOULD be replaced by three simple sentences to make reading easy for laypersons. You are not arguing in WP:Good faith, but I suppose you will argue that is "just a guideline", too, and "does not have to be followed". I am not going to respond to you again unless you say something of substance.HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:32, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Please don't just cite WP:AGF, read it, as your last post is a violation of it. Hahnemann “developed” homeopathy because of an observation he made when taking chinchona bark (at least that's what he said), which in my book is a subjective observation. I don't really care if you respond to me, but as long as I see problems with your suggestions, I'll continue to point them out. --Six words (talk) 20:42, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Hahnemann's original idea was based on the observation that Cinchona bark, which others had observed to be an effective treatment for malaria, caused in him what he thought were symptoms similar to those of malaria. It is simply not true to say that it wasn't based on observations, even if he jumped to a conclusion that wasn't correct. And I don't see anything in Six words's comments that indicates any lack of good faith. You might want to check out WP:AGF yourself. Brunton (talk) 20:45, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

And I wish that just once I could make and edit here without getting caught up in an edit conflict. Are we stuck in a 386 here or something? Brunton (talk) 20:48, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I really don't think your version is an improvement. For a start "principles of homeopathy began to be proposed" is in the passive, which (IIRC) is generally to be avoided in plain English (I still sometimes get pulled up on this when writing instructions). Adding the section in brackets doesn't make it read particularly well, and as I've noted above, the same result can be obtained by the wikilinks already in the article. The sentence as it was really isn't long enugh to need splitting to that extent. How about:

Homeopathy was first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796. It is based on an ipse dixit axiom which he called the law of similars, which states that preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals can cure patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.

Any better? Brunton (talk) 20:19, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Excellent job of making it more readable. I think "remedy" in scare quotes might be less objectionable to homeopathists than "cure". Can you suggest a layperson friendly definition of "ipse dixit axiom"? This expression in the second sentence actually scared me away from reading the article, as I was simply following a link in the middle of another article to get a quick scan overview of homeopathy, and did not want to go two links deep. Also the use of "axiom" is a bit esoteric in that laypeople likely have only encountered it in a high school geometry class, if they even got that far. Here is a first attempt -

"Homeopathic principles were not based on scientific reasoning, since the scientific method had not yet become widely used in Europe. (this is to exlain the "why", as you got me fixed on doing) Instead, principles were simply declared and then assumed to be true without any kind of evidence, and were not challenged again, no matter what was observed. A fundamental principle of homeopathy is the law of similars, which states that preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals can cure patients who already exhibit similar symptoms."

This is longer, but easier to read for someone (like a lay-person) who does not have any science background. My writing style is not very good, but the idea is to use short, simple, layperson friendly language whenever possible, which is certainly the case for something as simple as hmeopathy. Maybe you can suggest a short plain English replacement for "ipse dixit axiom" HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:51, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Another shot, to replace "ipse dixit axiom" with some version of "fundamental principles were assumed to be true without evidence". HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:56, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

The only reason I am not objecting to "ipse dixit axiom" is that nobody has been able to come up with an adequate plain English replacement - that is why the expressions are used and wikilinked. Your suggested text here is simply too long for the lead, which as you have noticed is quite long enough already. And I'm pretty certain that "cure" is what the "Law of Similars" (similia similibus curantur in Latin) claims. Brunton (talk) 21:00, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Brunton, I inserted your change, leaving removal of "ipse dixit axiom" to be further discussed in the next section.HkFnsNGA (talk) 23:49, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

"Ipse dixit axiom" to WP:Use plain Englishin lede

Resolved

Does anyone have a suggestion for a WP:Use plain English replacement of "ipse dixit axiom so laypersons can easily read this article without chasing down links? Here is how the third Lead sentence reads now -

It is based on an ipse dixit axiom which he called the law of similars, which states that preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals can cure patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.

My suggested plain English is from the wiki def of ipse dixit -

Hahnemann stated principles of homeopathy without proving them. They were all to be accepted based only on his reputation and authority (ipse dixit). One basic principle is the “law of similars”, which states that preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals can cure patients who already exhibit similar symptoms.

HkFnsNGA (talk) 01:06, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Explanations of p-value and publication bias - better, but still not good

The explanations have been improved, but I'm not really satisfied with them.

p-value: “If something is assumed to be false, and then the outcome of the experiment has only about a 1 in 20 chance of happening, then you can publish that it is effective.” I think I know what this is supposed to mean, but I don't think the meaning of this is clear to the average reader.
publication bias: Isn't it more about preferring to publish/submit positive outcomes? Publication bias isn't unique to homeopathy, and it's not about your believes per se. Often negative outcomes aren't reported because they're not thought of as “important”. The text as it stands right now reads more like an explanation of confirmation bias. --Six words (talk) 16:33, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

If you have a better p-value lay person definition, WP:Bold put it in.HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:05, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Publication bias/File drawer effect is the tendency to publish positive results, which occur randomly 1 in 20 times, and the tendency of null results to languish in file drawers. There is a related effect mentioned in the last entry (as of this morning) in the scientific method talk page, which I would call "nonreplication bias", of positive results not to be replicated since you don't get famous for replicating someone elses results, so you tend to do other experiments instead, which allows false positives to hang out. This is likely true for homeopathy, since most scientiswts would not waste their time testing it due to "zero molecules". For some reason, alot of scientists bought into the "cold fusion" thing, which I never understood why. Confirmation bias is when POV makes you favor confirming evidence and disfavor (e.g., ignore) nonconfirming evidence, which is not really related to publication of double blind studies, since this should be blinded out. I have not looked at the text since my edits were made, but you should WP:Bold modify it if I wrote it wrong, or if was modified to read wrong now. HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:05, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't have a good definition I could put in, this is why I started a new thread here - to get other editor's input. Actually, since you introduced it, you should have made sure that it is understandable before you put it in the article. While WP:BOLD is a good advice for articles that aren't visited regularly by other wikipedians, homeopathy certainly is on some watchlists, and waiting for other editor's ideas is likely to result in a better wording than I could come up with. There's no need to change this asap, it's pretty far down in the article, so I'll just wait for more input from others. --Six words (talk) 09:29, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

How is it not understandable? Here is the definition of E-value from the P-value article, "the average number of times in multiple testing that one expects to obtain a test statistic at least as extreme as the one that was actually observed, assuming that the null hypothesis is true", which might help you do a rewrite. I think my own version is slightly better at plain English than that in the P-value article, but they are very similar (I wrote mine before I read the other, indicating that some Wiki editor and I are on the same wavelength).HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:41, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Hahnemann’s dilution level in Lede

This statement was deleted from a description of the process of making a remedy in the Lede, during a larger revert done for other reasons –

" Hahnneman stated a dilution down to what comes out to 1 part in 10⁶⁰ (1 part in a trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion), so no molecule of the original substance would remain, but Hahnemann made his proposal before it was proved in chemistry that molecules exist."

