Health and Healing: The Philosophy
of Integrative Medicine and Optimum
Health by Andrew T. Weil M.D.
Outstanding
Why do we get sick? How do we get well? How do we avoid getting sick
again? Dr. Andrew Weil attempts to answer these fundamental questions
in Health and Healing, but the real joy of the book isnt in learning the
answers, but in following his mind down the path to an answer. He starts
with homeopathy, a treatment that, to an outsider, seems more like a leap
of faith than an actual system of healing. Weil recounts how homeopathy
cured--completely cured--an annoying intestinal problem he suffered.
Then he discusses the principles and history of this type of treatment,
including the surprising ways in which homeopathy has affected the
course of modern medicine. Finally, he gets to the real question: does
homeopathy work or is it simply a placebo effect? The only reasonable
answer is maybe, but accompanying Weil as he gets to that answer is a
fascinating experience. One of the strongest points made in this book is

that perfect health is simply unattainable. Were all going to feel bad
sometimes. Another is that the body eventually heals most of its injuries,
illnesses, and infections--up to 90 percent of them, by some estimates.
But its the other 10 percent that raise havoc. Weil, trained as a medical
doctor, believes that conventional medicine is great at handling trauma
and sudden, life-threatening conditions like heart attacks, but its less
good at dealing with chronic conditions like arthritis. Health and Healing
examines the strengths and weaknesses of both conventional and
alternative medicine, and offers a roadmap to determine which is best for
what ails you. --Lou Schuler
Personal Review: Health and Healing: The Philosophy of
Integrative Medicine and Optimum Health by Andrew T. Weil
M.D.
This book does include reference, in a rather mislabeled manner, to
naturopathy's central premise, the science-ejected sectarian belief of
vitalism [a 'purposeful life spirit bioagency'], per:
"naturopaths also believe in the vital natural force, the healing power of
nature, the medicatrix vis naturae of Hippocrates [p.138...e.g.] Hahnemann
worked out a precise method of diluting [homeopathic] remedies to
[supposedly] maximize their effectiveness [...he claimed] when properly
diluted, the more effective it will be at simulating the body's vital forces to
react against disease [...Hahnemann wrote] 'homeopathic dynamatizations
are processes [...wherein] the crude substance [...is] excited and enabled
to act spiritually (dynamically) upon the vital forces' [p.018]."
Of course, to label the obviously 'naturopathic homeopathic supernatural'
[see Pizzorno ISBN 0761504338, 1996; p.024 per "life force (or spirit)"]
"natural" -- to conflate the natural and the supernatural -- is quite
nonsensical.
It is also the M.O. of many CAMs.
Weil, coincidentally, wrote a blurb for that back of that Pizzorno book
stating:
"Total Wellness offers a wealth of useful information about the prevention
and treatment of disease by natural methods that support the intrinsic
healing mechanisms of the human body. Patient's and practitioners alike
can benefit from the practical wisdom compiled in these pages."
Hmmm: the supernatural is natural, figmentations are practical...
Caveat emptor [this shouldn't have to be said about medicine].
-r.c.

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