Of all of Hahnemann’s ipse dixit principles that homeopaths are supposed to follow with rigor, this one most characteristically defines homeopathy, and should be in the Lede following the definition of succusion, where it belongs, whether or not some homeopaths think it makes them look bad. Does anyone have a good objection to putting this back in its place describing how remedies are made? HkFnsNGA (talk) 03:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

This is overly specific (something you have raised as an objection to the current lead). This sort of detail is appropriate to the body of the article - the lead has to summarise, and summarise briefly to be an acceptable lenth. And while Hahnemann did recommend 30C for most purposes, modern homoeopaths use a wide variety of different potrencies. This is not "follow[ed] with rigour". Brunton (talk) 08:43, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with your objections below, but only made them for completeness. I disagree about your objection here. The "trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion" is very descriptive, and is so extreme that it is a number I remember from when I read about homeopathy 8 years ago. It is significant because Hahnemann's declaratoins are supposed to all be obeyed, so why omit this most important one. HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:30, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

We don't need it in a summarised lead. What we have in the lead (e.g. "Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains") is sufficient to convey the nature of the dilutions used. The specifics of the commonly used potencies are in the body of the article if the reader wants to see them. We don't need "extreme numbers" in the lead. And as I've already pointed out, this isn't rigidly followed by modern homoeopaths; indeed it wasn't followed by many 19th century homoeopaths. Brunton (talk) 10:38, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with all of your objections below, but not with this one. I think Hahnemann's authoritative dilution level, which homeopaths are not supposed to deviate from in the least, belongs here, and not “Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains.”, which belongs in the citicism paragraph. I did not make the number extreme, Hahnemann did, and it is truly an astonishing and informative number insofar as understanding what homeopathy is. I propose replacing this –

"Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains."

with this –

"Hahnneman stated a dilution which works out to 1 part in 1060 (1 part in a trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion), so no molecule of the original substance would remain, but Hahnemann made his proposal before it was proved in chemistry that molecules exist."'

and moving “Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains” to the criticism paragraph, where it should be re-worked to fit in. If you try it and read the paragraph, the flow is much better since the rest of the first paragraph is about Hahnemann's various ipse dixits.HkFnsNGA (talk) 12:31, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

"Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains" belongs in the descriptive section because it is simply describing the process by which remedies are made, rather than the implications of this. What you are proposing is moving descriptive material to the "criticism" section in order to make room for critical material in the descriptive section. Both are inappropriate. Brunton (talk) 14:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It is not critical material. It is a statement of Hahnemann's ipse dixit axiom on dilution levels. It belongs here in the sequence of all of Hahnemann's other ipse dixit axioms, but it may be commented on with criticism in the criticism paragraph.HkFnsNGA (talk) 14:17, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It is overly specific for the lead, and (since it is not adhered to in modern homoeopathic practice) clearly not a necessary principle. Brunton (talk) 15:08, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with you that the sections below are overly specific. I also think mention of repertories and succusion are overly specific. I think Hahnemann's dilution level is not overly specific, but instead is essential. In fact, it is the single fact about homeopathy that I specifically recalled from when I read about it 8 years ago. HkFnsNGA (talk) 18:07, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Homoeopaths consistently insist that succussion is an essential part of the potentization process, and stress the importance of the detailed consideration of symptoms in the individualised prescription. They do not always use 30C remedies. This recommendation of Hahnemann's is not important in the practice of homoeopathy. We have it in the article, but almost as an aside; it simply isn't significant enough to be included in the laed, however much it reinforces your POV.Brunton (talk) 18:45, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I incorporated your comment and completely reworded this in my proposal to shorten and simplify the lede sentences, and make them each about only one topic, below. HkFnsNGA (talk) 23:38, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Harmful remedies in Lede

Would any editors object to changing this –

”Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains.^[17]

To this -

"In modern homeopathy, dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains, but sometimes dilution levels are lower, and some of the original substance remains. ^[46] This has resulted in people being harmed from the toxic substances in “remedies”, and lawsuits against homeopathic companies. ^[47]^[17]"'

Object. This issue is already dealt with in the third paragraph of the lead ("Homeopathic “remedies” are safe at high dilutions recommended by Hahnemann, since they likely contain no molecules of the original substance, but they may not be safe at lower dilutions"). Brunton (talk) 08:49, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I put the "may not be safe" language in the lead sentence you cited. I just thought it might flow better if put here, since it was discussing highly dilute remedies, so it might as well also mention non highly dilute remedies. HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:27, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It fits better with the "criticism" section. Brunton (talk) 10:41, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Unlike the approach I suggest for the additional sentences below, I agree that it is better in the criticism section. I also think it is better here to state Hahnemann's declared dilution level as I suggested in the section above, than to use the sentence "Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains" here in this paragraph, when it also fits better in the criticism paragraph. HkFnsNGA (talk) 12:22, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Diet in lede

Diet is an extremely important part of modern homeopathy and should be in the Lede. Diet is one of the main things homeopaths focus on with patients coming in for a general check up. Here is a proposed brief description of this -

"Hahnemann advocated what he considered a proper diet, based on diets available in Germany in 1796.^[48]^[49]"

HkFnsNGA (talk) 04:45, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Object. Overly specific, thus lengthening an already long lead, and not particularly characteristic of homoeopathy other than in a historical sense. Modern medicine (as well as virtually every "alternative" medicine) advocates a balanced diet. Brunton (talk) 08:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

As you know, I think it is overlong, too. Naming trade manuals is overly specific, too, and uninformative as it is written. I just thought the complete picture should be put in the lead before paring it down.HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:24, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

No trade manuals are named in the lead. Brunton (talk) 10:29, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I meant stating that there are trade manuals named "repertories" with no further information, which is uninformative for a lead that is too long.

I agree with your OBJECT to my proposed insertion, because the lede is already too long. I was just trying to provide a comprehensive overview of the practice of homeopathy by further lenghening the lede, after which things could be ommitted from a perspective of considering it as a whole, using your proposal of working the current lede up and down, rather than replacing it as a whole. That is how I write articles for publication; I first write an abstract that is too long, but completely comprehensive, then I cut it down. The lede plays a role similar to an abstract in a publication, or an introduction to an article. HkFnsNGA (talk) 12:15, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Hygiene in lede

Hygiene is very important in homeopathy, and explains why homeopathy initially appeared to be successful. Here is a proposed brief statement of this for the Lede -

"Hahnemann required strict hygiene in his hospitals. Given the filthy, horrific state of occult based western medicine at that time, made his hospitals more successful than many others in Europe, despite the fact that his “remedies” contained no molecules of the original substance.^[50]^[51]"

HkFnsNGA (talk) 04:45, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Object - overly specific for lead, and once again significant only in its historical context - all medicine requires hygiene. Also seems to be introducing material not in the body of the article - I can't find the phrase "filthy, horrific state of occult based western medicine" there. Brunton (talk) 08:58, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I put this suggestion with the others above and below to be thorough, after which a paring down could be better reasoned. I agree the lede is already too long, having specifics like the name of a practices trade manuals and a statement that they are read.HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:33, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with your OBJECT to my proposed insertion, because the lede is already too long. I was just trying to provide a comprehensive overview of the practice of homeopathy by further lenghening the lede, after which things could be ommitted from a perspective of considering it as a whole, using your proposal of working the current lede up and down, rather than replacing it as a whole. HkFnsNGA (talk) 12:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Dreams in Lede

Resolved

Dreams play a role in homeopathy that is unique among widespread medical practices. They also help explain the significance of repertories, which are consulted like Bibles. While the paradigmatic pseudoscience, psychoanalysis, which is only practiced by MD’s, interprets dreams in an unfalsifiable manner, homeopaths do not interpret dreams, but instead categorize them and then consult the repertory as to what “remedy” to prescribe. Here is a proposed brief statement of this for the Lede -

From this -

"Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, and a “remedy” is selected based on the totality of symptoms."

To this -

"Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, which contain information on what “remedy” is selected based on the totality of symptoms, e.g., relating a childhood dream to a particular “remedy” (dreams are not supposed to be interpreted; the repertory lists “remedies” based on the topic of the dream). ^[52] Homeopaths may inquire as to the content of dreams to diagnose “psychic health” or the progress of treatment with “remedies”.^[53]"

Object. Once again you want to introduce overly specific material to an already long lead. It also once again seems to be introducing material that is not in the body of the article that the lead is supposed to summarise. Brunton (talk) 09:02, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I was trying in the above edits to be thorough. There should be something on dreams in the body. I hadn't noticed it was not there. I think the sentence about repertories is so uninformative as to be deletable. All practices consult their trade manuals to make decisions. HkFnsNGA (talk) 09:21, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

A repertory is not a "trade manual", it is a type of reference work specific to homoeopathy. And there really isn't any need to introduce a lot of unneccessary verbiage to the lead simply to object to the word "repertories". Brunton (talk) 10:31, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Brunton, as you know, I agree with your OBJECT to my proposed insertion, because the lede is already too long. I was just trying to provide a comprehensive overview of the practice of homeopathy by further lenghening the lede, after which things could be ommitted from a perspective of considering it as a whole, using your proposal of working the current lede up and down, rather than replacing it as a whole. I agree that repertories different from trade manuals of medicine because of the special attitude toward them as perrenially authoritative, no matter what may be observed, with no interpretation allowed, such as interpreting dreams in psychoanalysis by MD psychiatirsts (which I also think is bunk.)HkFnsNGA (talk) 12:10, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

A "comprehensive overview" belongs in the body of the article, not the lead. The lead should be a brief summary of the main points of the article - which at the moment (IMO) it is. Brunton (talk) 13:59, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I like the word "brief". What I meant was that the beliefs of homeopathy could be fully described with the addition of only four or five additional sentences and clauses. At this point, the lede would be even longer, but it is easier to properly cut down something that is complete than something missing a few parts. Note that "dreams" are pointed to early in the JAMA article linked to below. HkFnsNGA (talk) 18:04, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Homeopathy Article in JAMA Vol 22, March 17, 1894

(Archiving Bot, please don’t archive this section for a while, so editors who come later might know of this RS info.)

“Modern Homeopathy And Medical Science” is an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, March 17, 1894. It does not appear in the citation section, so I am letting editors know about this fine RS which complements the others, and is a lot more readable than other sources of that time period. Here [10]. HkFnsNGA (talk) 18:00, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Is this available anywhere online? Brunton (talk) 14:56, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

My bad. I forgot to put URL, the point of putting this section in her in the first place. (I suspected you and two others in particular might want this URL.) Here [11]. HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:59, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

That doesn't seem to give access to the text. Brunton (talk) 18:35, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It is working for me. Try again. HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:19, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It might be something to do with not being in the same country. Brunton (talk) 22:55, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Brunton, here's a link to the JAMA's website (subscription needed for the full text): [12]. --Six words (talk) 20:30, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

"of the similar substance"

Resolved

The addition of this phrase to the lead was unneccessary, and even inaccurate. It is enough to say that remedies are prepared by serial dilution (and not always of a substance - see for example remedies made from light reflected by Venus etc.), and not from "a similar substance" - the remedy should, according to homoeopaths, produce similar symptoms, not necessariy be similar to the cause of the patient's symptoms. Brunton (talk) 19:08, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. It was my edit you fixed, so I am marking this section resolved. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:32, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Why was "Dreams" material deleted from article body?

I added brief JAMA RS material on dreams to the article body in the philosophy section. It was deleted without explanation in the edit summary. Why was it deleted? HkFnsNGA (talk) 20:44, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Although JAMA is an RS, dreams appear not to have ever been mainstream, even within homeopathy. A reliable source about a WP:FRINGE phenomenon still requires the appropriate weight. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:49, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Dreams are mainstream in homeopathy, are fundamental to Hahnemann. I provided another source from one of many "mainstream" homeopathy websites. Dreams are specifically itemized in the repertories, which is as mainstream as it gets. Dreams are one of the first examples given in the JAMA article, about how homeopathic practice differs from science based medicine. If you read the second source, it explains how they occur in the repertories. When I went to a homeopath as a joke, I was immediately asked about my dreams. When I suggested deleteing it from the lede, User:Six words pointed out that psychological examination includes inquiry into dream content, to justify it being in the lede. I will not undo your revert again and continue to discuss this here. HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:10, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

(Even if it appears in that source, which it doesn't in the google books reference, at least for me.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:00, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Arthur Rubin , you are absolutely right. “Dream” does not come up in a search of that article for me either, so I see why you wrote what you did.

However, if you read the article, dreams do come up in the JAMA article, and in a prominent way. On p. 368, “The homeopathic doctor inquired what remedy was remedy was indicated if the patient dreamed of money” is one of the ONLY examples cited describing the JAMA author’s visit to a homeopathic hospital, as a med student, to consider entering it in instead of continuing in medical school.

As for David Nortman, that his blog entry, so he would have to be an established expert on homeopathy, with articles in peer-reviewed publications, for his opinion to be considered "reliable". — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:04, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, finding RS is difficult in homeopathy, since every site is non-RS. David Norman also published articles that were not blogs, but my sources are in another version of history that was deleted, and I don't know how to search the article history to find it. Maybe you can show me how to search article history. Norman appears as an article writer on many homeopathy sites.

WikiBlame is the only way I've found to search revision histories, and it no longer works for me, usually timing out. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:40, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, it doesn't work for me either. More interesting is that a word search for "dream" doesn't work in the JAMA article, where dreams are discussed up front, but "dream" cannot be found in a search. HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:55, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

My error. I hadn't noticed that was a blog entry, but included it as a source. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:01, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

The best RS is the repertories, where dreams and their associated remedies are itemized. Repertories are not fringe in homeopathy, but all of homeopathy seems fring to me. HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:10, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Published repertories might be appropriate, it being difficult to determine which may be "reliable within Homeopathy". (This does not mean blogs, but "real" publishers considered by homeopaths to reliably review their material.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:40, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I did not suggest mentioning dreams in the lede, nor did I suggest putting it in the article body, I just opposed HkFnsNGA's suggestion to delete the sentence Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending “remedies”. from the lede. When he said that that's what MDs do, too, I used dreams as an example - and he didn't believe me, so I'm quite surprised to hear that he went to a homeopath and was questioned about his dreams, too. Seriously, I don't think this discussion is going anywhere and it is getting annoying. --Six words (talk) 21:37, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I didn't say you did. (silly shoutback) You first said that dreams might be used to prescribe a cough remedy, as an example to justifiy keeping psychological examination in the lede, and I agreed with you. I was citing your talk page comment to me on dreams being an example of homeopathic practice, justifying putting "psychological examination" in the lede, which I found convincing to keep it in the lede. I once visited a "prominent" homeopath as a joke, after my mother died. I was asked about my dreams, but did not think anything about it until your comment indicating that this was conventional for homeopaths. I researched and ended up agreeing with you that this justified putting psychological examination in the lede, since the kind of examination was uniqure to homeopaths. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:01, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

In classic homeopathy there's no such thing as a cough remedy as they don't make or use medical diagnoses but match symptoms - a homeopath would try to find a remedy that supposedly causes coughing and a specific kind of dream. And as I recall, you didn't actually agree with me (simply keeping the sentence in the lede) - you still said psychological examination shouldn't be in the lede but suggested perhaps dreams instead should. --Six words (talk) 23:40, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

You clarified that that cough remedy was a made up example to make a point. I found the point you were making about dreams was very interesting, though uncited. Your point was cited when it was specfied in the old JAMA article, in which dreams about money were used to prescribe a remedy. I changed my mind and agree with you now, and incorporated your comment on dreams (now with JAMA as RS) into my suggestion to simplify the sentence structure in the lede, that I made below. HkFnsNGA (talk) 23:47, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Arthur Rubin, here [13] and here [14] and E Whitmont's "The use of Dreams in Homeopathic Prescribing and Proving" are good RS on dreams, although I think JAMA is clearly the best. I am not a big fan of JAMA in my academic real life. I spent eleven years at Stanford doing Phil of Sci and mathematical statistics and data analysis, and have been a part of an ungodly number of JAMA articles. I find that JAMA authors are, in general, completely illiterate in statistics, having only an undergraduate course under their belt, and not really understanding even that. They would typically go to their local university statistician lightweight for their experimental design, make unjustified parametric assumptions such as of Normality, then come to me with their data analysis problems, such as how to deal with skewness, AFTER the experiment or study was complete, then expect me to work some kind of nonparametric analysis miracle. When they did not like what I had to tell them (because they just blew a ton of grant money) they would then ignore me and “shop statisticians” until they found one who could get them published. That said, I find this particular JAMA article very convincing, especially as the author had a very pro-homeopathy POV initially, and seemed to find the dream to remedy part of the practice of particular notability. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:29, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Proposed additional sentence for first paragraph

Sooner of later, homeopaths will object to the current lede, as omitting material on diet, excercise, dreams, and provings, which they consider to be of utmost importance. This can be fixed with a single short sentence appended to the first lede paragraph, which should forever stablilize talk page discussions about adding content to the lede, and adds only a few more words to the lede.

The content of dreams, diet, exercise, and hygiene are important to homeopaths.

HkFnsNGA (talk) 21:31, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Homeopaths are objecting to the lede and the article all the time, but this is usually not something they object to. And this new proposed sentence just shows that you don't know as much about homepathy as you think you do - please at least read the article before you propose more changes to the lede. --Six words (talk) 21:44, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I don’t think I know much about homeopathy. My background is stistics and phil at UCLA, followed by eleven years at Stanford in phil of sci and math stat and data analysis. The only thing I learned about homeopathy was that it was nothing with water added, which seemed to be the universally accepted definition. However, one of my best friends is a celebrity MD and prominent professor of medicine, but who was initially trained in pharmacy and as a homeopathic doctor, then biochemistry. He stresses that homeopathy is really all about diet exercise, and doing nothing when the pharmacology industry is trying to skew studies to sell you something rather than nothing. He finds that doing nothing except diet and exercise is often better than selling a surgery or selling drugs for a pharmaceutical company. He is the one who objected to this ommission in the lede, and is where my idea for it came from. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:25, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Your background isn't important here, but it is important that you know what you're talking about before you try to change an article. This new proposition again contains a factual error: the keeping records of the progress of treatment isn't called proving. --Six words (talk) 22:43, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

My error. Thanks. I fixed it above. HkFnsNGA (talk) 23:35, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

The sentences of the first lede paragraph are numbered below. Problems with the sentence are listed in parentheses after each sentence.

(1) (definition) - Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners use highly diluted preparations. (Very bad “definition; no one could read this and go away thinking they know the definition of homeopathy)
(2) Homeopathy was first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796. (Not accurate in that all of homeopathy was not proposed then)
(3) It is based on an ipse dixit[4] axiom[5] which he called the law of similars, which states that a substance which causes certain symptoms in healthy individuals can cure patients who already exhibit similar symptoms. (Uses not plain English “ipse dixit axiom, fails to state that other principles are ipse dixit, unnecessarily compound sentence)
(4) Homeopathic “remedies” are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion, after each dilution under the assumption that this increases the effect. (Contains not plain English “serial dilution"; compounds principles of succussion with potentization in same sentence without defining potentization)
(6) Homeopaths call this process potentization. (Unnecessary reference to other sentence, ambiguous as to whether potentization is a combination of succussion with increasing effect with dilution, or just increasing effect with dilution)
(7) Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains. (does not describe two kinds of homeopaths, traditionalists and others; does not describe extreme nature of traditionalists commonly referred to by scientific people)
(8) Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending “remedies”.[7] (unnecessarily duplicates recommending remedies with next sentence)
(9) Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, and a “remedy” is selected based on the totality of symptoms. (unnecessarily duplicates recommending remedies with previous sentence)

This following proposed set of lede sentences slightly modifies the existing lede to fix the problems in parentheses, and improves it as listed in the parentheses after each sentence–

(1) definition - Homeopathy is an alternative medicine which treats an illness with a “remedy” with a substance that causes symptoms similar to that of the illness, believing that the “remedy” becomes more potent each time it is diluted, even when diluted so much that no molecule of the original substance remains. (good definition – has similars belief, potentization belief, and fact of what is really happening)
(2) The principles of homeopathy were stated by German physician Samuel Hahnemann, beginning in 1796, before molecules were proved to exist in chemistry. (accurately describes that the principles of homeopathy only began to be proposed in 1796, explains why super high dilutions were recommended)
(3) The principles were not proved in any way, but were to be accepted on Hahnemann’s reputation and authority. (replaces not plain English “ipse dixit axiom”, states all principles are ipse dixit, not just similars)
(4) The first principle is “the law of similars” which says that if a substance causes a healthy person to exhibit symptoms similar to those of an illness, then the substance can be used as a remedy for the illness. (more simple law of similars definition)
(5) The principle of “potentization” is that a remedy is made more potent each time it is diluted with water or alcohol. (very simple definition of potentization)
(6) Hahnemann believed that at each step of the dilution, the “remedy” must be shaken by forcefully striking it on an elastic body, such as a leather book cover, or it might not work; which he called “succussion”. (isolated definition of succussion)
(7) Hahnemann required dilutions such as down to 1 part in 106, in which case none of the original substance remains, but some modern homeopaths use lower dilutions. (states both traditional and other views)
(8) Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths examine the patient's physical and psychological state, and then books called "repertories" are consulted to recommend "remedies". (one sentence for remaining info)
The proposed lede is slightly existing lede contains about 20% less words than proposal so is shorter, but has the problems listed in parentheses. HkFnsNGA (talk) 02:20, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Psychological examination is in the lede but not RS in the article body

Resolved

Psychological state examination is in the lede but not described in any way or in the article body. It should be deleted as not significant enough to have been put in the article body, and as too vague. HkFnsNGA (talk) 22:51, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it is there in the first paragraph of the "Repertory" section, sourced to an FDA publication. Brunton (talk) 23:05, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

My error, thanks Brunton. HkFnsNGA (talk) 23:30, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I still can't find anything in the article about how the psychological state is examined. Do they just say, hi, how is your state of mind? HkFnsNGA (talk) 00:44, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Something like that, yes. The homoeopathic consultation (at least in the case of "classical" homoeopathy) will generally consist of a chat for about half an hour to an hour, in which the hmoeopath will ask about all sorts of aspects of the patient and their life, not just the particular condition that has led them to consult the homoeopath Brunton (talk) 05:07, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

It might be good to put questioning about dreams in the body, as the JAMA author seemed to think this was important and remembered it from visit to a homeopathic university. He said they discussed what remedy a homeopathic professor was asked to give if one has "dreams about money". The google search does not find "dream" in this article for some reason, but it is in the first paragraph on p 368. HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:30, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

It is probably appropriate in the body of the article, but it might be too specific for the lead. Brunton (talk) 05:44, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree, and agree with placing it under the psychological state examination section. Another editor deleted from its own dream section when I put it in, as "fringe", asking for more sources than JAMA, but he had not yet read the JAMA article, and we are discussing this in the "dream deletion" section on this page. HkFnsNGA (talk) 06:27, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

The Lede is very long, Violates multiple WP:guidelines, Doesn't well define homeopathy in first sentence, Lacks good "Why" explanations that are in article body, Reads like a committee product

The lede was significantly simplified in discussions in sections following this one, and a compromise reached to include science in a second sentence and description of similars practice and belief in the first. I am marking this section as resolved.

Resolved

The Lede is unnecessarily long.HkFnsNGA (talk) 02:20, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Combining

1. the comments of each editor who responded above,
2. WP:Lede on "first sentence" ("If its subject is amenable to definition, then the first sentence should give a concise definition: where possible"),
3. WP:Lede on "first paragraph" (“Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”),
4. WP:Use plain English (don't need "Ipse dixit", "axiom", "placebo effect", "serial dilution", "solution", etc. - "solution" is not even the correct usage, since there is no "solute" for the "cells" and tissues of the crushed plants and the un-dissolvable metals used in homeopathy),
5. WP:MOS ("concise" - all of the content can be covered with 2/3 of the words, and e.g., a practitioner consulting trade books for diagnosis is unremarkable), and
6. WP:MOS (“avoid jargon” - e.g. "repertories").

The existing lede violates all of thes quoted WP:guideline. Here is a lede proposal that corrects these, and specifically deals with each specific reasons to oppose made by each editor who commented on my first two proposals.

“Homeopathy (also spelled homoeopathy^[54] or homœopathy) is a form of alternative medicine, whereby it is claimed that if a substance causes a symptom of the illness, then highly diluting a mixture of the substance creates a remedy for the illness. Homeopathic "remedies" are, with rare exceptions, considered safe^[2] though homeopathy has been criticized for putting patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine such as vaccinations,^[3] anti-malarial drugs,^[4] and antibiotics.^[5] Homeopathy is practiced around the world, with great variations in its regulation and coverage by health care systems. However, homeopathy's effectiveness (beyond that of a sham treatment) is unsupported by the collective weight of modern medical and scientific research, and its principles are inconsistent with established laws of science.
Homeopathy was proposed in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. Hahnemann declared that a substance that creates the symptoms of an illness can be used to treat the illness, which he called “the law of similars”. He declared that the more the substance is diluted, the more effective it becomes, which he called “potentization”. The substance is crushed and mixed into a liquid (water or alchohol) then shaken by forceful striking, and the resulting mixture is repeatedly diluted then shaken by forceful striking. The resulting preparation is called a “remedy”.
Hahnemann’s declarations were made without using the scientific method, and before the molecular theory in chemistry. Under levels of dilution recommended by Hahnemann, no molecule of the original substance would likely remain in the “remedy”. Modern homeopathy claims that no molecule is needed because it claims that water has a “memory”, which is inconsistent with the laws of physics and chemistry. Inefficacy in clinical trials, and inconsistencies with established laws of science, have led to members of the scientific community calling homeopathy a pseudoscience, quackery,^[6]^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10] and a "cruel deception".^[11]”

Here is the existing lead, with 50% more words, and Wp:guidlines, as in items 2 - 6 above,

"Homeopathy (also spelled homoeopathy^[55] or homœopathy) is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners use highly^[13]^[14] diluted preparations. Homeopathy was first proposed by German physician Samuel Hahnemann in 1796, based on an ipse dixit^[15] axiom^[16] formulated by Hahnemann, which he called the law of similars, preparations which cause certain symptoms in healthy individuals are given in diluted form to patients who already exhibit similar symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are prepared by serial dilution with shaking by forceful striking, which homeopaths term succussion, after each dilution under the assumption that this increases the effect. Homeopaths call this process potentization. Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains.^[17] Apart from the symptoms, homeopaths use aspects of the patient's physical and psychological state in recommending remedies.^[18] Homeopathic reference books known as repertories are then consulted, and a remedy is selected based on the totality of symptoms. Homeopathic remedies are, with rare exceptions, considered safe^[2] though homeopathy has been criticized for putting patients at risk due to advice against conventional medicine such as vaccinations,^[3] anti-malarial drugs,^[4] and antibiotics.^[5]
Homeopathy's efficacy beyond the placebo effect is unsupported by the collective weight of scientific and clinical evidence.^[13]^[14]^[19]^[20]^[21] While some individual studies have positive results, systematic reviews of published trials fail to demonstrate efficacy conclusively.^[22]^[23]^[24]^[25]^[26] Furthermore, higher quality trials tend to report results that are less positive,^[24]^[27] and most positive studies have not been replicated or show methodological problems that prevent them from being considered unambiguous evidence of homeopathy's efficacy.^[13]^[20]^[28]^[29] A 2010 inquiry into the evidence base for homeopathy conducted by the United Kingdom's House of Commons Science and Technology Committee concluded that homeopathy is no more effective than placebo.^[14]
Depending on the dilution, homeopathic remedies may not contain any pharmacologically active molecules,^[30] and for such remedies to have pharmacological effect would violate fundamental principles of science.^[21]^[31] Modern homeopaths have proposed that water has a memory that allows homeopathic preparations to work without any of the original substance; however, there are no verified observations nor scientifically plausible physical mechanisms for such a phenomenon.^[31]^[32] The lack of convincing scientific evidence supporting homeopathy's efficacy^[33] and its use of remedies lacking active ingredients have caused homeopathy to be described as pseudoscience, quackery,^[6]^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10] and a "cruel deception".^[11]
The regulation and prevalence of homeopathy is highly variable from country to country. There are no specific legal regulations concerning its use in some countries, while in others, licenses or degrees in conventional medicine from accredited universities are required. In several countries, homeopathy is covered by the national insurance coverage to different extents, while in some it is fully integrated into the national health care system. In many countries, the laws that govern the regulation and testing of conventional drugs do not apply to homeopathic remedies.^[34]"

These specifics laden paragraphs can be moved to be the leads in the corresponding article sections.HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:16, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm a sucker for brevity - so this has my support. Shot info (talk) 09:36, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I really hate to repeat myself over and over again. The reason why there are “corresponding article sections” is that the sentences you propose to move there are their summaries. It's a long article, therefore it has a “long” lede (which is still within guidelines - it's four paragraphs). While your proposal is worded more carefully than the ones before, it still tries to leave out details of the homeopathic practice and focusses on what science has to say about homeopathy. While the scientific part is important, this article is about homeopathy as a whole, so describing remedy selection isn't being “overly specific”. The current lede is carefully worded and referenced, while yours has both style problems (e.g.: “whereby it is claimed”, “which he called” in two consecutive sentences) and contains vague/incorrect wording like “The substance is crushed and mixed into a liquid” - with no reference. It still uses “non-plain” English (dilution, sham treatment), indicating that it's just not possible to go without it. You substituted ipse dixit with “declation” - a word totally unknown to me and probably no more understandable than the former - if it was, you wouldn't need to link to ipse dixit.
btw: the current lede isn't violating any guidelines. --Six words (talk) 09:48, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

"declation" was a typo for "declaration". "Sham treatment" is from the definition of placebo in its Wiki article. I linked it becaue it seemed like an editor wanted a link to a definition of "ipse dixit".69.199.196.246 (talk) 05:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have to Oppose again. The new suggestion is indeed better than previous ones, but it still changes the balance so that the lead focuses on debunking homeopathy rather than presenting a balanced summary of the article. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:57, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

PS: Although the current lead is quite long, I do actually think it has the balance just about right. Any rewriting for clarification must, I think, retain the current balance - which has taken a lot of time and discussion to arrive at. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:00, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and we definitely shouldn't be replacing neutral words like "placebo" with emotive phrases like "sham treatment". -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:03, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

"Sham treatment" is a neutral expression and appears in the definition of "placebo" at the Wiki article. ".69.199.196.246 (talk) 05:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

The lead is supposed to be long because it's a long article, but the lead isn't "too" long. It does its job nicely and I see no need for major changes. -- Brangifer (talk) 20:02, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It is too long if you know an uneducated photograper who could not afford medical care for her 4 year old, googled "homeopathy", and tried to "remedy" things based on what she was able to read at Wiki (she read the first few sentences). Maybe Wiki "guidlines" could be stretched with a three sentence intro added at the outset of this article. All of the editors who have commented appear to share my view that molecules exist, and that there is no "extra force" in physics, but we seem to be debating style, at the expense of what really matters.HkFnsNGA (talk) 06:56, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I still don't buy your argument. The WP:LEAD guideline cannot be overridden. That doesnt' mean that small tweaks can't be made, but the lead is supposed to summarize and mention all significant content. If something is worth creating a section or subsection in the article, it should be mentioned in the lead. No one who first reads the lead and then reads the rest of the article should be surprised by anything they find. The lead should prepare them for what's coming. If you can find a way to say some things in a shorter and better way, go for it, but don't play with it too much or you'll do violence to all the efforts that led to its creation and present state. -- Brangifer (talk) 08:16, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

The lead is the length it is because it has to summarise a long article. The proposed "three sentence intro" would introduce redundancy, and would actually make the lead longer. Brunton (talk) 11:27, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

While I don't wish to denigrate your photographer friend in the slightest, her failure or inability to read beyond three sentences is not the fault of the Wikipedia article. And though the case may be sad, warning people off homeopathy is not the purpose of this article's lead. And I have to say, this really does support the suggestion that you have an agenda/COI here - I don't mean to offend you, but I really think you should just leave this to people who have no such personal issues and can write from a neutral POV. Best regards -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:34, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I think the lede is too long.

There is a lot to summarise, but I think the lede could perhaps do it more concisely - don't be afraid of cutting out some detail as long as it makes the main points clear. For instance, we have a whole paragraph on the regulation & prevalence of homeopathy even though that's already covered in a separate article - why not pare it down to one sentence?

Does the lede even need whole sentence on the House of Commons enquiry? That's just one enquiry out of many, and is already covered under the umbrella of "Homeopathy's efficacy beyond the placebo effect is unsupported by...". Similarly, the "No verified observations..." is merely repeating something that was summarised in the preceding sentence. We've got the word "dilution" or "diluted" six times in the lede - is that really the sharpest summary we can write? bobrayner (talk) 11:49, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd support a shortening that retains a balanced overall summary of the article, but I would not support a shortening that changes the balance and tone into that of an anti-homeopathy warning. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:56, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Well put, Boing. As much as I think homeopathy is bunkum, it would be a serious NPOV violation to edit the lead so it served as a warning. The content in the lead is determined by the content of the article, regardless of what message people might read into the finished product. It must sum up the whole thing. The length argument is rather spurious since we have many articles with leads that are even longer. The length and complexity of this article necessitates a relatively long lead.

Conciseness is a good thing. If anything is to be shortened, it should be done through conciseness, not deletion. -- Brangifer (talk) 16:57, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

[edit conflict] I agree that the sentence about the HoC inquiry report doesn't really belong in the lead, for the reasons Bobrayner gives above, but I think the "no verified observations..." statement, or something like it, is needed in the context of the first part of the same sentence raising "water memory" - it is referring to that and not the subject matter of the preceding sentence. Brunton (talk) 17:02, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Comments from an uninvolved editor, so do what you will with them. Homeopathic remedies just redirects to the main article. It seems to me, "Dilution often continues until none of the original substance remains." and "Depending on the dilution, homeopathic remedies may not contain any pharmacologically active molecules." say similar things and could be combined. The lede does not explain well the basics of what is diluted (many animal, plant, mineral, and synthetic substances?), or how these remedies are used. Is it mainly oral? In my opinion the basic description of homeopathy should be given more weight verses the detailed descriptions of the terminology and criticism of the science. Ward20 (talk) 20:52, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Here is a very short proposed lede:

"Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on three main principles, that a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"), that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"), and that the solute used for the dilution has a "memory". The first two principles were declared in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. The declaration that solutes like water and alcohol have a “memory” was made by 20th century homeopathists, responding to the fact that repeated dilution as recommended by Hahnemann would likely leave no molecules of the original substance. The principles upon which homeopathy is based are not consistent with well established principles of science. Homeopathic remedies are no more effective than a placebo. Its regulation varies widely around the world, but it is generally not considered harmful at high dilution levels.

It preserves the balance of the current lede since each paragraph is concisely replaced with a single sentence or less, without essential content loss. It addresses the bullet points 2-6 at the outset of this talk page section.69.199.196.246 (talk) 07:11, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Nice definition but not a LEAD per our guidelines. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:05, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I was trying to respond to these - WP:Lede "If its subject is amenable to definition, then the first sentence should give a concise definition where possible", and “Opening paragraph: The first paragraph should define the topic without being overly specific.”, also to WP:Use plain English 69.199.196.246 (talk) 06:33, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

That's the right way to start. I used to have a diagram I used to help me create a lead. I boiled each section down into a few sentences. A long and complicated section might require 2-3 sentences, while smaller and simpler ones might be covered in one sentence. A long article would still end up using 3-5 paragraphs, but nothing essential failed to be mentioned very briefly. -- Brangifer (talk) 06:39, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I like the bold compression, that's really good. However, the current lede has a lot of how scientific studies show no basis for homeopathy, and this is revisited repeatedly in the body of the article. If we could expand the "Homeopathic remedies are no more effective" sentence a bit (though not to the extent of the current lede!), I'd be very happy. bobrayner (talk) 10:14, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Attempting some minor tweaks to 69.199.196.246's fine proposal:

"Homeopathy is an alternative medicine based on three main principles: That a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness (called "the law of similars"); that repeated dilution (typically with water or alcohol) of the substance increases its potency (called "potentization"), and that the solute used for the dilution has a "memory". The first two principles were declared in 1796 by German physician Samuel Hahnemann. The declaration that solutes like water and alcohol have a “memory” was made by 20th century homeopaths, responding to the fact that repeated dilution (as recommended by Hahnemann) would likely leave no molecules of the original substance. The principles are not consistent with well-established science, and systematic reviews of clinical trials show that homeopathic remedies are no more effective than placebo. Regulation of homeopathy varies widely around the world, but it is generally not considered harmful at high dilution levels.

Any comments / complaints?

I wanted to wikilink "law of similars", and was surprised to find that we don't have a separate article for it. Hmm.
Also, I think it would be worth keeping a few citations - in most articles, people prefer to keep citations in the body, but it's impossible to write a lede for homeopathy that doesn't contain claims which will be contested by some editors... if we're writing an evidence-based article on an alt-med practice, then references are worth their weight in gold. What do you reckon?
The scientific conflict with homeopathy occurs on two distinct fronts - one is that the principles appear incompatible with mainstream physics, chemistry, &c; the other front involves actual clinical tests of whether or not the remedies are more effective than placebo. We might or might not need much detail of either in the lede, but I think that it's very important to at least mention both of these fronts. bobrayner (talk) 13:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

1. How about Sympathetic magic? That article mentions "the Law of Similarity", and see, for example, Sir James Frazer: The Golden Bough chapter 3. There are also occasional references to magic in the homoeopathic literature, and I notice that the Magical thinking article has a Wikilink from "Homeopathic magic" to the Homeopathy article.

2. The citations are in the lead specifically because virtually every statement in it was challenged. They are all used to support the same statements in the body of the article, as far as I'm aware (if they aren't they should be).

3. I agree that both need to be mentioned, but I also think that the lead should give at least some indication as to why this is so. Brunton (talk) 16:23, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Concise and very well worded by Bobrayner. Bobrayner's "two front" analysis quickly sums up about half of the article with one sentence. Yes, still needs citations added on "two front" findings. I agree with Brunton that a mention of "why" would by helpful (because continued dilution would make any effect impossible, since it eventually leaves no molecules, per established chemistry; and water does not have special powers like a "memory", per established physics), but keep it very brief, and word it better than what I just wrote. Leave word "magic" out (accurate and concise though it is). HkFnsNGA (talk) 17:37, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

As much as I'd personally agree with the point about magic, homeopathy is already controversial; wikilinking to magic could be a little too provocative. Citations should be straightforward - recycle the good ones from the current lede. I'm happy to add more detail on either of the two "fronts" as long as we end up with a lede shorter than the current one, and which satisfies other editor's concerns about tone - anybody want to try writing an extra sentence or two? bobrayner (talk) 18:12, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry to be such a pain, but I still have a few “complaints”:

“a substance which causes symptoms similar to those of an illness can be used to make a “remedy” for the illness” isn't correct as Hahnemann said (ipse dixit, bla bla bla) that some substances need to be potentised to develop “healing powers”.
The memory thing isn't a homeopathic principle, so if we claim that in our lede I fear that loads of homeopaths/their customers will come and try to change that (and insert some other “facts” while they're at it).
Even homeopaths agree that water memory is a theory, so we can't call it a declaration.
The lede should mention how a homeopathic remedy is chosen - the sentence we have right now seems very good to me.

I still like the current lede better, but with some extra lines and refs (if there's one article that needs to have references in the lede it's homeopathy, otherwise there's warring even over the most innocent sentences) we could trim the lede down a bit. --Six words (talk) 21:26, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

The water memory is not a theory, its an idea with no basis on evidence (and is in fact against the evidence since the water structure would only last nanoseconds), a (scientific) theory makes and is consistent with its falsifiable claims. Most homeopaths do propose this as the mechanism too as indicated. IRWolfie- (talk) 00:24, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

You're preaching to the choir here. We can call it a “proposed mechanism” if you dislike theory, but it's not a homeopathic principle, and calling it one wouldn't be correct. --Six words (talk) 13:58, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

I'd hesitate to call it even a "proposed mechanism", since there isn't really anything in the way of mechanism proposed here ("water remembers stuff" is not a mechanism). It's more of an ad hoc rationalisation of the implications of Avogadro's constant. Brunton (talk) 15:17, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Water memory is a widely held homeopathic conjecture first proposed by Jacques Benveniste. -- Brangifer (talk) 21:44, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

But it isn't a mechanism, any more than "aspirin works because it has acetylsalicylic acid in it" is a mechanism. "Conjecture" is probably OK, though. Brunton (talk) 22:36, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

To be honest, I'm completely indifferent on that point. Conjecture, mechanism, flight-of-fancy, whatever you prefer :-)

However, Six Words raised a couple of other points. On the first one, I think "some substances need to be potentised to develop “healing powers”" is already covered by the "can be used to make" wording - but if y'all prefer, we could expand/modify that slightly. Any suggestions for wording?

As for how a remedy is selected, I'm not 100% convinced we need that in a condensed lede but I'd be happy to go with the existing sentence as long as we remove/rephrase the "totality of symptoms" since that sounds rather mealy-mouthed. Homeopaths make decisions based on the symptoms that they are aware of, just as a real doctor might; I don't want to imply that either (a) homeopaths have special powers to see symptoms hidden to other practitioners, or (b) allopaths consistently disregard some significant symptoms. bobrayner (talk) 22:51, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Are we nearly there yet?

Resolved

It appears that we're converging on a lede which would be acceptable to the people who've commented so far. However, it occurs to me that we'll probably never get a lede which everybody is completely happy with, so at some point we'll have to go ahead and replace the lede anyway, whilst accepting that there are a few loose ends which might need to be tied up later. It's all very well having an "almost perfect" proposal sitting here, but in the meantime, article-space readers get something which I think is much more flawed.
Shall we thrash out one last draft, and put it into article-space? If anybody feels that I'm trying to bulldoze opposition on a particular phrase in the new lede, I'll step back away from that phrase. My main priority is to get these improvements to where readers will see them, rather than to "win" on some specific wording. bobrayner (talk) 23:03, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

I think the last suggested lede by bobrayner is fine as it stands. It is easy to read, and as fully informative as it is likely to ever get.

Agree with last suggested lead by bobraynor.HkFnsNGA (talk) 05:19, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I have not followed this discussion because changing the lead of this article has always been extremely contentious and generally induced huge battles between the two main pseudoscience factions. I did not want to even think about what might be the consequences of replacing the lead by a rewritten one that is arguably better and not obviously unbalanced. I guess that a number of other editors stayed out of the discussion for similar reasons.

Is the proposal to replace the entire current lead by the one paragraph above in Brunton's 16:23, 4 January 2011 post? I don't think we are there yet:

It's way too short. Apart from being an introduction and providing a quick orientation, the lead is also supposed to function as a summary of the article, briefly addressing all the major points discussed in the article. The proposed lead is about the same length as the original lead of pigeon photographer, which had to be doubled in size to pass GA. Personally I did not feel that that was strictly necessary for an article about such an obscure topic, but for a topic with the prominence of homeopathy it is necessary that the lead gives sufficient information.
I doubt that it is correct to describe water memory as a third principle of homeopathy, giving it the same prominence as the law of similars and potentisation. Homeopaths are very conservative, and ultimately they believe in Hahnemann's writings. I don't think they would be unhappy if someone could prove homeopathy to be effective, explain this effectivity scientifically, and at the same time disprove water memory. In the corresponding situation where the law of similars or potentisation is the only thing disproved and the rest proved they would not be happy. The claim is also unsourced and not present in the article, as far as I can tell.